Is my main analog audio out on my SB Live! broken? How could this be?

[mellondust]

Everything works fine except the main analog out for the four point surround. I have been using the digital out for around 2 years and decided that I wanted to hook my head phones up. I found out that the out for the rear speakers works fine, but the out for the front speakers does nothing. I have used the digital out for my speakers ever since I got the card a long time ago, and I can't remember if the output jack ever worked, although I think it did becuase I hooked up my head phones before with no problem. Could it be something wrong with the card itself or a software glitch? I have tested it out in win98 and xp with no success. Any suggestions of what I can do to solve the problem or test it. I can live with out it becuase I use the digital out, but still I like to have all my stuff running correctly.

 

[sohcrates]

sure it's not muted? did you try both wav's (mp3's) and cd's ?

 

[mellondust]

Nothing in the advanced sound area is muted, and don't see any options in the creative area to mute or unmute the outputs. Am I looking in the right place?

 

[sohcrates]

hmmm...and what about the volume control in the system tray?

i wonder if perhaps there's some kind of option that says to use digital out only that might be checked...hmmmm

you sure you're hooking up to the main out? not the secondary analog out?

 

[mellondust]

shouldn't both the outs work, or does your speaker setting make a difference. I'm am now at my school computer lab and can't check it out, I can check it out in 45 minutes, but I only have two of my four speakers hooked up and I know it is set to two speakers. But even if it is, the out I plug the headphone into is the rear outs and it is the only one that works.

 

[sohcrates]

well, with 2 outputs (for surround) you have to have surround enabled for both outs to work (though at least one should most likely always work)

 

[mellondust]

That was the problem, the speaker configuration has to be set to four speaker surround for both ports to work. I changed the configuration to head phones and no problems. I was worried that if I was in the wrong port with headphones that the sound placement would be all messed up in games, but it is fixed.

Thanks!!!!

 

[DrumminBoy]

Is it possible to hook one 2.1 speaker set into the front surround output and then another 2.1 set into the rear surround output to create a 4.2 surround system?

 

[sohcrates]

<< Is it possible to hook one 2.1 speaker set into the front surround output and then another 2.1 set into the rear surround output to create a 4.2 surround system? >>



sure. basically, you'd have 4 speakers and 2 subs....but it would work fine (though i don't know how much subwoofer-level signal comes out the surround output)