Why am I not able to go from the DA-48AV's optical output into my 990? I assume the DV-48AV can push a PCM bitstream through this output just as it can through the audio portion of its HDMI output. Also, I have successfully routed the 5.1 audio from my Mac Mini optical output into the 990 for movie-viewing, so I know "it works".
As I said, for DVD and CD you
can use the optical output. The problems arise when you move to DVD-Audio and SACD. DVD-Audio uses multichannel PCM, which requires too much bandwidth for a coaxial or optical cable. The best you can do with an optical connection on DVD-Audio is downmixed PCM stereo. SACD is even more prohibitive. The raw data is in DSD format, which HDMI can carry, but many players convert DSD to PCM internally. Either way, the multichannel DSD or PCM bitstream is too big for optical or coaxial. On top of that, though, SACD includes copy protection restrictions that basically "turn off" the optical and coaxial outputs. That leaves you with either HDMI or analog output as the only viable options.
Your Mac Mini outputs either PCM stereo (just like CD's) or a lossy bitstream such as Dolby Digital or DTS (just like DVD's). It is equivalent to a standard DVD player, not a DVD-A or SACD player.
The 48AV isn't made anymore, and therefore shows up on eBay for $50 to $100. It's a great low-risk way of checking out SACD and DVD-A audio without spending a ton of cash. That's my plan, at least.
Sounds like a good plan.
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