Meridian Unplugged - Powered by MrTechGuy.co.uk Forums Discussion Meridian - Systems CLUX-11SA HDMI to analogue converter

Jaco,

Does your PS3 handle SACD? If so you might want to try feeding it that. I think the PS3 feeds at 88.2kHz or 176.4kHz. Support for 88.2kHz would be very good since that is what the Oppo uses for DSD->PCM as well.

Shawn

"I see some business coming Mr Fogg's way... "

Maybe. Depends upon how well this thing works for those that don't have the Radiance. The Radiance likely is *far* better with regards to audio EDID then this thing.

Also since it needs an active sink to work (and not a DVI one since it doesn't seem to be able to modify a DVI EDID to HDMI EDID with Audio) that won't work well for those that want to use it for SACD/DVD-A. Radiance helps there since you can feed the boxes output to any input on the Radiance to have it act as a sink.

Shawn

Shawn, i fear not i have the 40 GB modell..

For those that were curious about this I received one of these boxes last week and had a little time to work with it tonight on the bench.

The chips are absolutely DAC chips. The three signal traces I mentioned earlier are the three clocks and the separate traces that go to one DAC each looks to be serial data. The pinout of the DACs is:

Pin 1 = Serial Data
Pin 2 = Bit Clock
Pin 3 = L/R Clock
Pin 4 = Master Clock

The master clock runs at 256xFs for both 48kHz and 96kHz playback and the DACs do receive data at 96kHz when playing a 6 channel LPCM track at 96kHz into the box over HDMI.

Going along with this I also received the 4x SPDIF output card PCBs. I am going to test that in the CLUX box to see if I can kill two birds with one stone.

I *might* be able to fit this card inside the CLUX chassis. If I can I think I will wire it to the existing outputs within the box as I don't think I can fit RCAs in it.

Shawn

Hey Shawn,

Well that is certainly great news! I wonder if a good powered HDMI switch/repeater like the HDMax 421 or the Radiient unit I use would work as "the active sink" (whatever that is???) in place of a pricey scaler?

Happy Trails!
Vince@Freewheelcycle.com

PS: I'll get my buggy modded HD-XA2 back to you very shortly.

I *think* that the 421 is a pure switch that does not perform any HDMI negotiation (this is why it supports HDMI v1.3 even though it came out before v1.3 silicon was available). In other words, it can't act as a sink.

That will be your best solution and there are plenty of options to go from the 3.5mm output to an RCA already on the market.

Cheers,

Will that still be a proper 75 Ohms connection ?

Yes, they are available. This came up at the top of Google for me:

3.5mm to Video cable.

Video and digital audio cables are both 75-ohm.

Cheers,

Hmm that cinch plug seems far from 75 Ohms

Too funny! You'll beat Meridian to releasing a box for legacy equipment.

It's Alive!

And all done within the CLUX chassis.

The install is a little tricky as you have to cut a few traces feeding the outputs to be able to use the existing outputs for the SPDIF outputs. You also need to drill a hole through the PCB itself to be able to connect the SPDIF outputs to the existing output jacks.

DACs are fed in 24bit left justified format. The data fed to the C/Sub DAC needs its channels inverted as they have the LFE on the left channel and Center on the Right channel which is opposite of what the Meridian expects. A jumper on the board will invert the channels to that SPDIF output.

For testing I am using the second output of the Radiance to the input of the CLUX box then from the output of the CLUX back into an input on the Radiance.

Shawn