What monitor input are you using HDMI or DVI?

[JBT]

HDMI to my TV, DVI to my 2nd monitor. I use sound occasionally on the TV. 90% of the time I am using my headphones though.

 

[MTDEW]

how else are they going to reroute the audio without a physical cable?

Although, I do not remember my source on that one so maybe its bunk. Anyone here with an AMD card that uses HDMI? If you disable your mobo's audio controller (done via bios) then we would know whether AMD includes an actual audio processor or just a reroute driver.

Ok, I disconnected my DVI and connected HDMI from one of 6950's to my monitor.
Disabled onboard audio in bios, then checked device manager upon reboot to be sure the AMD High Definition Audio Device is the only thing listed.
And then checked to make sure it is the default audio device.

And i'll be darned, i do have sound.
I can't tell how good it is since monitor speakers suck, but it definitely works.

 

[Fallengod]

Well of course you do. Most decent video cards can decode audio through hdmi port these days. Its how I output all my stuff to my TV too, otherwise I wouldnt have sound. I love that feature.

Even a GT 520 or AMD 5450 can output sound through the video card hdmi port.

 

[MTDEW]

Well of course you do. Most decent video cards can decode audio through hdmi port these days. Its how I output all my stuff to my TV too, otherwise I wouldnt have sound. I love that feature.

Even a GT 520 or AMD 5450 can output sound through the video card hdmi port.

Read the WHOLE thread...LOL
The question wasn't whether HDMI out on a video card supported audio.
It was questioned whether or not it was just a pass through of the mobos onboard sound or not.
And nobody really knew since no video card reviews ever seem to mention it, so it was tested.
I only found one tibit of info in another forum that AMD cards use a realtek sound chip, but thats about all Ive found, no clue exactly what it is and don't really care since i dont use it.
I just tested to answer a question. :biggrin:

 

[stylez777]

I use DVI for my Monitor and Also HDMI to output to my TV.

I do hate that windows 7 arranges teh desktop and moves open programs when I shut one off!!! SO ANNOYING!!

 

[iCyborg]

Read the WHOLE thread...LOL
The question wasn't whether HDMI out on a video card supported audio.
It was questioned whether or not it was just a pass through of the mobos onboard sound or not.
And nobody really knew since no video card reviews ever seem to mention it, so it was tested.
I only found one tibit of info in another forum that AMD cards use a realtek sound chip, but thats about all Ive found, no clue exactly what it is and don't really care since i dont use it.
I just tested to answer a question. :biggrin:

Yeah, it's not MB audio, there's an audio hardware block on the graphics card that implements Intel HD Audio/Azalia spec.

 

[cantholdanymore]

I'm not totally enamored of DisplayPort, at least on Windows 7. When a monitor goes off, Windows removes its desktop space entirely, which annoyingly rearranges my desktop icons and open program locations (especially when everything on my 1920x1200 gets moved to my portrait-rotated 1050x1680). I haven't moved my main monitor back to DVI because it has a setting to keep polling the PC even when turned off, which prevents that behavior, but it's still irksome and wastes power.

Agree, this utterly sucks.
Have a look at this:
http://social.technet.microsoft.com...l/thread/8a9b5aa7-fe33-4e6d-b39b-8ac80a21fdc2

You're not alone.

 

[Fallengod]

Read the WHOLE thread...LOL
The question wasn't whether HDMI out on a video card supported audio.
It was questioned whether or not it was just a pass through of the mobos onboard sound or not.
And nobody really knew since no video card reviews ever seem to mention it, so it was tested.
I only found one tibit of info in another forum that AMD cards use a realtek sound chip, but thats about all Ive found, no clue exactly what it is and don't really care since i dont use it.
I just tested to answer a question. :biggrin:

Fair enough. Sometimes I skip to the end.

That is kind of what I meant though. Of course its straight from the video card. I havnt used onboard sound in, forever. I always have that disabled.

 

[MTDEW]

I can't believe its so hard to find out what soundchip Nvidia and AMD use in their cards .
If anyone knows, please post, cuz now that i've searched and cannot seem to find any info, its driving me nuts, even though i dont even use it. lOL

 

[Despoiler]

Display port.

