z680 with Audigy2

seawolf21

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Feb 27, 2003
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I'm thinking of getting a set of Z680. I currently have the Audigy 2. What are the inputs on the speakers? Thanks.
 

chizow

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Jun 26, 2001
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Originally posted by: seawolf21
I'm thinking of getting a set of Z680. I currently have the Audigy 2. What are the inputs on the speakers? Thanks.

Z-680 Inputs Up-Close and Personal

I'd go with a digital coax from your A2 to the digital coax RCA input of the Z-680 for movies b/c of the built in DD 5.1 decoder. For standard use and games, I'd stick with the 3 analog mini inputs. You'll need a 1/8'' mini-jack to RCA converter from your Audigy 2; a nice gold plated plug adapter can be had from Radio Shack for $3.

Chiz
 

amdmaxx

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Jan 6, 2001
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Question for Experts:
I have Z-680 and SB Audigy EX..
I been using Audigy's external box with Toslink optical cable from the box to Z-680 control pod's digital Optical in.. It worked fine..
Now I have purchased this cable:
http://www.cobaltcable.com/product/digital_coax_cable.htm
It is a digital coax cable with RCA on one side (Z-680'd pod digital coax in side) and 3.5 mini on the other side (into digital out on SB Audigy card)..
I switch the control pod of speakers to coax - but it does not detect anything.. Could someone help?
Is it the cable that is wrong? Or is there a setting on SB Audigy to switch from digital toslink (optical) to digital coax?
Any help appreciated.
 

NicColt

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Jul 23, 2000
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>It is a digital coax cable with RCA on one side
>I switch the control pod of speakers to coax - but it does not detect anything..

Only digital feeds will play through the digital coax - games on the other hand that are 'analog' will only play through on the RCA side. You can thank Creative Labs for this one.
 

amdmaxx

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Jan 6, 2001
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u serious? that is horrible..
I been playing winamp through digital.. Didnt know winamp passes digital..
So games no go?

Originally posted by: NicColt
>It is a digital coax cable with RCA on one side
>I switch the control pod of speakers to coax - but it does not detect anything..

Only digital feeds will play through the digital coax - games on the other hand that are 'analog' will only play through on the RCA side. You can thank Creative Labs for this one.

 

Jadow

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Feb 12, 2003
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well, with my audigy 2 (and Creative 4 point surround speakers) the mini jack (headphone type) digitla out on the SB Audigy goes to the digital in on the 4 point speakers, and everything plays.

I think he's wrong
 

amdmaxx

Senior member
Jan 6, 2001
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ye, thanks, I got it to work, played around with audigy settings..

Originally posted by: Jadow
well, with my audigy 2 (and Creative 4 point surround speakers) the mini jack (headphone type) digitla out on the SB Audigy goes to the digital in on the 4 point speakers, and everything plays.

I think he's wrong

 

NicColt

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Jul 23, 2000
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>well, with my audigy 2 (and Creative 4 point surround speakers)

it will work with the Creative speakers no problem. and yes you can get it to work but it won't be digital it will be analog.
 

Pariah

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Apr 16, 2000
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Only digital feeds will play through the digital coax - games on the other hand that are 'analog' will only play through on the RCA side. You can thank Creative Labs for this one.

Any audio can be converted back and forth between analog and digital. There is no such thing as analog only audio, in fact no game audio is analog as anything stored on a HD is digital. It baffles me why people insist on ripping companies based on incorrect information that often doesn't make any sense. Creative cards can transmit any audio either through analog or digital unless the standard doesn't allow it. It can't send unencoded multichannel audio through a standard digital coax/TOS because it isn't possible. No audio equipment can.

Now I have purchased this cable:
http://www.cobaltcable.com/product/digital_coax_cable.htm
It is a digital coax cable with RCA on one side (Z-680'd pod digital coax in side) and 3.5 mini on the other side (into digital out on SB Audigy card)..

