Digital out

Does RCA coaxial or toslink sound better?
Or does it depend on system design (jitter specifications).
There's a web site where a person metions RCA coaxial is better.
Troll elimination? don't be teflos (that's Greek for blind)
SteveG don't be a trollop. he he Troll operator that is.

Does RCA coaxial or toslink sound better?

No.

Or does it depend on system design (jitter specifications).

No.

There's a web site where a person metions RCA coaxial is better.

So what? There are websites where they tell you that CDs edged with green marker pens sound 'better' too. And anyway, here's one that says the complete opposite about toslink... and I don't believe either of them, because there is essentially no difference between the signals - we have boxes that easily, and with no processing, convert between toslink and coax at will.

Troll elimination? don't be teflon (that's Greek for blind)

Not in any dictionary I've ever seen, and I tried a lot.

SteveG don't be a trollop. he he Troll operator that is.

Wouldn't have to be if there weren't trolls around... but hey, I didn't write that bit. You'd have to take that up with RadioKenny.

There is a bit more useful information about the S/PDIF system and transmission that you haven't gleaned, though, which is performance-related when it comes to the difference between coaxial and light transmission. And that is that according to Toshiba, you can reliably send signals further through a coax link than their optical one - but that's primarily because this is a LED-driven system rather than a Laser-driven one. There is nothing to stop you using repeaters if you want - which is what an optical switcher sometimes does.

I suppose that if you wanted to be really picky about it, you'd have to say that the coax was potentially worse - but only because there are far more things to go wrong. But jitter doesn't enter into this at all - as a basic understanding of what's being transmitted, and a little distributed parameter transmission theory would reveal.

That's a great question [and answer] about toslink vs RCA.  
There are some persistant myths in audio, and there are lots of digital myths about digital transfers, including one that declares that a .wav file sounds different depending on the medium it is stored on.      

But we should never hesitate to ask any honest question, no matter how basic or how controversial, for fear of being ridiculed and labelled a 'troll' or some other descriminating clasification...  ask away.
 

Like how could the medium possibly affect the sound of a .wav file, since the data always goes into ram before being sent to the D/As anyway.  

don't be teflon (that's Greek for blind)

Look here

Scroll down to "tuphlôsis" - sort of sounds close to "teflon".

Well I have bought another sony dvd player with optical and coaxial out.
Sony dvp-ns730P. I have also bought tannoy mx-2 speakers.
I prefer the sound of the coax.
I have finally realized that digital connection between my player and receiver does sound better than rca analog connection.
Now my system can reveal more detail.
The only thing I regret is getting the panasonic receiver.
I should I've bought a denon or yamaha receiver.
My receiver doesn't seem so powerful anymore with these tannoy's.

I prefer the sound of the coax.

That is entirely your prerogative, but I doubt very much that it is the interconnect that is responsible for this. Since I'm not aware, and I'm sure you're not either, of how the different inputs are processed in your reciever, or how the outputs are arrived at in the player, you cannot attribute any sonic differences to any one component with any degree of reliability at all. This is a classic audiophile fallacy - ascribing a minute difference to the first thing they think of without considering the whole picture. I just think that it's rather perverse that you're attributing this to the one thing in the chain that's most unlikely to be responsible for it!

"I prefer the sound of coax"

Don't get me wrong, I'm just saying coax sounds better on my system.
Nothing more nothing less.

using toslink certainly has more audible jitter distortion on my system and I'm definetely not saying it's caused by the link it self.

just redraped the power cord from the left to right side of this computer.  and if definitely started to act up . . . got automatic disconnects from the Internet.  redraped power cord to original location and all the problems went away (including screen jitter!)

from now on I am always going to drape all power cords to the left side

one of the hardest things for any maintenance service bureau to explain to clients is that in systems the thing that breaks is seldom the 'thing' that went wrong (god, that's a positively linearly illogical thought?)  it does tend to be the weak link and in well designed mechanical systems tends to be the least expensive component in the chain.  Digital, software, systems are not mature enough yet that this concept is built into their design so . . . weaknesses are a bit more chaotic and superstition is a bit more gausian in distribution than among auto mechanics say.

Digital, software, systems are not mature enough yet that this concept is built into their design so . . . weaknesses are a bit more chaotic and superstition is a bit more gausian in distribution than among auto mechanics say.

