Slayn
11-28-08, 11:17 PM
I am trying to get the best sound out of the computer. I have a pretty built machine ( e7200 oced to 3.8ghz, 4gb of ram, gtx260, creative labs x-fi titanium pci-e sound card, vista 64 etc. ) and I am trying to get it to work well with my home theatre system. Currently I have an older Sony 5.1 surround sound system it is 5.1 and has DTS but is a bit older of a model and it is starting to go out. This is what I am having a hard time on:
What should I replace the receiver and what is the best way to get audio out of the PC? There are so many ways to do it. Some people say that using the hook ups directly on the sound card is the best ( the front, center, rear, sub ) but that doesnt really work well for my currently as I go through the received unless I can get a receiver that goes directly to the back panels on the sound card, which I am not sure if they make those. Is hooking it up through the sound cards analog outputs the best audio anyway? I keep hearing different things.
The second way to hook it up is what I am doing now which is through the optical out on the back of the sound card to the optical on the receiver. This works semi decently but all the software is being a pain in my ass. I will explain. I do not get "true" surround sound with the optical set up as far as I can tell. I play Warhammer which uses EAX. If I use the program "Alchemy" and enter Warhammer with the other program "Dolby Live" it will I guess "convert" the EAX to Dolby and it will make it work in 5.1 surround sound just fine. Sometimes the software has problems though such as in Warhammer in works perfectly fine but while listening to a Youtube video I would have to turn off the Dolby Live and it crahses and I have to restart half the time. Not sure on the quality of this set up either.
Third option is to buy a newer receiver ( which I am going to do since mine currently is breaking ) that has HDMI. What I would do then is hook up my GTX260 to the Creative Labs X-Fi Titanium Fatality PCI-r etc etc card using a spdif cable. Then I would connect the video card to the receiever using a dvi-hdmi adapter that can pass through audio right to the receiver. I dont even KNOW how this would work out I have no clue. People tell me that the Nvidia card's SPDIF connector can only pass 2.1 audio or something, I dont quite understand.
You guys can see why I had to ask this here, there are just far too many factors and I want to get this to work. Bottom line is that I need to buy a new receiver because mine is currently malfunctioning. I opened it up and something is loose inside and causes the speakers to go in and out. It is around 8 years old so I do not mind I just need to know what the best thing to do is. I currently have my pc as top priority hooked up dvi-hdmi to a 37" 1080p tv, a ps2 ( upgrading to ps3 ) that is hooked to tv with component ( will be hdmi with ps3 ) and also optical to the receiver I have ( I dunno if I can do straight HDMI with a new receiver ). Third item I have is my satellite tv hooked up the same, HDMI to my HDMI switch and then optical to my optical switch into the receiver.
So my current dillema is to hook up my pc audio for the best quality:
Straight to the 4 output if possible at all through the receiver
Through optical on the sound card, if that works well.
Through the sound card to video card with SPDIF, and then video card to receiver with dvi-hdmi connection.
Thank you all in advance for reading this super lengthy post.
What should I replace the receiver and what is the best way to get audio out of the PC? There are so many ways to do it. Some people say that using the hook ups directly on the sound card is the best ( the front, center, rear, sub ) but that doesnt really work well for my currently as I go through the received unless I can get a receiver that goes directly to the back panels on the sound card, which I am not sure if they make those. Is hooking it up through the sound cards analog outputs the best audio anyway? I keep hearing different things.
The second way to hook it up is what I am doing now which is through the optical out on the back of the sound card to the optical on the receiver. This works semi decently but all the software is being a pain in my ass. I will explain. I do not get "true" surround sound with the optical set up as far as I can tell. I play Warhammer which uses EAX. If I use the program "Alchemy" and enter Warhammer with the other program "Dolby Live" it will I guess "convert" the EAX to Dolby and it will make it work in 5.1 surround sound just fine. Sometimes the software has problems though such as in Warhammer in works perfectly fine but while listening to a Youtube video I would have to turn off the Dolby Live and it crahses and I have to restart half the time. Not sure on the quality of this set up either.
Third option is to buy a newer receiver ( which I am going to do since mine currently is breaking ) that has HDMI. What I would do then is hook up my GTX260 to the Creative Labs X-Fi Titanium Fatality PCI-r etc etc card using a spdif cable. Then I would connect the video card to the receiever using a dvi-hdmi adapter that can pass through audio right to the receiver. I dont even KNOW how this would work out I have no clue. People tell me that the Nvidia card's SPDIF connector can only pass 2.1 audio or something, I dont quite understand.
You guys can see why I had to ask this here, there are just far too many factors and I want to get this to work. Bottom line is that I need to buy a new receiver because mine is currently malfunctioning. I opened it up and something is loose inside and causes the speakers to go in and out. It is around 8 years old so I do not mind I just need to know what the best thing to do is. I currently have my pc as top priority hooked up dvi-hdmi to a 37" 1080p tv, a ps2 ( upgrading to ps3 ) that is hooked to tv with component ( will be hdmi with ps3 ) and also optical to the receiver I have ( I dunno if I can do straight HDMI with a new receiver ). Third item I have is my satellite tv hooked up the same, HDMI to my HDMI switch and then optical to my optical switch into the receiver.
So my current dillema is to hook up my pc audio for the best quality:
Straight to the 4 output if possible at all through the receiver
Through optical on the sound card, if that works well.
Through the sound card to video card with SPDIF, and then video card to receiver with dvi-hdmi connection.
Thank you all in advance for reading this super lengthy post.