 

[KingFatty]

I can't believe its so hard to find out what soundchip Nvidia and AMD use in their cards .
If anyone knows, please post, cuz now that i've searched and cannot seem to find any info, its driving me nuts, even though i dont even use it. lOL

But isn't there a good incentive to use the videocard soundcard? If your CPU is hitting 100% usage, wouldn't you free up some resources by using the videocard soundcard? The motherboard soundcard uses up some CPU resources I think.

Man, why haven't sites tested this? Use your soundcard to improve performance (even if it's a tiny bit, I'd rather make the best usage of my existing hardware).

maybe someone could test this out, see if CPU scores are higher when using the videocard soundcard?

 

[Zebo]

DVI on NEC 2490wuxi gen 1. Never liked dual monitors. Tried it but found it distracting. Windows 7 has a cool drag feature giving two full sized pages when i need it.

 

[Burpy]

Display Port, although I wish I could use DVI, because DP has many odd quirks.

 

[Fallengod]

But isn't there a good incentive to use the videocard soundcard? If your CPU is hitting 100% usage, wouldn't you free up some resources by using the videocard soundcard? The motherboard soundcard uses up some CPU resources I think.

Man, why haven't sites tested this? Use your soundcard to improve performance (even if it's a tiny bit, I'd rather make the best usage of my existing hardware).

maybe someone could test this out, see if CPU scores are higher when using the videocard soundcard?

Well, yes, but this has been tested in the past. These days CPU's are so fast I would highly doubt you would see much of a difference. In the past, it was only a small impact, and that was on much slower CPU's. Also, I havnt used onboard soundcard in a while anyways. I have my own Audigy ZS Platinum soundcard, this would alleviate the same type of CPU usage that youre suggesting with the videocard sound. But yes, using motherboard onboard sound does take a little CPU processing power.

 

[ss284]

3x display port, but I also experience weird quirks sometimes.

 

[Remobz]

I only use DVI.

 

[fastman]

Thanks to all who replied. I see no definitive majority to what people are using. I tried to make a poll but couldn't figure it out. For those who were wondering if using your sound card vs. on-board sound saves CPU time, yes it does, but it’s less than 5% I believe.

 

[KingFatty]

Any ideas if the videocard soundcard is of better quality than the motherboard soundcard? Should we use it for quality purposes? I think there is a good argument for getting a discrete sound card, to improve sound quality, but I wonder about the quality of the videocard soundcard?

 

[Fallengod]

Any ideas if the videocard soundcard is of better quality than the motherboard soundcard? Should we use it for quality purposes? I think there is a good argument for getting a discrete sound card, to improve sound quality, but I wonder about the quality of the videocard soundcard?

I have no idea, but the videocard sound processing has to be able to do Blu-ray sound formats and I know it does because I stream blu-rays to my TV all the time from my video card....So it has to be able to decode everything up to the lossless Dolby TrueHD, DTS-HD and Linear PCM I would assume. Those are pretty high quality formats. I guess the question is, which would sound better. Id assume a motherboard onboard soundcard would but...

 

[serpretetsky]

Digitial Audio is digital audio, whether it's coming from your video card, your on-board mobo, or you $200 sound card, it's the same exact signal.

Now, different sound chips may support different formats and some may allow bistreaming the original audio source straight to the reciever
http://www.missingremote.com/guide/bitstreaming-hdmi-hd-audio-formats-your-htpc

ati has had a built in audio chip since they had HDMI (or at least as long as i can remember). Nvidia used pass through audio from your mobo for a little while (you had to physically connect a cable from your video card to the SPDIF on your mobo)

 

[MTDEW]

But isn't there a good incentive to use the videocard soundcard? If your CPU is hitting 100% usage, wouldn't you free up some resources by using the videocard soundcard? The motherboard soundcard uses up some CPU resources I think.

Man, why haven't sites tested this? Use your soundcard to improve performance (even if it's a tiny bit, I'd rather make the best usage of my existing hardware).

maybe someone could test this out, see if CPU scores are higher when using the videocard soundcard?

