[Gene Jockey]

I've recently been tinkering with ripping DTS audio into my iTunes library. So far, it had come off of my DTS CDs. These play fine when I use Audio MIDI Setup to set the output on my Sonica to 44.1 kHz and 2-ch 24 bit. Just recently, I found that someone had written a python script to convert ac3 and DTS files from DVDs into padded WAV files, which are essentially what the files on DTS audio CDs are. The rub is, however, that audio sourced from DVDs is 48 kHz. Audio MIDI Setup allows me to only choose one frequency to output. If I use 44.1 kHz, all my DTS CD music works, music from DVDs does not. Choose 48 kHz, other way around.

So I'm stuck. I've finally figured out how to do this, but I'm hamstrung by this sampling rate issue. I need to be able to send the raw audio in its native frequency to my receiver, but OS X does not seem to allow this. Is it a limitation of the OS, or the Sonica hardware? Are there digital output devices where you can simply set output to "native"? Or am I just stuck?

[skirbomatic]

I'm afraid of stepping into this thread, but it's the holidays, so what the hell.

I'm confused by your questions.

What is a DTS CD? DTS is a surround sound format for DVDs. It uses the DVD sampling rate of 48khz and is a competitor to the various Dolby methods of DVD audio surround sound. Yes, a 48khz sampled audio file can be stored into your iTunes library and played back as analog, the same as any standard CD 'Red Book' 44.1khz file, but all audio CD's have a 44.1khz sampling rate. Are you actually burning 48khz sampled audio onto CDs? For what purpose?

I think what you may need is something like the Alesis Masterlink ML-9600. See here:

http://www.alesis.com/products/ml9600/about.html

You said you need to output raw digital data to your receiver using the 'native' sampling rate. This device will do it. You can read more here:

http://www.stereophile.com/cdplayers/605/index.html

[Gene Jockey]

There exist DTS CDs, which are DTS encoded audio sampled at 44.1 kHz and structured on an audio CD so as to look like Red Book audio data. When played on a transport which can pass the raw digital signal to a receiver, the receiver decodes the DTS information in the stream and you get multi-channel audio. Play one on a regular CD player, you get static. You can rip these with iTunes as Apple Lossless and play them back in all their multi-channel glory with a setup that sends digital audio to a receiver. You can also rip the DTS audio from a DVD and process it so it can be stored as Apple Lossless as well, but it retains its 48 kHz sample rate.

I'm not burning anything to CD. I have 48 kHz files (from DTS DVDs I've ripped) and 44.1 kHz files (from DTS audio CDs I've ripped) in my iTunes library. I have a USB device which outputs digital audio via a TosLink output. I want to send the audio to my receiver, digitally, without resampling. If you resample the DTS bitstream, you break it. Make more sense now?

Thanks though.