Surround Sound

[JDizzy]

I have a question...

I have the Sage 5 up and running and am working out a few audio issues...

My sound card is a SoundBlaster Live 64 USB external (my PC has onboard sound). I had to connect the computer's onboard audio out to my Blaster's audio in to get sound out to TV through the soundcard (I would like to get ALL sound from computer going through Blaster)

I am connected to the TV with RCA phono plugs and to my receiver with optical cable from my extrnal sound card but I can't seem to get the 5.1 to work

I have many movies saved in the Divx AVI format with Dolby 5.1 audio.

(1) Does Sage support passing the 5.1 sound through?

I would like to get a sound card that will allow me to hook-up both RCA out (to TV when not using receiver) and also optical out (for 5.1 when watching movies)
I would like to be able to output from both at the same time and if possible be able to adjust the output volumn of each independent of each other....

(2) Is that possible with Sage and soundcards

(3) Which sound card would you use (I don't use it for games, but would prefer audiophile sound quality)

(4) When playing a movie through Media Center the sound passed to my reciever says 'PCM 48' or something like that....if it is 5.1, a blue light comes on

As it is now, when I play the movies through Sage Media Center, the sound is very low and no 5.1 sound (as I cannot figure out how to pass the dolby signal through to receiver) and you have to crank up the volumn. (which is dangerous if you forget to turn it down before going back to live tv)!!!
The live TV's volumn is fine...

(I also have a Linkplayer that I can stream the movies across my network and when using it, the 5.1 works fine)...but, I would like to keep everything within the Sage user interface

So I'm not sure if this is a configuration problem, hardware related, or both....

My receiver has all the decoders built-in so I just need to pass through the sound


Sorry if I'm rambling but my brain's mush after trying for hours to get this working..

What do you think?
Thanks,
JDizz

[mattdcknsn]

I can try and answer some of your questions,

(1) Does Sage support passing the 5.1 sound through?

Yes it does, it took me awhile to figure this one out, for me I had to get the soundcard to do SPDIF output, and the audio render to do this as well. I got the soundcard to output SPDIF by using FilterManager (somebody else remarked on it and it was great, thanks whoever that was).

(3) Which sound card would you use (I don't use it for games, but would prefer audiophile sound quality)

I am using the onboard soundcard I think its SoundMax, not quite sure though at the moment. So far I have been impressed with it.

The biggest problem for me was to get both the Audio Renderer and the Audio Decoder on the same page.

Hope that helps out.

[JDizzy]

I have been trying to get 5.1 sound through Sage's video player and have yet to figure out the trick...

If I use Sage's built-in DVD player with a disk I get 5.1 sent to my receiver.

I have many avi movies (1-2Gb) with 5.1 sound that I have compressed with divx and saved to disk and watched with 5.1 sound using other players. If I try to use Sage's built-in player I get PCM 48 sound but not 5.1 surround.

In video setup I am using the same renderer and decoder filter as I had success with playing DVDs (Soundblaster X-fi audio and Nvidia decoder) but it is not picking up, or outputting the 5.1....

I though maybe it was because I didn't have the divx codex installed but I reinstalled the latest version and still no cigar... I do not see the divx codex on menu withing Sage to choose from....hmmmm

I would like to be able to watch my movies with the 5.1 sound and have went as far as ripping the entire movie into a folder (movie only, no menus
5+ Gb) and tried to watch it that way.... it basically locks up with a black screen and I have to shut down Sage to recover... (it could be a size issue as I have done some TV series this way and they work (vob file size 1.5Gb)

Any ideas, or other ways to convert or compress the movies and still keep the 5.1 sound intact?

Thanks,
JDizz

[gplasky]

Have you tried using the AC3 filter for your sound and wave out? nVidia works with your DVD because that is AC3. Is the Divx audio truly an AC3 soundtrack? If the AC3 filter doesn't work try ffdshow.

Gerry

[JDizzy]

Yup, tried AC3 to no avail...

Not sure if encoded audio is true AC3, all I know is that when compressing using divx I checked off ' keep original sound'.
When viewing video with another player, it does show 5.1 audio...
I'll try the other program you mentioned..
JDizz

[JDizzy]

I finally got the AC3 5.1 working with all video sources (except live tv of course which my capture card does not support)
I am using the nvidia decoder and I think my problem was within Windows as far as having the 'computer' sound system set to 2 speakers rather than 5.1.

Life is good!
JDizz