MiSTer FPGA Forum

Hello again!

I got myself a PCM5102 i2s DAC to use in my Ironclad+ setup.
I am very new to this type of stuff, but i just followed the instructions and connected it like this.

And i flipped the SW0 switch on my DE10-Nano. And everything is working just fine as far as i can tell!
I have sound in all cores i have tried and it sounds pretty good.

But later on i was looking around on the mt32-pi github page. And there they have a section about this very DAC.
Apparently it can be configured using 4 soldering bridges on the back side. And they instruct that it is important that you have a specific configuration in order for it to output sound.

I looked at the back of mine and there none of the pads are bridged as far as i can tell. So this makes me wonder.

Are thees settings only relevant for people connecting the DAC to a raspberry pi?
Is it possible that sound is still being output from the DE10-Nanos own DAC even after the SW0 is flipped?
Is there an easy way to find out what DAC is currently being utilized by the system?

I mean i could just bring out the soldering iron and find out if it makes any difference with the pads bridged like the mt32-pi github suggests. It would be pretty easy to reverse if needed.
But in my experience it is generally a bad idé to try to fix something that is not broken.

Any advice or input from someone who is more knowledgeable than me?

I don't know the answer but it does say "must be set correctly before sound is produced."

If you have solder wick it should be easy enough to reverse if it doesn't work

It was hard to see with the naked eye but it turns out there was actually a connection on bridge 4 in the L position. When checking with a multimeter there was clearly a connection there. So this probably had something to do with why it was working when it really shouldn't have.

Anyway i just soldered all the bridges according to configuration suggested and everything still works fine.
Cant really tell if anything has changed or not from doing so.

I also tried unplugging the DAC completely from the Ironclad board and started the Mister with the SW0 still activated. And it turns out i was still getting sound. But the volume was WAY higher than before. So clearly the PCM5102 was doing something while plugged in.
This would suggest to me that it was in fact being utilized and working normally when i had it plugged in.