Did you really spend $40 on a "digital" audio cable to connect a SB Extigy and z680? Ignoring the fact there is no such thing as a digital audio cable, any $5 radio shack cable would perform identically when transferring a digital signal. Even if it was analog, the sound card and speakers aren't high grade enough for the cable to make any difference.
 

lameaway

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Jun 18, 2003
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There is no sound card that can process analog audio... thats silly. Everything is of course digital up to the output stage, at which it can either be packaged up into a digital protocol like Dolby and sent across a cable or sent directly to DACs. The reason some soundcards are incapable of sending multichannel output from games to the digital out is simply because they are incapable of encoding 5 or 6 raw_digital_ channels into a serial protocol like Dolby Digital. I'm rather sure the Audigy is capable of this...

EDIT: And when I say protocol, I really mean format. :confused:
 

JonTom

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Oct 10, 2001
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I thought I read somewhere the A2 wouldn't pass a digital signal from a DVD due to DRM BS... However, that makes no sense and I can't find anything about it on creative's site. Can anyone elaborate?

 

NicColt

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Jul 23, 2000
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>Creative cards can transmit any audio either through analog or digital unless the standard doesn't allow it.

OK this was beaten to death in previous threads and in other forums, who here will stand up and say that the A2 will play digital and analog through digital coax to the Z680's please raise your hand.
 

lameaway

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Jun 18, 2003
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There is no such thing as analog audio, as far as the sound card is concerned. What are you trying to say? That it won't take input from the ADCs and pass it to the encoder? Maybe linking to one of these threads would help people in this thread to understand, myself included.
 

Pariah

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Apr 16, 2000
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Originally posted by: NicColt
>Creative cards can transmit any audio either through analog or digital unless the standard doesn't allow it.

OK this was beaten to death in previous threads and in other forums, who here will stand up and say that the A2 will play digital and analog through digital coax to the Z680's please raise your hand.

I think it is safe to say, no one else here has any idea what you are talking about.
 

Accord99

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Jul 2, 2001
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Originally posted by: JonTom
I thought I read somewhere the A2 wouldn't pass a digital signal from a DVD due to DRM BS... However, that makes no sense and I can't find anything about it on creative's site. Can anyone elaborate?
With DRM for Creative soundcards, it means that if you for some reason, happen to acquire a DRM protected file, it will actually play properly. While for other soundcards which do not have DRM, then it won't play at all. And no, the A2 will easily pass through DD or DTS streams from a DVD to a receiver for decoding. What it won't do is pass through the digital signal for DVD-Audio, but this is a part of the DVD-Audio specification. Nearly all of the consumer DVD-Audio players will not output a digital signal either.

 

JonTom

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Oct 10, 2001
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Originally posted by: Accord99
What it won't do is pass through the digital signal for DVD-Audio, but this is a part of the DVD-Audio specification. Nearly all of the consumer DVD-Audio players will not output a digital signal either.

Ahh... Thanks, this likely won't affect me for some time!

 

NicColt

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Jul 23, 2000
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Pariah = wasted post.

Accord99 = informative post, knows what he's talking about listen to him.

chizow = informative post, knows what he's talking about listen to him.

>I been playing winamp through digital.. Didnt know winamp passes digital..
>ye, thanks, I got it to work, played around with audigy settings..

Creative products with digital out (including even the newest Audigy and Audigy 2), will only get 5.1out via analog connection and Digital Din. The coxial connection (SPDIF) will only output 2 channels when you are listening to non-Dolby/AC-3 sources. If you play DVDs and do a SPDIF pass-thru, the soundcard will output the DD/AC-3 stream via SPDIF to the external decoder thus enabling 5.1.

This was posted by Accord99 which is correct
SPDIF by its nature is only 2 channels. DD and DTS uses compression to fit more channels but there is no way to send 5.1 channels of uncompressed digital audio over 1 SPDIF cable.

and yes with digital coax you can get winamp for example to work but it won't be 5.1 you may hear it on all speakers but it won't be 5.1 if you switch it to the analog or digital din then you will get the 5.1 source. If you want 5.1 from the SPDIF with digital coax then the source must be DD/AC-3 and the player must be capable of playing DD/AC-3 failure to meat this requirement it will default to a 2 channel stereo even if you have 4 or 5 speakers connected.
 

lameaway

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Jun 18, 2003
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Nic, there's no need for you to rate other people's posts. How about you make _your_ arguments and let readers do the rating themselves? Jackass...

