how do i connect my soundcard to my receiver/AC-3 decoder?

[xyyz]

where (and what is it called) do i get the cable that goes from my soundcard to my AC-3 decoder?

 

[yllus]

What you want is an adapter that has a male stereo miniplug on one end, and female left and right RCA composite jacks on the other. Then you want to take a RCA composite cable, plug than into the adapter and run that cable to the back of your receiver. The adapter plugs into the line-out port on your sound card.

If you've got a long ways to run that cable, you may consider buying a short RCA cable, a lot of audio wire and splicing the RCA ends onto it. I've run a cable 40 feet without signal loss this way, though I'm not sure how much further you would want to push that.

 

[xyyz]

say that again... i'm trying to visualize it... but it's not working.

male minplug on one side... female on the other... and then an RCA cable which splits off into two connectors... ummm then which one of those two do i connect to the single AC-3 digital coax connector on the decoder?

 

[Zab]

1 male 1/8" miniplug that goes to 2 rca jacks.

 

[xyyz]

which rca jack do i connect to the AC-3 coax input?

 

[AMB]

Here is one for a Sb Live to a coax SP/DIF input:

3.5mm to RCA Phono Connector

 

[Platypussssssss]

You cannot connect the line out to the AC3-decoder. You need a digital connection, optical or coaxial.

 

[xyyz]

I have a Turtle Beach Santa Cruz, the VersaJack can also be used as a digital out.

 

[AMB]

With the Sb Live, the yellow digital out should be used, that is like a normal line out

 

[andri]

My Aureal has a optical S/PDIF out, so I just bought a cable (the salesmen were quite baffled when I asked a "optical S/PDIF" cable btw), hooked it up and it works like a charm.

 

[NicColt]

I'm kinda tired replying to this but here goes.

You will absolutely need the optical/s-pdif I/O 2 daughter card or the Philips card with Optical out. Any OTHER adapted connection will simulate stereo or fake surround.

 

[Noriaki]

NicColt, where did you come up with that? He doens't have an SBLive! or a Philips card.

He has a Turtle Beach Santa Cruz, yes? The Versa jack can carry an AC-3 signal, yet? The Versa jack is ministereo 3.5mm, yes? Is any of this untrue? from every review I've read the versa jack can output a normal AC-3 signal, it's just not a normal shaped jack.

So he needs a 3.5mm mini-stereo to RCA adapater. If you have two RCAs one (or maybe both) of them will have the AC-3 signal. Just try one and if it doesn't work use the other.

A 3.5mm male mini-stereo to dual RCA (male or female) should set you back about $5 at radio shack.

 

[Pariah]

http://www.voyetra-turtle-beach.com/site/kb_ftp/5856003.asp

Seems overly complicated and not well thought out.

 

[xyyz]

Thank you everyone especially Pariah and Noriaki!

I sorted it out... I had one of those 3.5mm mini-stereo to RCA adapater from an older setup...

I popped it in the red rca line into the coax in on my DTT2500 and the "Dolby Digital" light came on.

Excited, i put in "The Matrix" and nearly lost bladder control... it was friggin AMAZING!!!!

Again, my thanks to everyone (well almost everyone) who really understood my problem and didn't complicate things.

 

[AMB]

I do not think there is an Optical SP/DIF, but I think there is an Optical TOSLINK

 

[Hossenfeffer]

Ok, so I want to run a line from the coaxial out of my SB Live card to the JVC 6500 receiver in the living room (50-75 of cable I imagine). I'm presently using the coaxial input for the $64 Oritron DVD200 player.

Could I somehow incorporate the RCA Phono inputs on the receiver?

Wild thought... what about running a coaxial cable from the dvd player to the sound card and one from the sound card to the receiver? HeeHee.

 

[Hossenfeffer]

Hmm, haven't been keeping up with the sb live stuff. Will have a 5.1 platinum coming in a month or so from Comdex. Thinking of buying the optical i/o card for my current live and then running an optical cable to the receiver in the living room thereby allowing me to listen to my mp3's throughout the household.

