What is SPDIF?

[Gamelan]

S/PDIF - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[boybianchi]

Originally Posted by ilike2music

I've heard people talk about spdif connections a lot, but I always wonder: what exactly is SPDIF? What is it used for? What are some practical applications?

Thanks!

to make a long story short:

There's two types of ways to transmit audio.

1. Analogue (RCA, TRS, XLR etc)
2. Digital (Spdif, ADAT, etc)

So Spdif is one kind of digital audio transmission. You are likely to see it on a decent audio interface or even at the back of high quality CD-players for example.

There's a lot more to it, but this is the basic explanation IMHO.

[NeoHippy]

spdif's datasignal is actually pretty similar to Aes/Ebu...just some databytes are different..

its really usefull if you have digital gear and you dont want to AD/DA the signal again...

the connectors are normal cinch(RCA)...but if you want to use it you should go for a "special" spdif cable...its charactaristic impedance is different to the normal analog RCA cables..

cheers

[Manfrensengensen]

I use it because my Yamaha Motif uses 24bit samples and converts to 16bit at the analog audio out jacks.
Using the SPDIF on the keyboard to the interface SPDIF input gives 24bit to the interface without converting it again and also gives and extra stereo pair on my interface.