A/V Cable Extension was e: Bunch-o-Questions

[zedrein]

Here's another barb for ya: What's a man to do when he wants to use his video game AV cables' stereo jacks on an AV receiver, but doesn't want to use quality-inhibiting extenders? I have a tremendous Monster brand Gamecube S-video cable that I use for my SNES and N64 consoles, the only problem is that where the audio and video breakout comes together, there is no additional length for the stereo RCA jacks to get to muh receiver! Is there a way to remedy this without losing quality?! And yes, I do realize that Monster brand products tend to be overpriced, but if you can't see/hear the difference in quality, you are out of your ass!!

[kendrick]

I think the consensus these days is that you should convert to digital or to optical if you want the least loss or distortion. While the popular mod is to pull that signal straight off the audio chip on the console, it's also not unusual just to run the audio signal into a convertor box and then run an optical line to your receiver.

Just a friendly reminder, you should start a new topic if you have a new question or an unrelated subject to address.

[zedrein]

That's what I was anticipating you to say. But by God, I am such a weirdo that I would never want to add components and such that weren't on the console before. It's not that I think I will ruin the machine, it's just that I don't like modding consoles in any way.

[kendrick]

So don't mod the console, just run the signal into a convertor box. One of these items is pretty typical, as is the quoted price:

http://www.hdtvsupply.com/analog-audio-to-digital-audio-converter.html

[zedrein]

So don't mod the console, just run the signal into a convertor box. One of these items is pretty typical, as is the quoted price:

http://www.hdtvsupply.com/analog-audio-to-digital-audio-converter.html

Oh my God, I didn't think such a thing existed! Thanks for the linky. Thank goodness something like this is around because I was getting worried that it would be difficult to route the audio from my consoles without losing some quality along the way. In your experience is there a significant change in how the audio sounds once it's been converted to a digital format? I mean, I can't imagine it would get any better, but maybe there are little nuances in the digital realm that weren't there before the conversion?

Blast you, Nintendo, for not including secondary audio outputs on any of your consoles!! {sans the NES}

[kendrick]

Normally, a mod that grabs a compatible digital signal off the audio encoder chip gives you the best result. When you convert the analog signal to digital using one of these external boxes instead, any distortion or artifacts in the sound and music will be converted and transmitted anyway. Put another way, while there's no loss of quality when converting, there's generally no improvement either. The best result is that you don't pick up any hum or compression, and you don't lose any volume.