Dolby Digital Soundcard Recomendations

[The Maynard]

I'm going to be building a seperate computer that will be a dedicated DIVX server. I will have a video out to the TV and the Dolby Digital out to my reciever. I haven't yet owned a soundcard that outputs DD 5.1 so I had some questions:

Which one is recomended?
Will it be able to be outputed to my Home Theater reciever?
Which type cable will I need to run the DD 5.1 out to the reciever, optical or coaxial?
Will their be any signal humming? Anyone experience any?

Any pics I've seen showing the back of the cards looks like mini-headphone jacks for the outputs so I don't know what to use to run out to the reciever. Any help and suggestions will be much appreciated.
Thanks

[The Maynard]

Sound Blaster Audigy Platinum eX EAX ADVANCED HD. Dual SB1394 (IEEE 1394 compliant) connector. External Audigy drive. 24 bit / 96 Khz DACs. Retail Box

This one looks like it has optical inputs and outputs for pluging this into a reciever. Any ideas if it's a good one?

[vhelp]

The maynard,

my two cents worth..

Well, I have 3 of them, (but not their latest, Audigy)
I've found that all these SB cards Hog your system recourse
to the limit, and then some. If you're playing divX, I don't know
how much you will need to kickstarts and what-nots, but if you CPU
isn't strong enough, and couple the above issue, YOU may have some
dissapointments when using these cards. I'm using two cheap scards
for my purpose, but what's wrong w/ Dolby Prologic anyways ??

-vhelp
----------------------------------------------
Happy HOLIDAY all.

[crahak]

Well, I have 3 sb live 5.1 (2 oem and a platinum), and I'm not impressed at all by them. There are a LOT of driver issues (those people crying because supposedly of ATI drivers haven't seen anything). That card was REALLY evil combined with a VIA chipset... BSOD every 5 minute or less, unless you really get into funny stuff like PCI latency patches and other fun stuff that only work so good. (Card is non bus mastering, and cretive don't care either).

They're also known for AC3 pass-thru hell and creative didn't quite seem to bother about it with win 2k... Plus, some people report the spdif output voltage being out of spec, lots of fun stuff like that...

Drivers used to be downloadable somehow, now I'd have to pay to order CD's or something... (not free either). And the typical install from the DRIVERS CD (not those extra CDs that come with it) did install a bunch of samples, demo stuff and nice things that took over a gig... (Anyways, the CD that came with my platinum did) and it takes a while to clean up.

My next one sure won't be one anyways.

AC3 is nice though. Many other sound cards are just evil (or their drivers) when it comes to pass AC3 thru, so you must shop carefully. Lots of advertized "6 channel" cards also only have analog outputs... I don't care much about toslink, spdif works good anyhow, and cables are cheaper, and you can do them yourself cheap and good. (most stores tend to sell overpriced toslink and spdif cables...)

It's the best way to send audio to a home theater, for sure. Not just for AC3, but it's practically immune (no one says jitter and no one gets hurt? lol) to hum and such noise (hum is analog and won't affect the way the digital stream is decoded). This also makes it even good to play mp3's and the like. AC3 is nice anyways

Dunno for sure about the audigy's, but sb live 5.1 wise, you need a 1/8" mono jack to female RCA apapter so you can use a standard "spidif" coax with RCA connectors...

Uhhh. You say a divx "server", whereas it sounds more like a "player" to me than a server. Anyways, I burn all mine to CDR's.

[The Maynard]

Dolby Digital is just so much better than pro-logic. I like having a full range of sound in the rear speakers instead of just tinny nothing sound. I have kickass rear speakers and I want to take advantage of them as much as possible.
I've found a few other cards that are cheaper and they seem to have optical outputs. Here they are with some links to the pics of the cards:

Aopen Model AW850D, PCI Sound Card Retail $24 ( I may get this one because it looks like it has 2 optical and 2 coaxial.)
http://www.newegg.com/app/Showimage.asp?image=29-117-106-09.jpg/29-117-106-08.jpg/29-1...117-106-06.jpg

Chaintech 6 Channel Sound Card Model AV515M $16
http://www.newegg.com/app/Showimage.asp?image=29-120-101-03.JPG/29-120-101-05.JPG/29-1...120-101-02.JPG

Guillemot Hercules Fortissimo III 7.1 - OEM $42
http://www.newegg.com/app/Showimage.asp?image=29-116-116-03.jpg/29-116-116-04.JPG/29-116-116-01.JPG


Thanks for the heads up about the Sound Blaster issues. It seems that Sound Blaster is not all that it's cracked up to be. I've had nothing but problems with the SB cards I've owned and have heard nothing but bad things about them.
The processor I'm going to use will either be an AMD Duron 1GHz or I might just pay a few extra bucks and get an AMD XP1800. So resources might be tight depending on which one I get.

If you could, take a look at the cards listed above and tell me what you think. Thanks alot!

[The Maynard]

Well, it'll be a Divx PLAYER for the TV and reciever it's plugged into. But it will be a Divx server for my other computers. All my videos will be stored on it and will be served over the network. I'll have a 40GB hard drive for it which should hold a large number of movies and when It gets close to being filled I'll put the old ones on CD to make room for the new ones.
These will be the specs:
AMD Duron 1GHz or XP1800
ECS k7s5a mobo
256mb ram
16x DVD-ROM
40GB HD
Jaton 32mb video card with RCA and S-Video TV out
And the AOpen 5.1 sound card

I'm trying to decide on the case but I've narrowed it down to a couple of mini desktop case that are designed to look like a home theater reciever.

I used to have an SB Live and I had the same VIA conflicts that you did. They just suck. It wouldn't even work with the mobo listed above. Sound was very choppy. Oh well. I will rule them out entirely. Thanks for the help.

[crahak]

I could be completely wrong, but from what I believe both the first cards only have analog outputs for 6 speakers, and that sux

The 3rd one sounds good, mind you I've never tried it myself.

Mind you, the sb live should work fine (BSOD wise) with the K7S5A (I have 2 of 'em, with the dreaded DDR problem. Had to solder resistors on both to get them working fine... lol). Drivers are still a pain, and it's best avoided.

CPU Wise, I'd spend the extra 5$ and get the XP 1800+ I would have bought that same one too, but the older VIA board I'll be using only supports duron/athlon with a FSB of 200MHz... So I went for a Duron 1300 (I think it was like 5$ less than the XP 1800+)... It is too for a "media playing box"... No keyboard, no mouse, just a DVD-Rom drive, a remote, and a S-video out Some coding to do after I get the whole thing put together (mail ordering fun...) but it should be a nice thing... My family will be able to play anything without my assistance, or a 16 page manual with illustrations... lol

[The Maynard]

On the first to cards, though, the pics show a piece that you hook into the sound card that gives you optical or coaxial outputs. Do you think that they are converted from digital to analog because of the way they're hooked up? Should I get the one that has the optical output built INTO the card?

[crahak]

See? I told ya I could be COMPLETELY wrong I didn't see the extension brackets when I looked, just the cards (it was late too... lol) Yes, the first one has both spdif and toslink, and the second by the looks of it only has toslink. I like spdif better, but it's only a personnal preference...