Problem with outputting digitally from soundcards....advice needed

gline

I recently purchased a dobly digital capable amp.

problem is im using an audigy 2 soundcard and it cant out put digitally, only through a 3.5,, jack which the amp doesnt take a digital input. also i read that it only outputs dolby and dts outputs, so can only be used when you are viewing a dvd and the likes

is there any soundcard that you can ouput ALL audio through a digital connector, like digital coax or optical???

How does everyone else do it with their htpc's or media centres?

8T8

Creative sell a little adapter on their site which gives their soundcards the proper coaxial and optical digital outs.

That will allow you to hook up the AMP to the Creative card.

Yes there are cards that come with coax and/or optical outputs and also do real time Dolby Digital encoding for all content.

In fact the Tech Report did a review of two such cards only a day ago. One of which and the one of the two they recommend is available at OcUK.

gline

i have the creative adapter but it only works with

• Sound Blaster Live! 24-bit
• Sound Blaster Audigy Value/SE
• Sound Blaster Audigy 2 Value
• Sound Blaster Audigy 4
• Sound Blaster X-Fi XtremeMusic
• Sound Blaster X-Fi Platinum
• Sound Blaster X-Fi Fatal1ty
• Sound Blaster X-Fi Elite Pro

Also it only outputs audio when a dolby digital signal is played and not all the other audio afaik

il check out the other links you gave me, thanks for the info

mossym

i have an audigy 2 hooked up to my amp. Maplin sell a little adapter that will convert the 3.5mm plug on your soundcard to a normal phono connection so that you can go digital coax into the back of your amp. I use mediaportal exclusively on this pc, but everything, stereo and surround formats gets passed, i only use the digital audio out. I'm pretty sure everythign will get passed on the digital output.

anyhow, the little adapter costs less than 5 euros if i remember coirrectly..so won't be expensive to give it a go anyway

gline

mossym wrote:

i have an audigy 2 hooked up to my amp. Maplin sell a little adapter that will convert the 3.5mm plug on your soundcard to a normal phono connection so that you can go digital coax into the back of your amp. I use mediaportal exclusively on this pc, but everything, stereo and surround formats gets passed, i only use the digital audio out. I'm pretty sure everythign will get passed on the digital output.

anyhow, the little adapter costs less than 5 euros if i remember coirrectly..so won't be expensive to give it a go anyway

so i just need a 3.5mm to phono?? stereo or mono???

mossym

gline wrote:

so i just need a 3.5mm to phono?? stereo or mono???

mono will do. phono is only mono anyway, that's why they usually have two, one for each channel, but yeah, a mono one should do

http://www.maplin.co.uk/module.aspx?ModuleNo=34197&doy=6m2

http://www.maplin.co.uk/module.aspx?ModuleNo=1180&doy=6m2


either of those will do the job...

gline

mossym wrote:

mono will do. phono is only mono anyway, that's why they usually have two, one for each channel, but yeah, a mono one should do

http://www.maplin.co.uk/module.aspx?ModuleNo=34197&doy=6m2

http://www.maplin.co.uk/module.aspx?ModuleNo=1180&doy=6m2


either of those will do the job...

thanks man for the info

8T8

gline wrote:

i have the creative adapter but it only works with

• Sound Blaster Live! 24-bit
• Sound Blaster Audigy Value/SE
• Sound Blaster Audigy 2 Value
• Sound Blaster Audigy 4
• Sound Blaster X-Fi XtremeMusic
• Sound Blaster X-Fi Platinum
• Sound Blaster X-Fi Fatal1ty
• Sound Blaster X-Fi Elite Pro

Also it only outputs audio when a dolby digital signal is played and not all the other audio afaik

il check out the other links you gave me, thanks for the info

You have an Audigy 2 it should be working as it's the same chip that's on most of the cards, because the Audigy does not have a real time Dolby Digital encoder it merely decodes whatever is in that format in the first place.

I'm not sure about software encoders I know there are some fake surround software features built into some sound cards but that is usually over analogue. Also AC3Filter is probably capable of doing some of that as well and passing it through the SPDIF connection.

