Playback DSD (natively) with a PC

[zdjh22]

If that is the sole aim of the thread then it should be titled how to playback DSD (natively) with a PC.

Thank you.

I don't have a opinion on audio quality of DSD vs PCM. But I do vastly prefer ISOs as my archival storage format, and so ISO playback of SACDs, which naturally involves DSD playback by hook or by crook is important to me.

As to Sony's motivations regarding DSD playback, who knows? They developed/chose DSD as their archival format for preservation of Columbia master tapes (according to the lore) but in all of the madness resulting in DMCA/HDCP etc. it was natural to lock down the digital form. Once the horse was out of the PS3 barn (an inspiring bit of reverse engineering, enabled by Sony weirdly deciding to promote SACD in that game console) it would have been understandable to open PC to AVR bitstream transfers. I'm sure there were lots of other economic stakeholders who preferred the status quo, and almost two decades later there we remain. It will be interesting to see what lives longer, the few hacked devices that can rip SACDs, or the production and availability of SACDs themselves.

 

[mandrix]

Thank you.

I don't have a opinion on audio quality of DSD vs PCM. But I do vastly prefer ISOs as my archival storage format, and so ISO playback of SACDs, which naturally involves DSD playback by hook or by crook is important to me.

As to Sony's motivations regarding DSD playback, who knows? They developed/chose DSD as their archival format for preservation of Columbia master tapes (according to the lore) but in all of the madness resulting in DMCA/HDCP etc. it was natural to lock down the digital form. Once the horse was out of the PS3 barn (an inspiring bit of reverse engineering, enabled by Sony weirdly deciding to promote SACD in that game console) it would have been understandable to open PC to AVR bitstream transfers. I'm sure there were lots of other economic stakeholders who preferred the status quo, and almost two decades later there we remain. It will be interesting to see what lives longer, the few hacked devices that can rip SACDs, or the production and availability of SACDs themselves.

I'm right there with you in .iso for archival format, but also for playback. I find all the ripping stuff tiresome. I know others like to rip/convert to the smallest size and I'm good with that, just seldom do it.

 

[marktherob2005]

I am able to play Blu-Ray ISO thru HDMI from PC to AVR (Onkyo TX-NR616) using PowerDVD22. Wondering if you could play SACD ISO thru foobar (it would likely convert it to PCM) I will try and post back here.

 

[zdjh22]

I am able to play Blu-Ray ISO thru HDMI from PC to AVR (Onkyo TX-NR616) using PowerDVD22. Wondering if you could play SACD ISO thru foobar (it would likely convert it to PCM) I will try and post back here.

Yes, foobar can definitely mount SACD-flavor ISO’s with the correct plug-in, and can play them back with realtime conversion to PCM. On a ISO with both, both the stereo and MCH versions are listed.

For platforms that don’t run foobar, or are relatively underpowered CPU-wise (say a Raspberry Pi 3) realtime conversion might not work for DST-compressed MCH streams. Unfortunately an AVR that otherwise is happy with DSD input via HDMI from an SACD or universal disk player won’t be able to receive DSD over HDMI from a PC or single board computer because the computer HDMI drivers can’t support that.