I went through that dilemma when i had to decide to use my X-fi vs onboard audio for better airflow when trying to squeeze a soundcard between my two video cards.
And the conclusion i came to after reading a LOT was right in line with what Fallengod stated, that it has virtually no performance hit with modern cpu's.

I guess the same could be asked for GPU integrated sound , does it use GPU/CPU resources?
And how much?

But, yeah, you're thinking the same as I am, i cannot believe i can't find a single review that tests a GPU's sound chip.
You'd figure someone would have at least tested the quality of GPU based sound.

 

[RavenSEAL]

2x DVI

 

[MTDEW]

Digitial Audio is digital audio, whether it's coming from your video card, your on-board mobo, or you $200 sound card, it's the same exact signal.

Now, different sound chips may support different formats and some may allow bistreaming the original audio source straight to the reciever
http://www.missingremote.com/guide/bitstreaming-hdmi-hd-audio-formats-your-htpc

ati has had a built in audio chip since they had HDMI (or at least as long as i can remember). Nvidia used pass through audio from your mobo for a little while (you had to physically connect a cable from your video card to the SPDIF on your mobo)

Nice link, reading it now. :thumbsup:

 

[taltamir]

Ok, I disconnected my DVI and connected HDMI from one of 6950's to my monitor.
Disabled onboard audio in bios, then checked device manager upon reboot to be sure the AMD High Definition Audio Device is the only thing listed.
And then checked to make sure it is the default audio device.

And i'll be darned, i do have sound.
I can't tell how good it is since monitor speakers suck, but it definitely works.

That is pretty awesome. Thanks for doing the experiment. I was parroting what I heard on forums before... glad we thought to actually perform a test and verify it. Turns out common knowledge is wrong.

Reminds me when my friend was asking around if he could replace just one of the 3 antennae on his router to get better reception and all the forum experts said no, not a single person thought it was doable... his dad the cell phone engineer said yes and was right.

Anyways, thanks for the experiment. And would be great if we could get some professional reviewers to test the quality of those cards.

Digitial Audio is digital audio

Several issues.
1. In movies and music you have a prerendered track for a specific amount of speakers. This needs to be processed to match the amount of speakers you actually have (usually different then what it was designed for).
Even if your CPU is massively overpowered and can easily handle it, there is still a different in quality of the algorithms used by different companies.
2. Video games need to mix in multiple sounds together on demand (based on player's actions) and take the directionality and hopefully terrain into account. A non trivial task (and one that is usually done wrong).
3. The second most common digital audio link after HDMI is optical audio out. I will forgive you if you never heard of it. People typically run their PC speakers on analog.
4. There is no such thing as a digital speaker. Speakers are made by running an electric current through a magnet which causes it to vibrate and produce sound. Take a speaker apart and you would find a round magnet with an electrical wire soldered unto to it. Analog audio is the raw electrical current that runs, unmodified, through the magnet to produce sound. Your TV has a digital to analog converter and there is a very good chance it is lower quality then a good stand alone audio card. Best is to get a good amp.

 

[serpretetsky]

Several issues.
1. In movies and music you have a prerendered track for a specific amount of speakers. This needs to be processed to match the amount of speakers you actually have (usually different then what it was designed for).
Even if your CPU is massively overpowered and can easily handle it, there is still a different in quality of the algorithms used by different companies.
2. Video games need to mix in multiple sounds together on demand (based on player's actions) and take the directionality and hopefully terrain into account. A non trivial task (and one that is usually done wrong).
3. The second most common digital audio link after HDMI is optical audio out. I will forgive you if you never heard of it. People typically run their PC speakers on analog.
4. There is no such thing as a digital speaker. Speakers are made by running an electric current through a magnet which causes it to vibrate and produce sound. Take a speaker apart and you would find a round magnet with an electrical wire soldered unto to it. Analog audio is the raw electrical current that runs, unmodified, through the magnet to produce sound. Your TV has a digital to analog converter and there is a very good chance it is lower quality then a good stand alone audio card. Best is to get a good amp.

wait... im confused, are you disagreeing with me on anything or just adding some points?