But as far as my understanding goes on this you need a card capable of real time Dolby Digital encoding in order for everything to be processed through the amp via SPDIF (I could be wrong but I don't think I am).

gline

8T8 wrote:

You have an Audigy 2 it should be working as it's the same chip that's on most of the cards, because the Audigy does not have a real time Dolby Digital encoder it merely decodes whatever is in that format in the first place.

I'm not sure about software encoders I know there are some fake surround software features built into some sound cards but that is usually over analogue. Also AC3Filter is probably capable of doing some of that as well and passing it through the SPDIF connection.

But as far as my understanding goes on this you need a card capable of real time Dolby Digital encoding in order for everything to be processed through the amp via SPDIF (I could be wrong but I don't think I am).

that is what i thought, but according to mossym it does work

maybe it outputs non dolby content as pcm ??

also the adapter does NOT work with audigy 2, i tried it, only the models above

8T8

Out of curiosity what version Audigy 2 do you have it is just a stock Audigy 2 ?

According to the spec's on Creatives site the stock Audigy 2 has a SPDIF output ?

This may sound silly but are you sure the adapter is in the right port on the card I don't have the manual so I cannot tell which one it is, on my X-Fi is is the last port on the right when looking straight at it & the card is installed in the PC and upside down.

gline

8T8 wrote:

Out of curiosity what version Audigy 2 do you have it is just a stock Audigy 2 ?

yes just the plain old audigy 2

mossym

any audio that is not already dolby digital or dts encoded just comes out as pcm stereo. if i'm watching tv ofr instance through my htpc i am feeding stereo into my amp and runnint dts neo encoding on it (or dolby pro logicII, given my mood) as soon as i switch to a dvd my amp automatically switches to dolby digital or dts depending on the soundtrack i choose.

The audigy 2 does not do real time DD or DTS encoding, but it doesn't need to. the effects would be no better than applying pro logic 2 or neo processing to the stereo sound when it reaches your amp.

gline

mossym wrote:

any audio that is not already dolby digital or dts encoded just comes out as pcm stereo. if i'm watching tv ofr instance through my htpc i am feeding stereo into my amp and runnint dts neo encoding on it (or dolby pro logicII, given my mood) as soon as i switch to a dvd my amp automatically switches to dolby digital or dts depending on the soundtrack i choose.

The audigy 2 does not do real time DD or DTS encoding, but it doesn't need to. the effects would be no better than applying pro logic 2 or neo processing to the stereo sound when it reaches your amp.

cool thanks for the info.

so there is no real point in buying a card that does DD encoding as it will just be 2 channels upmixed to 5.1 or 6.1?

mossym

as long as you can get your card working like i have mine working then none whatsoever. the cards that do DD decoding will do one of two things.

1)convert pcm stereo to DD stereo, straight conversion, no processing.

2) some may allow you to convert the stereo sound to a 5.1 sound. Dolby's version of this is Prologic II. your receiver will most likely do this for you on stereo sources anyway, so it's down to which does a better job.

i think 1 is far more likely. so in essense there is nothing to be gained, as far as i can see from getting a card that can do DD encoding.

mossym

8T8 wrote:

.

But as far as my understanding goes on this you need a card capable of real time Dolby Digital encoding in order for everything to be processed through the amp via SPDIF (I could be wrong but I don't think I am).

ah, hate to say it but i think you are. a normal dvd player cannot encode into DD or DTS. it just passes the stream. So if you have your dvd player hooked up to your amp using spdif only, then it passes the stream and the amp decodes it.

so far so good. however if you put a cd in your dvd player, it will still play. It doesn't have a DD or DTS track, yet it still plays fine. the dvd player is passing the pcm stream to your amp which then decodes it.

8T8

I'll take your word for it as audio is not my forte, I think I'm getting my wires crossed anyway as I was referring to the simple fact that you need a real time encoder in order to convert absolutely everything that isn't DD in the first place into DD which we all agree on I think