Page 1 of co-ax or optical ?

ok, I`ve now got DVD & a JBL system, that comes with a "cheap" co-ax lead, so want to get a better one.

So really which is best, optical or co-ax? in no more them 5 words :p

I`m tending towards co-ax, as both PS2 and SKY+ use optical so don`t really want to put my DVD trough a signal router. (for some reason, my Sony SKY has an optical point, but not active!)

Also which should I go for, 1.5m needed, £20ish to spend

Thanks in advance for your info

Coax has the edge, in most people`s opinions. Try http://www.beyondhifi.net for good quality, well priced leads. Not sure what they do on the coax front, though...

Theory suggests optical should be better (less scope for interference). In practice, co-ax generally comes out better.

Coax every time.

All the best,

Andrew.

Since you refer to "a" co-ax lead and optical connections I assume this is a digital connection. In which case spend the £20 on DVD`s. If the sound is working fine with the cable you are already using it will be no better for £20 wasted on a different one, unless you`ve got a susceptible imagination.

Richer Sounds do a cable loan service, so if you have a store nearby, why not take advantage of it and see if you can spot the difference?

This item was edited on Wednesday, 24th October 2001, 13:14

Re John Howells` post:

Absolutely - it`s a well known fact that digital signals are completely impervious to any form of interference or degredation - and there`s all that lovely error correction "Just In Case".

In fact you could get away with a length of wet string.

Alternatively, you could adopt less of a closed mind approach and accept that at high data rates, it`s possible to get all sorts of odd problems with such old chestnuts as impedance matching, attenuation, reflections etc. Any of which may cause spurious extra or missing bits, resulting in excessive error detection/correction with associated reduction of quality.

As RichardH suggests - audition some.

This item was edited on Wednesday, 24th October 2001, 13:28

You seem to have ignored the bit where I said "If the sound is working fine with the cable you are already using". But if that`s the case and the questioner still wants to waste time and effort, that`s his choice.

And as for "you could adopt less of a closed mind approach and accept that at high data rates .." Oh, I haven`t laughed so much since I can`t remember when at the idea that digital audio is at "high data rates". Thanks for that. The highest you`ll ever get will be a tad below 1.5Mbits/second from full rate DTS. At that rate, which barely qualifies as low, you are quite right in saying that you don`t need something much better than wet string for digital connections. Thanks for pointing that out.

Its a bit like the argument use coax wiring for computer networks (terrible data loss, screwed data blah blah or use fibre optics reliable WORKS!!! ... mmmmm and the winner is fibre optic

Well, if a co-ax network is suffering any measureable data loss or screwed data (other than that inherent in the CSMA/D protocol, which does not count) then somebody has messed up the installation. But at high date rates (>>100Mbits/sec) than fibre wins every time for all but the shortest distances.