OT but which of the PS3 output does one use to play SACD? The manual specifically states hindi pwede yung optical out.
How should I connect my PlayStation3 in order to play SA-CDs? There are two ways but the results are not the same.
The simplest way is to connect the analog AV output to an AV receiver/amplifier. This way you can play the stereo area of SA-CDs.
Note: some SA-CDs are stereo only but the majority of titles contain a stereo and a multichannel recording. These are stored separately on the disc. A handful of titles contain a multi-channel mix only.
The best way to enjoy SA-CDs on PS3 is by connection the console to an AV receiver through HDMI. Not all receivers are suited for this – not even all with HDMI input. See ‘What receiver should I use?’. PS3 outputs high-resolution PCM (24-bit, 176 kHz).
With this way you can enjoy the full benefit of multi-channel music from SA-CD.
Can’t I use the optical digital output?Originally, you could for games, CDs, DVDs and even BDs but you couldn’t for SA-CDs. The optical connection, also known as Tos-link, is a so-called SPDIF (Sony/Philips Digital Interface). It can carry stereo PCM or compressed multichannel audio like Dolby Digital and DTS, but not lossless discrete multichannel audio like DSD, multichannel PCM, Dolby TrueHD or DTS-HD Master Audio.
With system software v 2.00, if you’ve got an AV Receiver without HDMI PS3 can convert multichannel SA-CD to multichannel DTS for you and feed it to the optical digital output. If you disable DTS out it will output PCM stereo, also during multichannel SA-CD playback. The output frequency is 48kHz.
In version 2.01 however, DSD-to-DTS conversion is disabled again. Optical output from SA-CD remains supported but in stereo only.
Can PS3 simultaneously output stereo via analog out and multichannel via digital out?No (unlike PS2, reportedly). You are forced to choose between stereo and multichannel.
Can PS3 output DSD audio?Streaming of the pure DSD signal would be very preferable over conversion to PCM but unfortunately at this moment PS3 does not support that.
Why not?This is a mystery. Standards and regulations permit it. HDMI from versions 1.2 and up can transmit DSD securely with HDCP (High-bandwidth Digital Content Protection). We can only hope that there are no PS3 hardware constraints here and that Sony will issue a firmware upgrade in the future that enables this function. Sony has already released an AV Receiver that accepts DSD input.
For more info go to:
PS3 SACD FAQ
