Digital Audio Cables – Why You Need Them

Practically all of the sound recorded today is recorded digitally, which means it is encoded into I’s and 0’s.

The record player and cassette player have been replaced by such technologies as the MP3, CD, and DVD players, which have a computer chip in them that processes the encoded sound signal and reproduces the recorded sound. To carry and deliver flawless digital audio between two digital components, you need digital audio cables.

Digital audio, because it is encoded, must be decoded to be played. Regular audio cables decode signals and transmit them only as analog signals, so the digital feature of the sound is lost. When you have the most advanced components, you must connect them to each other with a cable that transmits using the same technology.

Digital audio quality stems from the professional Digital Audio Tapes (DAT), which were used in the 20th century for high quality recordings and for the transmission of these recordings. The modern version of this transmission protocol uses recently developed hardware, such as fiber optic cables. Be aware that digital cables and jacks may look just like the familiar RCA cable and jacks, but inside they are not.

Digital audio cables come in two types: optical digital cables and coaxial digital cables. As their name suggests, the first has an optical fiber inside the cable and the second is very similar to the now familiar TV coaxial cable, with a thick copper wire running through the center of the cable. Coaxial cables are significantly more affordable than optical cables, but the quality of the coaxial cables is very impressive. Where electric impulses transmit the data in a Coaxial cable, pulses of light transmit the signal in a fiber optic cable. Both of these types of cables can be installed incorrectly, and can easily be damaged, so great care must be taken, and consideration must be given to the length of the cable and its trajectory. The further you must travel with the cable and the more exposed it is, the higher the risk of a faulty transmission or breakage.

The standard for the process of transmitting digital audio is called S/PDIF, which stands for Sony/Philips Digital Interconnect Format, so it is clear who jointly developed it. Now that we know that if you decode digital audio to analog, you lose quality of sound. To avoid degrading the sound, S/PDIF digital audio cables transmits the code without first decoding it. The receiving digital component can then decode and reproduce the same high quality, crisp, digital sound.

Digital audio cables are used most commonly with CD players and with DVD players, which are used to play CD’s. Recent high-end car audio systems also come with installed digital audio cabling.

Find out first what your equipment supports by reading the instructions carefully. If your aim is to enhance your audio experience, you may wish to hear the contrast between the digital sound quality and the analog sound quality, particularly where it is very notorious, for example in a surround sound home theater.