where to buy optical adaptor

[metalgear 0]

trying to link my portable cd player to dac and require this adaptor, can anyone suggest where to get it ?

 

Thanks in advance.

[pegasus21 0]

I've made one before. You can make it for under 10 dollars. The circuit is below.

 

The picture does not include the optical side in the form of a TOSLINK module. It's easilly implementable through the use of a resistor and bright red led in series. For the resistor, you can try about 100 Ohms. Should be very bright. Then you get a 3.5mm audio socket with an open back to stick the led head at.

 

One last thing, a 74HCU04 for the 7404 is highly recommended.

 

 

Edited October 19, 2006 by pegasus21

[metalgear 0]

wow - the only parts are understand is that is starts as coax and ends as toslink. is there any degradation with this connection over the pure optical/coax one ?

 

anyway I'm actually asking about an optical connection -

- on my dac is the regular optical squarish plug

- on my portable CD player, the portable-out is actuall a perfectly round 3.5mm jack.

[pegasus21 0]

Does your cd player have optical out in the form of the 3.5mm jack? if it has, it would be easier since you just need to find the right connectors.

 

I was assuming you were having a cd player deck with coax spdif.

[1bit 0]

there's a shop at around one of the corner in sim lim square level 1 that sells rather nice toslink cables with interchangeable connectors so you can plug it in 3 variations i.e. mini-mini, square-square, and mini-square.

 

iirc it costs around $20+ and the cables come in pearly white colour.

 

btw, afaik the optical out from most pcdps can only be used if it is powered from external power source (the wall adapter) and not with batteries.

 

[pegasus21 0]

Supposedly the older models can have optical without being plugged in.

[jasonhanjk 0]

It is recommended that the other input that are not in use are to short to ground. You can leave the output open.

[metalgear 0]

Thanks for the replies.

 

I finally found one optical cable from the mac shop in funan that has adaptors on BOTH ends of the cable. my cdp has a 3.5mm optical out, and yes it only works if powered via AC.

 

Do these optical adaptors degrade signal quality like the analog audio ones ?

[pegasus21 0]

The signal is digital in nature. As long as the light intensity doesn't degrade over a certain level, the signal is lossless.

[metalgear 0]

The signal is digital in nature. As long as the light intensity doesn't degrade over a certain level, the signal is lossless.

 

thats what I've been reading so far. so it probably means a reasonably built cable will go a long way.

 

nevertheless, conventional behaviour seems otherwise - there are more coax-digitalcables around than optical ones (new and used). however just judging by what equipment suppliers offer - high end designs come with optical inputs/outputs almost all the time.

 

thanks pegasus21 - you've been a great help

 

[pegasus21 0]

No problem. Just to highlight one point. All coax cables are the same. That is to say, whether they are for networking or digital audio, they are the same cable. Hence more easilly available.