[GCTonyHawk7]

Hey guys. Got a good tough mystery for you audio gurus.

First I will set up the scenario. I've got a Realtek HD audio integrated sound card on my motherboard. I use it's Optical output to feed my Z5500 speakers. I've got a Nintendo Wii hooked up with video on my Tuner Card, and the audio is converted to a 3.5mm jack and plugged into the blue line-in port on the computer.

Now, the big issue; when playing the Wii, I can not seem to get the sound to play on my speakers. Now, to solve this, I can plug in the analog cables to go from the Z5500 to my speakers, but that causes a huge Ground-looping fiasco that is too in depth to go into here.

So, I need to play my Wii over my Z-5500 speakers, and it needs to go to the speakers optically. Now, you might say, just plug the Wii into my speakers directly and use it like that. I could do that, but then I am unable to record the audio, and this is why I use the tuner-setup in the first place.

So, is it just my integrated sound card that isn't able to take the analog input and output it digitally, or is this just a common trait of sound and electronics. I attempted to search Google, but it is so specific, I can not find anything on the issue. If I have to buy a new sound card to make it work, I will do so in a heart beat. I was looking at sound cards anyways. Is there some setting on a sound card's spec sheet that will detail this feature?

I am only assuming it is my sound card and not all, but I would not know. Please help if you can.

Quick recap: Wii plugged in analog line-in, and needs to output over optical cable, not working on my integrated sound card. Do I need do buy another?

Thanks guys.

 

[nick_charles]

In theory this should not be an issue. The chipset supports DA and AD functions, a couple of things may be happening.

1) Your card needs to be told to automatically do the AD without having a
3rd party aplication running, you may need to set up the analog input as a record input.

2) If 1) is okay the digital output from this automatic conversion has to be in a format supported by your speakers i.e the right bit-depth and sampling rate.

EDIT:try here....

http://www.gigabyte.com.tw/FileList/...00_0418-05.pdf

Are you sure the analog signal out of the Tuner card is okay ?

 

[GCTonyHawk7]

Hey, thanks for the reply. Got a few questions about it though. First off, what is AD and DA? Not familiar with those terms.

The Wii line-in input is set as a recording input and is set as the defualt record input as well. In the control panel, it has a Recording Volume, and a Playback Volume, both of which are unmuted. It is set to record at 16 bits, 48000Hz as the default format.

The speakers are being sent a 24 bits 96000Hz signal. This is what my speakers natively support, so that is the best I can do. Sound works on everything else just fine, it is only this line in that won't play.

As I said before, the sollution to all of this is plugging in the analog 3.5 mm cables, and viola, you have sound from the Wii. But that causes a ground loop with the my headphones that is unbearable.

I am using DScaler as a displaying software for the tuner card. Audio input for the device is set to Line-in, sample rate is 48000Hz, stereo sound. In he audio setup window, the Mixer device is set to the line in, and it says the destination is Master Volume. You are unable to change the destination, it is just set that way.

If I go to the Windows Vista sound panel, and go to the recording device tab, I can see line-in, set as the defualt device. It says it is working, and if I turn on the Wii, it shows little green bars. (The signal it is recieving.) So, it knows the sound is there... it just isn't taking it and putting it out over Optical. If I go to its properties, I can change name and icon, volume levels, and then some settings. "DC Offset Cancellation" is checked on, and "Immediate mode" is set off. "Allow applications to take exclusive control of this device" is on.

So, hopefully that tells you all you need to know. Honestly, I would imagine it is just my card.

Just a quick note, that manual you linked to doesn't seem to be for my drivers at all. Mine is a much more simplistic system it would seem.

Made you a quick screenshot of all of this.

Thanks for all the help guys.

 

[nick_charles]

Quote:

Originally Posted by GCTonyHawk7 /img/forum/go_quote.gif Hey, thanks for the reply. Got a few questions about it though. First off, what is AD and DA? Not familiar with those terms.

AD is Analog to Digital
DA is Digital to Analog

Quote:

The Wii line-in input is set as a recording input and is set as the defualt record input as well. In the control panel, it has a Recording Volume, and a Playback Volume, both of which are unmuted. It is set to record at 16 bits, 48000Hz as the default format.

Okay

Quote:

The speakers are being sent a 24 bits 96000Hz signal. This is what my speakers natively support, so that is the best I can do. Sound works on everything else just fine, it is only this line in that won't play.

