I have a 950 and I want to play sound on the multi-zone from a digital source on "Video 2 / Optical 2". I know a digital source is not directly supported, so I hooked "tape out" to "aux1" and set multizone source to "aux1".

I know this means I could only listen to the digital source if that source was set as the active source in the main zone. Even so, I listened to the digital source in the main zone, but in the multi-zone no sound would play.

Shouldn't this work?

Tuner or other analog sources work fine in the multi-zone.

For kicks, I also tried hooking Aux1 input to the 2 extra channels on the output ("surr back" since I have a 5.1 setup I don't need all 7.1 channels). This worked but it is controlled by the main volume source which dampens the sound too much.

The problem is I want to be able to listen to MP3 but the MP3 source is a rather long run and passes by noisy RF sources so I don't want to use an analog line level cable.

Any ideas would be greatly appreciated.

As I recall, both the second zone and the record outputs are analog only - digital inputs are not supported by either.

In case this helps anyone else, I found the GEFEN DIGITAL AUDIO TO ANOLOG AUDIO CONVERTER, which is $68 at Buy.com. This way you can pipe the digital out (or split the input) to Aux and play a digital source in the second zone.

I don't know what the quality of the DAC will be, but given my second zone is for ceiling speakers, I am hoping it will be sufficient.

That sounds like it ought to work pretty well, actually. Interesting find.