Meridian Unplugged - Powered by MrTechGuy.co.uk Forums Discussion Meridian - Systems 3x S/PDIF modded HD-DVD player in the works...

So the 3 by SPDIF Outputs from the Toshiba / Oppo must correspond to the same Channel designations as the Meridian Pro expects???? i.e.

SPDIF Output 1 goes to D1 or D4 on the IE42 Board and equals Channels Front Left and Right of the Multichannel Mix??

SPDIF Output 2 goes to D2 or D5 on the IE42 Board and equals Channels Rear Left and Right of the Multichannel Mix??

SPDIF Output 3 goes to D3 or D6 on the IE42 Board and equals Channels Centre and Sub of the Multichannel Mix??

And then you configure the Source on the 861/G68 to Expect a "Multichannel" Type Input??

Is this correct??

Is this also how the DVDUpGrades Mod is configured??

Yes, in MConfig, you connect your source to your processor with a m/channel digital connection. Obviously the source left/right/centre/sub/surrounds must correspond to what the processor expects, but not having read about any issues with this, I assume that this isn't normally a problem.

"So the 3 by SPDIF Outputs from the Toshiba / Oppo must correspond to the same Channel designations as the Meridian Pro expects????"

Yes, the output channels need to map onto what the Meridian is looking for. One of the issues with the Oppo 970 was that the channels are backwards, left would come out right and vice versa, center would come out the sub and vice versa and surround left would come out surround right and vice versa. This is why the 3x transceiver board has the facility to invert the channels to correct for this sort of thing if needed to map the channels properly with the Meridian.

Shawn

Shawn. Presumably it is standard practice to pair L/R front, C/Sub, L/R surround, and L/R side? And that centre is on the "left"?

"Presumably it is standard practice to pair L/R front, C/Sub, L/R surround, and L/R side?"

I would think those pairings are pretty standard, nothing I have seen has differed from that.

"And that centre is on the "left"?"

That may or may not be the case internally. When you are feeding an analog DAC it really doesn't matter which way you input the data (L>L, R>R or L>R, R>L) so long as you take the proper analog output to the correct channel.

When this matters is when you tie into the serial data feeding the DAC and spit that out over SPDIF. SPDIF has a very defined left channel and right channel so if the channels are inverted in the serial data they would be over SPDIF too. The 970 has all the channels swapped side to side in the way it feeds its 6 channel DAC, so with a straight serial data->SPDIF your channels are swapped side to side from where they should be. LFE ends up on "Left" and Center on "Right." This is why the 3x SPDIF transceiver board has the ability to invert the channels side to side for each of the SPDIF outputs individually so you can swap it to get center on 'left' and LFE on 'right' as needed by the Meridian. It may be that the 970 ends up being the only unit I run into that has the channels inverted like this internally but if there are others the board can deal with them too.

Shawn

Ah, I think you have answered my next question. So if the L/R front and L/R rear pairings were ok, but the C/Sub pair was inverted, the board would cope?

"So if the L/R front and L/R rear pairings were ok, but the C/Sub pair was inverted, the board would cope?"

Yes, each SPDIF output has the ability to invert its 2 channels side to side independent of the other SPDIF outputs. So in your example above you would simply move one jumper on the board to invert the serial data for the C/Sub output and everything would be proper.

Shawn

"You want fries with that?" Nice job!

On a Redbook CD or a "standard" DVD how would the sound quality compare to an 800? The picture quality?

To answer your guys' questions, the pairings are SMPTE standard, ie L/R, C/Sub, Surround L/R.

BTW, what's the difference between the Oppo 980H and 981HD - and would the Transciever Board fit and work in both?

The board should work in both, but there are a number of differences:

http://www.oppodigital.com/dv980h/dv980h_comp.asp

If you have an external video processor or don't care about progressive video quality, you want the 980.