What application is sending the 24/96K signal out , it looks like you are recording at 16/48 and upsampling to 24/96, or trying to, on the fly.

Try this, record a short sample at 16/48 from the wii, then separately play it back at 24/96 from whatever application you use for playback, does it work ?

Quote:

Audio input for the device is set to Line-in, sample rate is 48000Hz, stereo sound. In he audio setup window, the Mixer device is set to the line in, and it says the destination is Master Volume. You are unable to change the destination, it is just set that way.

Sorry, this is the Tuner card right ?

Quote:

If I go to the Windows Vista sound panel, and go to the recording device tab, I can see line-in, set as the defualt device. It says it is working, and if I turn on the Wii, it shows little green bars. (The signal it is recieving.) So, it knows the sound is there... it just isn't taking it and putting it out over Optical. If I go to its properties, I can change name and icon, volume levels, and then some settings. "DC Offset Cancellation" is checked on, and "Immediate mode" is set off. "Allow applications to take exclusive control of this device" is on.

Okay. My guess is that there is a disconnect between the input and output, that is it takes the signal fine but is not automatically upsampling it and outputting it. Without seeing your manual or a skipload of screen shots I am flummoxed.

Can you set your Wii to 24/96 or set your speakers to 16/48 or anyway set both to the same values so as to avoid upsampling , it may not be relevant but it is one less variable...you can swap them back later.

 

[GCTonyHawk7]

I'll just go in order here.

- All applications other than DScaler are working and sending out 96/24. Trillian, Media Player, VLC, Windows... goes on and on.

- I tried recording it with the Wii, and it recorded fine. I can play it back in Media Player Classic and have sound perfectly. So, it is receiving the sound and everything just fine, the card is just not outputting it to the speakers. Optical is just the raw digital data from the computer. So, it is possible for it to send this digital data over the optical. However, when it is an analog signal, it doesn't seem to convert the analog to the digital to send out.

- Yes, that was in DScaler for the tuner card.

- I tried matching the formats, and this did nothing.

At this point, I don't really even care if this happens in my current settup, I just want to know if buying a new card, like the Razer AC-1 would fix this issue. I figure a more feature-ful card would have options for this. Although, since I've only used the onboard, I wouldn't know.

So, can I get what I want with other soundcards?

Thanks for the help.

 

[nick_charles]

Sorry for the delay, my Internet connection died. I tracked down the Vista version of the manual for your card, it did not help I am sorry to say. There was no clues as to whether what you want to do is possible or not with that card.

With my external USB sound card I cannot do this either. I can record an analog signal and later play it back as a digital stream from the same application that records it, but I cannot monitor the recording in real time via SPDIF, I can monitor the analog output but that does not help you.

As for other cards, I cannot say. But what you are looking for is a direct monitor function on the SPDIF out from an analog input.

 

[Rempert]

I don't think direct monitoring is going to work with digital outputs. What you need is to use some real audio software, and route the sound to the digital outputs using ASIO (which for onboard sound would probably also mean using ASIO4ALL).

 

[1UP]

Maybe look at this EDIROL UA-1EX USB Audio Interface :: Overview

 

[alleyezon_d]

Hi,

I've gone through all this a while ago when trying to hear myself with my own mic with a similar setup (external dac, speakers). The trouble is the drivers. If you go to sounds>playback devices and check the properties of speakers or headphones, you will see a tab called "levels" and this is where you set the volume of any line-in's you want to monitor (ie, mic's, etc. and I believe the default is mute). Now if you check the same tab for the "digital output" playback device, you will see it is blank. It sucks, and I've been updating my drivers every time they release a new version (pretty frequent) to check for this functionality. No luck so far.

 

[nick_charles]

Quote:

Originally Posted by 1UP /img/forum/go_quote.gif Maybe look at this EDIROL UA-1EX USB Audio Interface :: Overview

Danger Will Robinson !

This is my card and I definitely **cannot** automatically stream digital from an analog input , I have tried a few different apps, no joy

 

[1UP]

He could do it the other way round

 

[GCTonyHawk7]

Wow, the obvious just struck me last night.

All I need to do is get a female 3.5 to two male 3.5mm Splitter. Run one of them into the computer like I am now, and it can record, and run the other to the speakers so I can hear it at the same time. Also, since the electrical stream only goes one way through those cables, it would never route back to the computer and shouldn't cause the ground loop issue.

Let me know if you think this won't work, and thanks for all your help guys.