Looking for a place to pick it up.

 

[NicColt]

I've been reading about this topic in the AVSforums for about a year now, and this is one of the most talked about and most confusing topics. This is what I understand from all of this.

There is a difference between 4 point, stereo, and surround sound like AC-3, THX and Dolby. No sound card can transmit the digital signal to produce true surround such as Dolby, THX or AC-3 trough the digital out to a Home theatre receiver. If you are using a computer sound system like the Promedia's, VideoLogic DigiTheatre or something similar, those systems are able to decode the Sound cards digital out signal to do the surround sound decoding, then your fine.

To achieve true surround through a home theatre receiver, you will need the Optional Optical s/pdif out or TOSlink connectors. The optical s/pdif out is built into the Philips acoustics edge card but is an option known as the I/O 2 Daughter card for the live. The Optical s/pdif out or TOSlink are the only connectors that can transmit the cards digital signal to the home theatre surround receiver. Once the receiver gets the digital signal from the DVD via TOSlink or Optical out, the home theatre receiver can then decode it to have true Dolby/THX or AC-3 surround. xyyz said that "I had one of those 3.5mm mini-stereo to RCA adapter from an older setup..." There is no way that you can tell me that a "Mini-Stereo to RCA" connector can carry a digital surround signal, they carry an analog signal only. You can use analog connectors such as this but this will transmit stereo or left right and back speakers for a 4 point simulated surround at best. What I am saying is that, yes you can giddy up some sort of analog connection but you will not get the true surround from your home theatre, only stereo or simulated surround. To get true surround you will need to send the digital signal from your sound card via s/pdif or TOSlink to your home theatre receiver so it can decode the signal.

 

[Noriaki]

xyyz: Glad you got it setup right for dolby digital. It's pretty damn sweet, yes? After hearing DVDs in dolby digital it was hard to go back to my 2 speaker setup.


NicColt:

Of course an RCA cable can carry a digital AC-3 signal.
There are two types of SPDIF cable a Coaxial cable with RCA connectors and an optical cable with TOSLINK connectors. The capabilities of both are exactly the same.
In the case of a Turtle Beach Santa Cruz Sound card it has a 3.5mm minijack that TB dubbed the Versa jack. One possible function of this is Stereo analog (Center and Sub). Another function of this is to output an AC-3 stream. This little versa jack is a non-standard SPDIF connector carrying a standard SPDIF signal. Turtle Beach designed the versa jack so that you could use a 3.5mm mini-stereo to RCA converter (which is a fairly standard item) so that you could get this standard SPDIF signal to a standard SPDIF connector. Then you have an RCA plug carrying an SPDIF signal, take a Coaxial cable with RCA plugs at both end of it and hook up this little plug to your reciver/amp and voila you have AC-3 in your AMP.
A standard RCA cable can carry a single Analog channel (that's why you typically get them in a red/white or red/black pair so they can carry a stereo signal), that same standard RCA cable can also carry a digital AC-3 (or DTS for that matter) stream. I'm not sure where you get this idea that you need optical. A coaxial cable with RCA connectors has the exact same capabilities as an optical cable with TOSLINK connectors. The connectors are not compatible, so it's possible with certain amps you will need one or the other becuase the amp won't have both, but an RCA cable can and will carry an AC-3 signal from a TB Santa Cruz to a reciever that has RCA SPDIF input (in this case the DTT2500 which does have that RCA SPDIF input port)

I believe that you may be right if you restrict your statements to an SBLive! I'm not 100% sure whether or not the SBLive! can output a standard SPDIF signal, my SBLive has no digital outputs so I've never cared to take notice, but the TB Santa Cruz is.


An analog signal the waveform created by the changing the voltage (over time) along the wire represent the actual sound, and the speaker just uses this voltage to control it's electromagnets to move the speaker and make sound.

