How does vista handle 2 sound cards?

[xsilver]

long story short -
havent been able to get spdif and headphone out to work at the same time after installing vista 64.
I have a realtek onboard solution (p5k-e) that has spdif

Just wanted to know if I can get a workaround by getting another sound card and therefore vista will output headphones on the pci card and the onboard will handle the spdif?

or is there another workaround to get headphones and spdif working?

The closest thing I have found is to use a program called virtual audio cable which I think uses a loopback to double up the sound; only problem is the driver isnt signed so I cant get it working on 64bit vista!?

btw. currently if i want spdif - select spdif as the default sound device. Then restart all apps (annoying!)

 

[QuixoticOne]

There's no mixer setting to enable both digital out and analog out at the same time?
I think I've got a P5K-E with Vista64 on it unless I'm confusing the motherboard.
I'll take a look later on and see if I see anything.
Did you try to install the driver or mixer utilities right from realtek's site to see if they're better than the version Windows Update or the original CD had?

Pull the sound chip datasheet from realtek's site corresponding to the sound chip and see if it seems to say that there is a limit as to having EITHER digital out OR analog out.
If it is possible for the chip to output both (and I don't see why it could not), then I assume with the right mixer settings it should work.

Now if you're outputting AAC AC-52 AC3 / DTS / Dolby mode audio out the digital port when playing a DVD or something multi-channel beyond stereo I'm not sure if it would have a totally distinct capability to stereo downmix the digital tracks out to headphones AND play the digital signal over the SPDIF... though that would be more of a limitation of the Vista audio software than the chip assuming the digital and analog DAC channels are truly independent in the sound chip (which they may not be).

Multiple sound cards -- yeah in theory they ought to be able to play independently, though you'd have to get the software to play back not on one device but multiple ones, and most software and the traditional Vista sound output stuff probably wouldn't make that easy.

If you got one of the sound cards with hardware dolby digital live / DTS encoding support then maybe it'd be more likely to always be able to play something out analog and digital at the same time.

Watch out for the DRM stuff though since it would be likely to shut off various outputs / inputs that might frustrate any work-around you come up with.

 

[xsilver]

Its a vista problem - on XP i dont have to do anything and it outputs to both. In fact on XP the only way you mess it up is to specifically select spdif - then it disables analog.

On vista I find that you can only select 1 device although both devices are actually capable (eg. you can select "test" and either device can play a sound) but only 1 device can actually output in WMP or whatever.

Did heaps of research and supposedly some versions of the realtek driver are somehow unintentionally buggy such that both are outputted or something - I have no idea - I cant seem to find the right driver version

I am on vista 64 btw.

I know there could be some limitations on getting AC3/DTS on spdif + output on headphones but If I can get stereo on both I would be happy

My interpretation of the problem is that vista no longer allows audio to be outputted without some kind of authorization therefore it can only do it on 1 device at a time. so lame.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Originally posted by: xsilver
My interpretation of the problem is that vista no longer allows audio to be outputted without some kind of authorization therefore it can only do it on 1 device at a time. so lame.

Vista defect # 43598 duly noted.

 

[Modelworks]

Could be an issue related to the way vista handles sound. Vista doesn't process sound at the kernel level for all applications generating sound. Instead each application is processed separately. If the application you are using only outputs to wave out and not spdif then that is all vista will output. It isn't like in xp where you could send a sound to the kernel mixer and that would output to whatever sources. Instead the application has to pick the output and if your application can only select one then your pretty much stuck with that.

Its good in one way that you can set a master output level for all devices then set volume levels for each application and have them mixed together. But bad when you want to do what you are trying to do.