Anyway, what you're saying makes sense, yes, but I was under the impression that the Audigy contained its own AC-3 encoder, which would take raw multichannel data from any source and encode it into an AC-3 stream to send down the wire. Having never owned an Audigy I can't say for sure, but this is at least how the onboard audio on my NForce1 board works.
 

JonTom

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Oct 10, 2001
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Originally posted by: NicColt
and yes with digital coax you can get winamp for example to work but it won't be 5.1 you may hear it on all speakers but it won't be 5.1 if you switch it to the analog or digital din then you will get the 5.1 source. If you want 5.1 from the SPDIF with digital coax then the source must be DD/AC-3 and the player must be capable of playing DD/AC-3 failure to meat this requirement it will default to a 2 channel stereo even if you have 4 or 5 speakers connected.

okay. does this mean that if I want to play a game with support for more than 2 speakers (not DD yet, as I understand it, but say 4 point surround), I must use the analog connections? I cannot connect to my HT receiver and play through that with my TV and HT setup?

The HT receiver does decode DD and DTS. I have a DVD player for movies. Playing games in surround sound (4.1, 5.1, DD later when supported...) would be nice. Not having to run 6 cables (3 prs) 40+ feet from computer to HT receiver to support an analog connection is the attraction ($$, aesthetics, hum).

What is Digital Din?
 

DaveSimmons

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Aug 12, 2001
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Originally posted by: lameaway
There is no sound card that can process analog audio... thats silly. Everything is of course digital up to the output stage, at which it can either be packaged up into a digital protocol like Dolby and sent across a cable or sent directly to DACs. The reason some soundcards are incapable of sending multichannel output from games to the digital out is simply because they are incapable of encoding 5 or 6 raw_digital_ channels into a serial protocol like Dolby Digital. I'm rather sure the Audigy is capable of this...

EDIT: And when I say protocol, I really mean format. :confused:
Don't you mean the Audigy /2 are not capable of this?

Everything I've read says that Creative does not do realtime dolby encoding of game audio, that only the nforce does this right now. If you can find a reference that says the Audigy / 2 does do realtime DD or DTS 5.1 encoding of game audio (vs. passthrough of DVD pre-encoded 5.1) please provide a link and prove me wrong :)

 

lameaway

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Jun 18, 2003
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Well then, it turns out, I'm very wrong. After working with several NForce boards, I thought that this would be standard in the latest premium soundcards, especially those touting 5.1 surround and Dolby Digital. Suckage...
 

DaveSimmons

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Aug 12, 2001
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Yes, it was already a flaw in the Live 5.1 cards, you'd think that two generations later they'd get it right.
 

Pariah

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Apr 16, 2000
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Originally posted by: DaveSimmons
Yes, it was already a flaw in the Live 5.1 cards, you'd think that two generations later they'd get it right.

No, they don't support it, but I don't see why anyone would want this feature in the first place, as it doesn't really make sense for anyone except someone who has a digital capable receiver and no analog 5.1 in. How many people fall into that category? If you care about audio quality, you would never use the DD encoding feature as there are numerous ways this can potentially mangle the audio. There is absolutely no way that the converted, compressed, and encoded stream will be more accurate than the original source output through analog. Also, why would you want to bypass the vastly superior audio circuitry of the Audigy 2 in favor of letting inferior equipment like the Logitech speakers decode the signal? That doesn't make any sense. If all you're interested is digital out, any $20 card with it will perform equally well to any other card with it. There is a common misconception that digital audio transfers mean higher quality when compared to analog transfers which is plainly false. It all depends on the equipment and the source being played.