That may have been true in the past for auto mechanics, but over the last few years, many of them have had to rethink their approach to this - all because of the introduction of digital engine management units (ECUs) - devices that they inherently don't understand, and that can cause mechanical malfunctions when they misbehave. I have a friend who's a vehicle electrician, and he's spent ages coming to terms with what these things can do - I just think that it's all rather amusing, watching a load of people who should know better blaming the ECU for everything (they cost a fortune) when rather more than half the time it's the sensors... and main agents screwing a fortune out of people for their own, almost criminal, misdiagnosis of faults because of this. They keep saying 'well, that's what the tester said' without for one moment wondering why... I think that partly it's because in the past, whatever has failed has essentially been visible - and with digital systems, it's more often not.

It's very similar with digital audio and audiophiles, only sometimes it's more subtle. They will change cables, and nothing else, and it sounds 'different'. Just the fact that the new cable has a different characteristic impedance, and capacitance, can make a difference to the way the terminations work - but this doesn't make the cable that sounds 'best' necessarily a better cable, just perhaps a more appropriate one. And this is my fundamental objection to most of their rambling - they keep making subjective judgements without taking any account of the objective differences that their modifications cause. And the worst of it is that many of the self-proclaiming ones actually scorn any degree of objectivity completely. I'm not for one moment suggesting that everybody who desires to achieve the best sound they can is guilty of this - it's that particular subsection that really gets me annoyed - the ones who only peddle 'magic' cures. Yes, the green felt pen brigade...

Well, it can make a difference between optical and coax. But in that case it would not be due to the cable, but to the design of the clocking of the DA. If they just use the recovered clock without any retiming to a more stable clock, there can be a difference between the jitter transfered between an optical and a coax. (same goes for the apparent different sound between sources of .wav files)

Note the use of a lot of "can", any good design would not let this happen.

Another point would be how audible a couple of ns of jitter is....compared to 0.5% distortion in a typical audiophile loudspeaker. This is something that really bothers me with the so-called audiophiles. They talk endlesly about the difference between 2 cables that may make a difference of 0.0001% to the end result. And then comfortably forget about dynamic speakers distorting 0.5% (and then you have good ones) and that everything acoustical is ultimately dependent on the speed of sound. And the speed of sound is not as stable as the speed of light, believe me. A couple % of change between any 2 days is nothing special.

Didn't we have this discussion before? Anyway, it makes the money roll.

Well, it can make a difference between optical and coax. But in that case it would not be due to the cable, but to the design of the clocking of the DA. If they just use the recovered clock without any retiming to a more stable clock, there can be a difference between the jitter transfered between an optical and a coax. (same goes for the apparent different sound between sources of .wav files)

Note the use of a lot of "can", any good design would not let this happen.

In the vast majority of cases, certainly the output is identical... the logic feed to the coax line is identical to the logic feed to the toslink sender - the LED. So there is no transmitted difference. But a lot of devices (like Sony Minidisc recorders) arange for the different inputs to be switched, and handled separately, so all bets are off there. But I've never been able to measure any difference with the Sony... When the toslink fibre link fails after a suitable distance (which it will do rather sooner than the coax), the link just stops dead - there is no effectively no signal to recover. It is in the nature of the schmitt stage in the reciever to either work or not work, and the jitter doesn't get worse at the transition point - it's a schmitt! So if there is going to be any difference at all, it's likely to be at the receiving end. And as you say, a good design would eliminate any differences at this point.

Oh, and I agree entirely about the distortion. Quite frankly, I find it rather hard to believe that anybody could really spot any of these differences with a true ABX test.

So it certainly seems to me that the panasonic has more jitter with its re-synchronising clock with the optical input, which is then feed into a ram buffer then sent to the DA. Surely its not the DA clock. But then again panasonic is not famous for low jitter DA's in there budget line.

Great point about the magnitude of the jitter in the jitter question.  At worst the jitter spans a tiny fraction of a degree of phase at the highest, most critcal frequency.

It can be 'dialed up' in an oscilloscope to monsterous looking levels, and it's ugly looking stuff, but you're never going to hear it.  

Any person with sensible hearing can hear a difference between a player with 2000ps and a player with 400ps jitter.
I know I can and I know you can  

don't be teflon (that's Greek for blind)

Look here

Scroll down to "tuphlôsis" - sort of sounds close to "teflon".

My error. Its teflos. I must be blind.