A friend of mine has been expressing an interest in the n900 and its capabilites. I believe it ticks all the boxes, especially compared to the iphone, with one exception. He is a bit of an audiphile and would like to output Digital audio from the device.
Does anyone know if the n900 can currently do this or would a driver need to be developed (something like dacmagic) to allow the digital signal over usb? or prehaps maybe someone is already doing this???
From my understanding you can do this with the iphone, so its a case of, can you do it with the n900????
the main issue is the USB port, it's intended for charging and (client) data only, no host mode or USB On-The-Go.
but usb-audio interfaces will only work on an USB port that provides host mode.
Practically, even if you have digital audio over USB on N900 you still need to power your phone! I don't believe anyone's presented a solution for dealing with signal as well as powering the phone, since I don't believe USB DACs are concerned with providing USB power along with USB data.
Practically, even if you have digital audio over USB on N900 you still need to power your phone! I don't believe anyone's presented a solution for dealing with signal as well as powering the phone, since I don't believe USB DACs are concerned with providing USB power along with USB data.
Would love to be proven wrong though!
The N900 has a battery. So you don't have to provide power over the Ethernet cable.
The friction involved in charging the battery and unplugging the USB Audio interface when more power is needed, makes USB+Digital Audio a non-starter for me. Once I've got the N900 in-line doing audio tasks, I don't want to think about charging the unit or interrupting my audio work!
For me that feeling extends to many other potential uses of N900 USB (DVB, mounting an external disk). In fact, if typical USB accessories had better ways to supply power to upstream mobile devices, we might start seeing mobile devices become more involved in studio work. Sadly for now it's a very niche thing.
the main issue is the USB port, it's intended for charging and (client) data only, no host mode or USB On-The-Go.
but usb-audio interfaces will only work on an USB port that provides host mode.
