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Author Topic: Virtual Audio Cable  (Read 4360 times)

sKiZo

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Virtual Audio Cable
« on: May 21, 2012, 12:40:31 pm »

Just picked up on a Maverick TubeMagic D1 DAC (that's a mouthful).

Problem being, they don't have a dedicated ASIO driver, and I tend to shy away from ASIO4ALL as it's managed to fubar a couple installs for me in the past. I'd also prefer not to upgrade my current XPsp3 Media Edition installation, so I don't have access to WASAPI.

I've heard good things about Virtual Audio Cable (VAC) and wonder if anyone's had any luck using that to hook a DAC to JRiver?

My thoughts -

I'd build one paired VAC, hook that to the DAC output to the computer, then build another paired VAC, hook that to JRiver's input in OPTIONS, then use the VAC repeater to "clone" one cable to the other?

It looks like what it does is act as a software switch to stream the output from one software package to the input of another. Clever. Little or no added latency as the signal transfer is all digital and there's no additional hardware involved in the "cables" themselves.

Here's a couple links for more background ...
http://software.muzychenko.net/eng/vac.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_Audio_Cable
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Scolex

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Re: Virtual Audio Cable
« Reply #1 on: May 21, 2012, 12:53:33 pm »

I don't understand how this is going to help since it has nothing to do with output mode.
You could use kernel streaming which is what ASIO4ALL actually is.

I have used VAC in the past but I used it for streaming to an internet radio site and it worked great for that.
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Sean

sKiZo

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Re: Virtual Audio Cable
« Reply #2 on: May 21, 2012, 06:10:22 pm »

I'm as much or probably more in the dark about how VAC does it's thing as you, which is why I posted up. Hoping for real world experience here bypassing the Windows KMixer and hooking a DAC direct to JRiver in XP.

Way it was explained to me, the raw analog output of the DAC can be routed directly to a player app without mixing or conversion using the "virtual cables". I'm told it's plug 'n play with VLC Media-Player, but once again, haven't a clue exactly how that happens either. Be nice if that were true for JRiver too.

Then again, maybe XP's KMixer isn't quite the problem it's made out to be. A lot of the "issues" people go on about are related to latency and the way it reads redbook header info, and a lot of that has apparently been addressed in slipstream upgrades?
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sKiZo

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Re: Virtual Audio Cable
« Reply #3 on: May 21, 2012, 06:22:35 pm »

Or maybe I should just go with kernel streaming? Been doing a bit of research on that, and it apparently bypasses the KMixer and avoids the latency issues too? And is probably my next best option if a dedicated ASIO driver isn't available?



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