Volume controlled by Roon on which DACs?

Audio Gear Talk
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What the OP is talking about is called USB HID volume control. Not all DACs support it. The Brooklyn does not - I asked Michal from Mytek about this a few times and confirmed it does not. He said it was feasible to add via firmware but that was a long time ago and I don’t see any sign of it. This was the one single thing stopping me from buying the Brooklyn, and the Ayre Codex as well for that matter. My understanding is that this is a capability of all Sabre DAC chips - but not all companies enable or implement it. I have no idea why it is SO useful…

You might find this thread I started on the CA forum useful:

http://www.computeraudiophile.com/f6-dac-digital-analog-conversion/digital-analogue-converter-pre-support-universal-serial-bus-industry-standard-cables-connectors-and-communications-protocols-between-computers-and-electronic-devices-hid-volume-control-27174/

This is what I wrote there:

  • USB HID volume control is (from my somewhat limited understanding) the system whereby the DAC can communicate simple playback control commands to the computer software player - and vice versa - over the USB connection. What this means in practice is that, amongst other things:

  • The DAC buttons and infrared remote control can control the play/pause, stop, and skip/rewind of the software player itself, such as iTunes, Audirvana, etc

  • In the other direction, the computer software player can control the output volume of the DAC itself when force max volume/disable volume is set on the software player.
    Note that this is different than the computer varying the volume that it sends to the DAC. With USB HID volume control the computer can output unmodified full volume all the time, it is the DAC that controls the output volume (just remotely controlled by the computer).

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