All a digital signal is is a series of 1s and 0s, represented by two different voltages. The reciver accepts this series of 1s and 0s and then "decodes" it into analog channels (6 of them for AC-3) and then sends that analog signal along 6 separate wires to speakers. (AC-3 is one possible format for those 1s and 0s, DTS is another one, PCM is a 3rd though it only has 2 channel encoded not 6)

So as you can see in either case the RCA cable is merely acting as a conduit for voltage to move from one place to another, whether that voltage is being interpreted as 1s and 0s for a reciver or as a sound waveform the RCA cable really doens't care.


Edit: I'm not trying to make you look dumb or anything here, just trying to add some knowledge, so if you know any or all of this forgive me.

 

[NicColt]

I give up....

"Of course an RCA cable can carry a digital AC-3 signal."

 

[Noriaki]

I don't see what your problem with that statement is.

Pete's (Ed: my friend you aren't suppose to know who that is) DVD player is hooked up to his HK reciver with an RCA SPDIF cable and we get dolby digital just fine.

There are two kinds of SPDIF cable, one has RCA plugs.




<< I popped it in the red rca line into the coax in on my DTT2500 and the &quot;Dolby Digital&quot; light came on. >>

Does that not sound like he's getting dolby digital through an RCA cable?

Go read the specs on a TB Santa Cruz it can output an AC-3 signal if your software DVD player supports AC-3 passthrough.

I think I'll stop replying to this now...obviously you wish to beleive that only an optical cable can carry an AC-3 signal, and if you wish to believe that you are welcome to. Sorry for the thread crapping xyyz.

 

[Sugadaddy]

Noriaki is right.

And this:

<< There is no way that you can tell me that a &quot;Mini-Stereo to RCA&quot; connector can carry a digital surround signal, they carry an analog signal only. >>


Is wrong. An RCA cable hooked up to the spdif on the Lives or its equivalent on the Santa Cruz can surely carry the undecoded AC-3 signal for the decoder to decode.

And BTW, you seem a little mixed up. THX is NOT a type of sound like Dolby Digital or DTS, it's a speaker and home theater certification.(means that they've passed some sort of test)

 

[Hossenfeffer]

Ok, it's late and I haven't slept. True or False time:

1 - If I run a cable from the coaxial out on my SB live daughter card what might possible inputs be?
- The coaxial digital in?
- The phono inputs?

And now, for the easy question:

2 - Is my thought process moving slower than a pregnant one-legged yak wading through a stream of frozen molasses?

Thanks for answering the pop quiz

 

[NicColt]

<< And BTW, you seem a little mixed up. THX is NOT a type of sound like Dolby Digital or DTS, >>


Perhaps you could explain what this says from the THX.com website then.

----
Is Home THX compatible with Dolby Digital and DTS?

Absolutely! The goal of the Home THX System is to accurately recreate the experience of the film mixing theatre. All mixing theatres are capable of creating both 4 and 5.1 channel mixes. The acoustics, equalization curves, and loudspeaker arrays used in a mixing theatre remain the same for a digital 5.1 channel soundtrack as they do for a 4 channel Dolby Surround soundtrack. Home THX Technologies are needed to reproduce these movie soundtracks accurately.

Will Home THX Dipole Surrounds work with these 5.1 channel digital formats?

Yes. The Dipole Surrounds' design emulates the soundfield of an array of loudspeakers exactly as those found in mixing theatres and movie theatres. In movie theatres, these &quot;surround arrays&quot; provide a big surround sound experience. Because surround placement in the home is limited to a few speakers close to the listener, the THX Dipole Surround is the best way to provide a big surround experience. Sound effects and pans will have correct directional cues, and surround ambiences will be open and enveloping. With the newer &quot;split surround&quot; formats it is even more important that surround cues and pans do not &quot;collapse into a box&quot;.
---

and I seem to be a little mixed up??? I guess everyone is entitle to their own opinions.

 

[Hossenfeffer]

The way I understand it is that THX is more a certification standard than a &quot;type of sound&quot;. Naturally it would be compatible with DTS and Dolby Surround. To make sure you see and hear the movie how the director &quot;intended it&quot;, you follow the guidelines of THX, use the THX equipment, etc.