Problems with Toslink Optical Switcher

[Frustrated]

I have a problem with a passive optical switcher. Would love to hear if anyone has an idea how to correct it.

Im using a Rotel 966 with 2 toslink connectors, unfortunately I have 3 toslink devices (X-box, G5 Apple and Digital TV.) These devices only have Toslink, no coaxial option.

My problem is only the X-box will work, using the optical switcher. The switcher is connected to the Rotel with 1 meter Toslink cable. The digital decoder had another 1 meter cable.

I checked and switched all the cables. None of the cables are defective.


The G5 works with a long run (ca. 10 meter) straight into the Rotel, but as soon as i run it through the optical switcher.....no sound. I thought well maybe the run is too long. I hooked up my digital tv decoder to the optical switcher with 1 meter of cable. Same thing silence!

The receiver recognizes a digital signal is there, but there is no sound, no clicking, etc.... nothing.

I contacted the manufacturer of the Humax digital TV decoder, and they said their official response was......"The decoder software does not support an optical switcher."

I wont waste my time calling Apple.

I have tried all of the ports on the optical switcher and they all work with the X-box., but none work with the digital tv decoder or my G5.

Any ideas? Anyone experience this problem? I'm going to try putting an amplifier in the signal path, but theoretically I shouldnt need one.


PS. I liked the serious discussion on speaker cables. I've worked for 20 years in post-production. You can't make an original recording better than it is, you can only try to reproduce it as accurately as it was recorded. To acheive this you dont need exotic cables. If you like a pretty cable, thats cool, but I hide mine.

 

[Frustrated]

No Ideas????

Not one idea, after all this time? Come on somebody must have an idea.

Any one using a passive toslink switcher with or with out a Rotel 966?

 

[markw]

The first thing I would try ...

...is to see if each source works when plugged directly into the receiver. If that's the case. the problem would be isolated to the switchbox.

If they work when plugged directly into the TV but they don't work through the switchbox, I'd be on the horn with the manufacturer of that switchbox.

...maybe there's some fine print or stated limitations in the instructions or warranty of said switchbox?

just a thought... I have heard that with toslink one of the biggest problems is with the connectors on the ends and their male connector fitting correctly and snugly into the female jacks. Being light driven, they need to be durn near perfectly aligned and in this case, you're multiplying the possibility of problems at least two fold for each device.

Ever consider those optical/coaxial converters?

 

[Frustrated]

Cool Finally a reply

Yes all of the devices work when plugged directly into the Rotel.

I thought too that maybe it was the switcher, BUT if the Xbox works on all 3 channels with any combination of cables....THEN the other devices should work too. Shouldnt it?

The optical to coaxial conversion isnt an option, because I need the coaxials for other devices.

What really confused me is the statement from Humax stating a software incompatibility.....HOW can that be? It's just an LED flashing on and off.

The switcher has no real information, with it.....The only limitiation came from Humax the Digital TV Decoder supplied by my cable company. As I said about ... not software compatible...sounds like BS to me.

I tried writing Apple and I have a thread at Apple discussions, but even if there is a known issue Apple will probably not admit it. Unless you are lucky and get a real enthusiast at apple support, their reps rely solely on their knowledge bases.

Sent an email to Microsoft asking why their product works...lol....and Rotel. Who knows. Who can help?

 

[Takeereasy]

I've got a suggestion, I'm sure you've thought of this it's just that sometimes it's the simple things so don't laugh but..... You are running 3 opticals into the switcher and one out to the input on the receiver right? Have you assigned all the devices to get audio from that optical input? I'm having a hard time expressing what I mean but here's an example. When I forst got my new receiver it came with a factory default that had my dvd player assigned to optical input 1, I needed it to be on Digital Coax input one in order to get sound out of it. If you are running three sources off of one input you need to make sure they are all defaulting to that one input to get sound.

Like I said I know you've already done it, but just in case. Good luck with your problem.

 

[Frustrated]

Assigning inputs

Yes all outputs and inputs are assigned correctly. Not laughing.....You never know.

 

[markw]

About the only thing I can think of...

...is that perhaps the strength of the "light signal" is insufficient to make it through the two additional junctions the switchbox imposes, not to mention the switch itself, without significant loss. Afrer all, it's only supplied by a lil' LCD.

Again, the toslink path is a much more fragile path than coax.

 

[Frustrated]

I think you mean LED

I think you mean LED, the distance should be ok....I have much longer distances, without having a problem. Again the Microsoft X-box works.....and the optical output for the Xbox is a cheap made in China adapter.

But....just to see.....I put a digital amplifier in the line. Didn't help a bit.

The total distance is less than 2.5 meters and shouldnt be a problem.

I have distances up to 10 meters without showing drop outs.

 

[MDS]

Please clarify a few things for me.

You have a 3-in, 2-out optical switcher or 3-in, 1-out?

The xbox works when connected to any of the inputs of the switcher, but was that with the xbox alone or with the xbox connected to one input and one or both of the others also connected?

Do either the humax or g5 work when they are the one and only device connected to the switcher?

If you are certain the inputs on the receiver are assigned appropriately, I think the issue could be that when multiple devices are connected to the inputs of the switcher, at least one of them is 'always on'; like the humax decoder. Being a passive switcher, it doesn't process the signal in any way and that would be combining two different digital signals, rendering the signal that the receiver sees unrecognizable.

A note about 'software compatibility': While I'm sure this was just a knee-jerk reaction from the customer service reps because they either don't know or didn't bother to help get to the real source of the problem, there could be a kernel of truth to it. Toslink supports a max of 48 kHz sampling rate, so the only software incompatibility would be if the signal were processed in some way to change the sampling rate to one that is unsupported. If the humax works fine connected directly to the receiver or when it is the only device connected to the switcher, then you can rule that out.

It is possible that the emitter in the switcher is weak, but if it is truly passive, it won't touch the signal at all leading me to believe the issue is multiple devices transmitting at the same time and thus modifying the signal so that the receiver can't recognize it as a valid bitstream.

 

[Frustrated]

Good Question

Ok..... the Passive Switcher is a 3 in 1 out...or 1 in 3 out... It can be used either way since it is just an optical path way. The channel selection is done by "twisting" a selctor till it locks in place.

The Rotel has 2 toslink optical inputs.

I just tried hooking the Humax by itself and same thing.....low pops and noise.

The other devices arent "in line" at the same time. It is sort of like one of those roundtables used to switch a locomotive from one train line to another. Only 1 line can be hooked at a time.

I thought maybe it was loosing too much energy...although I find that really, really hard to believe.......so like I said I put in an amplifiere in line. Made the problem worse.

The switcher doesnt do anything....it is just a pathway....like a toslink cable.

I saw Oelbach has an acitve switcher for around 140 Euro. I was thinking of trying that, but I would rather this works. Im a cheapskate....sorry cant help it.

 

[Frustrated]

sorry forgot the xbox

Yeah the xbox works no matter what is hooked up, not hooked up, running or not running.

 

[Frustrated]

Rotel answers me

Rotel seems to think the problem could be my passive switcher might reduce the slew rate. The engineer wanted some more info.

The idea seems to make sense, except that damn x-box works.

 

[Frustrated]

Answer to my prayers - Problem solved by Rotel techy

The answer came from Rotel:

I replaced the Passive Switcher with an active Zehnder OM-1 Switcher. Problem solved for all of my digital devices, except the X-Box.....lol. Well the X-box enjoys a seperate Digital input all by itself. All of the other optical devices are running on the Zehnder. The Zehnder cost around 90 Euro, it has 4 inputs and 2 outputs and can automatically switch.