Can you rate the efficacy of anoptical audio link as oppossed to other methods of audio transmission?

Question

Can you rate the efficacy of anoptical audio link as oppossed to other methods of audio transmission?

Answer 1

The above is half right. While an optical link is a true digital link and will work excellently well, so will coax. In fact there is no difference between optical and coax. Digital is digital. It doesn't care what the medium is. It either works or it doesn't. As long as you are using a digital link it makes no difference which kind of link you use other than the price of cables. Coax is far cheaper than optical for the same result.

Answer 2

Optical transmission is digital, and suffers no degradation with distance or coupling to other wires.  If this is a home theater situation,  use the optical link if it is available at both ends because it bypasses the digital to analog conversion at the source end and the analog to digital conversion at the other end.

Skin effect is not an issue.  It is an increased electrical resistance of a conductor due to self inductance,  and is negligible at audio frequencies - only a concern at radio frequencies.

Answer 3

Depends on the bandwidth. Audiophiles will probably argue that you can't beat a solid copper conductor because of the "skin effect".