should i change souncard?

[peter2679]

hi, my current setup involves me plugging my xfi extremusik to an older receiver (yamaha rxv-1200) through the 6ch input on the receiver. Also on the receiver i have connected a stand-alone dvd player and digital cable receiver through digital coaxial cables.

Now, there are three things my speaker setup gets judged on:

1) games: playing games on my computer is awesome. i don't like fps games so i usually play RTS and RPGs. the sound of games is incredible on this setup and i have no complaints whatsoever.

2) music: playing cds through the dvd player makes music sound noticeably better than playing them on my computer. i doesn't matter if its my wma collection or original cds, music sounds better when playing from the dvd player. i attribute this to better dacs on the receiver and pro logic II music mode on the receiver is better than all the different gizmos xfi offers (crystallizer, cms3d...).

3)movies and digital tv: this would be the same analysis as with music. 2-channel content is better when not playing through the computer. and dvds... well... it's pretty much the same but settings sometimes aren't right and i don't get the 5.1 soundtrack outputting but a 2 channel soundtrack. And sometimes it feels like i'm not convinced that it's not the original 5.1 soundtrack from the dvd itself that is playing.

Based on all this, would you guys recommend that i get a different soundcard, and what changes would i notice on my setup. i was thinking a soundcard from auzentech that outputs a digital signal would result in better sound quality than what i am currently getting.

 

[YOyoYOhowsDAjello]

Before getting a new soundcard, you might want to set up a digital connection from your X-Fi to the receiver for when you want to do music / watch video.

Depending on what X-Fi you have, you should be able to get SPDIF out of the flexi-jack.

You'd still get the X-Fi's excellent gaming performance (through 6 channel input) and you'd be sending your receiver a digital signal for the other sources when you enable that output.

 

[peter2679]

so you're telling me to use the one output i have left on the extremusik to output a digital signal to my receiver. then i would change my receiver from 6ch input to a digital input depending on what i'm doing on the computer. the one question i have is that when the flexijack on the extremusic is set to digital output do i need to do anything on my computer to tell the computer which type of output i would like to use or are both types enabled all the time? i mean in windows do i need to go to the creative software and switch between the analog outputs or the digital.

 

[YOyoYOhowsDAjello]

Originally posted by: peter2679
so you're telling me to use the one output i have left on the extremusik to output a digital signal to my receiver. then i would change my receiver from 6ch input to a digital input depending on what i'm doing on the computer. the one question i have is that when the flexijack on the extremusic is set to digital output do i need to do anything on my computer to tell the computer which type of output i would like to use or are both types enabled all the time? i mean in windows do i need to go to the creative software and switch between the analog outputs or the digital.

I don't have an X-Fi to tell you, but for my own soundcard it's just a couple buttons I click to switch from analog to digital output. The X-Fi control utility should allow you to easily select between the kind of output you want to use.

A couple selections in that utility program and then switching the source on your receiver should be all you need to do to change the audio from analog to digital (and back).

 

[darkswordsman17]

Well, if you've already got it hooked up with 6 channel then you're not going to get any better sound for games (unless you prefer the sound of DDL/DTS encoded stuff which I don't know would be worth the cost). Like Jello said you can always use the flexjack to get digital out for music and movies (I would guess your reciever would be better for decoding capabilities), although its really not that necessary (for instance maybe you like the EQ and/or CMSS that Creative offers and so it might not even be worth the hassle of doing that.

I wouldn't say that it'd be worth it for you to switch cards at this point, as the X-Fi is far from a bad card.

 

[peter2679]

well there's games, movies and music. currently i'm sacrificing movies and music for the game capabilities of the xfi. now hooking up the digital output on the xfi on top of the analog connection is an easy fix to my problem but it already would require me to change inputs on the receiver (which is fine) but if i have to do it in software too then forget it.

 

[YOyoYOhowsDAjello]

Originally posted by: peter2679
well there's games, movies and music. currently i'm sacrificing movies and music for the game capabilities of the xfi. now hooking up the digital output on the xfi on top of the analog connection is an easy fix to my problem but it already would require me to change inputs on the receiver (which is fine) but if i have to do it in software too then forget it.

It would just require a few seconds to change settings in software.

I'm not sure how the new DDL / DTS encoding cards are set up, but on my X-Mystique I would also need to change settings going from games to other sources. Enabling DDL is a setting on my utility program, so when I just want PCM or passthrough, I need to change my SPDIF output setting.

Getting a new card might not mean eliminating any of the software changes that you want to avoid.

 

[peter2679]

thanks for all the replies, i think you convincedme on keeping the xfi for now. i'm out of coaxial inputs on the yammy so i'll have set it up differently to have dvd go through optical but i think it's a very good solution to my problem. thanks again.

 

[YOyoYOhowsDAjello]

Originally posted by: peter2679
thanks for all the replies, i think you convincedme on keeping the xfi for now. i'm out of coaxial inputs on the yammy so i'll have set it up differently to have dvd go through optical but i think it's a very good solution to my problem. thanks again.

Let us know how it works out.

I'm not sure if you need a mono to RCA or Stereo to RCA adapter for the Xtreme Music card. Make sure to look up which kind you need to get before buying.

I think one or two might even be digital a digital optical minijack? Anyway... if you figure out what kind of connection Creative decided to use for that particular card, you should be in business.

 

[peter2679]

well, i finally had time this week to hook up the flexijack on the xfi to the digital input on my receiver. the good news is that all outputs are on all the time (sort of...). so now i can just flip the 6ch input button on the receiver and i go from listening from one set of outputs to the other. i've done some testing just to see how it works out but haven't really compared audio quality in any way yet.

All i've figured out is that when i open the thx setup console this is what happens. the sound card is setup for a 5.1 speaker set. when my receiver is in 6ch mode (analog outputs) and i test all the channels, all the channels work fine. when i turn to the digital input, i only get two channels. another problem is that the xfi can output at 48 or 96khz sampling frequency. i noticed that my receiver turns off all dsp when receiving a sampling frequency of 96khz so the amp gets stuck in stereo which means only two channels. this is not good at all. at 48khz the dsp turns on and i get to use pro logic II which i love in all situations. In any case since i haven't really tested audio quality i can't say yet if this is a good thing or a bad thing.
Now when i try to watch movies things get a little complicated. i use powerdvd as my software player. in its configuration menu, if i set the audio to 6 channels it decodes the track whether dd5.1 or dts and outputs that to the receiver through the analog outputs. if i turn the receiver to the optical input i get a two channel soundtrack which goes through the prologic II processing. obviously i'd rather get the original 5.1 soundtrack. i could change the configuration in power dvd and it could output the bitstream to the receiver which the receiver sees and does the decoding. this would be ideal but in this mode if i change the receiver to 6ch input, i get nothing.

anyways that's all i've done for now. i need to look into this 96 versus 48khz thing and what real effect this has.

 

[YOyoYOhowsDAjello]

I think it sounds like things are working as they should.

If you send bitstream, 6 channel direct wouldn't be working since it's not decoding the signal at the soundcard.

Not sure on the 48khz vs. 96khz issue. I listen to music in just stereo so I haven't really messed with that much. I also send a 44.1khz signal for my music rather than 48 or 96.

 

[Ghouler]

i could change the configuration in power dvd and it could output the bitstream to the receiver which the receiver sees and does the decoding. this would be ideal but in this mode if i change the receiver to 6ch input, i get nothing.

If you want your receiver to decode dolby you need to make sure that you set
both power DVD and X-Fi to output SPDIF.

The setting for X-Fi is in the Audio Console on the Decoder tab.

Good Luck