[.Sup]

Hi guys I cannot get Digital out working on my X-fi FPS (without external console)
I bought this

(mono 1/8>female RCA) and used a coaxial cable and get no sound. In the Creative console it says unknown or invalid signal.

Look at the picture posted on their site:

Quote:

Sound Blaster X-Fi Platinum/Fatal1ty FPS and Digital Speakers Note: As the X-Fi Platinum and the X-Fi Fatal1ty FPS cards share the same connectivity options on both the card and the X-Fi I/O Drive, the information in this section will pertain to both sound cards. Note: You will not receive surround sound from speakers connected to a sound card using a digital connection unless the signal is a DTS or an AC3 encoded signal and is being decoded by the speakers or home theater system. To connect your digital speakers to the X-Fi Platinum/Fatal1ty FPS, the speaker system must have either a coaxial or optical Digital In jack. An RCA-to-miniplug cable is connected to the FlexiJack on the back of the sound card. An RCA-to-RCA cable is then connected between the RCA-to-miniplug cable and the speaker system.

Have the exact same description in my manual
Did anyone got this working?

 

[iriverdude]

Diagram looks like it has 2 rings on the connector. Have you selected digital out in console & mixer?

 

[FallenAngel]

Need to enable Digital I/O in mixer.

 

[obobskivich]

usually the Creative "digital via TRS" has in on one "channel" and out on the other, are you sure you're connected proper? and enabled proper? (as per FA)

 

[.Sup]

I am not sure if connected correctly tbh. I have also tried mini optical toslink cable with no success. I really can't find an option in Creative console to enable digital but since it says unknown or invalid signal under spdif tab I would say its not connected properly.

 

[obobskivich]

it wont do TOS without the special Creative cable, which is $15 from their site

I don't remember if "left" or "right" is the output, I'm guessing you've got it backwards though (i.e: you can't easily get an output, because they want you to buy their cable

)

 

[.Sup]

Quote:

Originally Posted by obobskivich /img/forum/go_quote.gif it wont do TOS without the special Creative cable, which is $15 from their site I don't remember if "left" or "right" is the output, I'm guessing you've got it backwards though (i.e: you can't easily get an output, because they want you to buy their cable )

heh thanks for input obob, to be honest I was trying not to get their cable at any cost, spend more money on toslink cable and adapters than their cable is worth. Damn you Creative!

Btw theres an output/input marked "digital" thats where i plugged the cable in- but that input also has the functionality of line in (mic) and something else. The question is how to tell the card it should output digital not input anything

 

[Alydon]

.Sup,

Here a few links that might help you out:

Digital Output vs. Analog Output

FlexiJack Configurations for S/PDIF Digital I/O, Mic In/Line In

I think iriverdude is right. The first link above says that X-Fi cards have a stereo SPDIF digital out, so it looks like you need a stereo-mini-to-single-RCA adapter like this one. What you bought is a mono-mini-to-RCA adapter.

 

[ROBSCIX]

A 3.5 mini to twin RCA outs cable should work... or the adapter.

 

[obobskivich]

Quote:

Originally Posted by ROBSCIX /img/forum/go_quote.gif A 3.5 mini to twin RCA outs cable should work... or the adapter.

yeah

alydon, the adapter you're talking about would be nonsensical

he just needs a "stereo to RCA" plug, and a little bit of experimenting to find which one is output

 

[Alydon]

Yeah I figured that out after I thought about it a bit. I just misread what Creative was saying when they said "stereo spdif." They just mean that their spdif output signal contains a stereo (i.e. front L/R) signal, not that the digital signal actually uses 2 separate channels to carry its signal.

My bad.

 

[obobskivich]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Alydon /img/forum/go_quote.gif Yeah I figured that out after I thought about it a bit. I just misread what Creative was saying when they said "stereo spdif." They just mean that their spdif output signal contains a stereo (i.e. front L/R) signal, not that the digital signal actually uses 2 separate channels to carry its signal. My bad.

its supposed to be multi-ch 0.o (my Prelude is....)

but it does use a stereo TRS jack, one of the "channels" is input, one of them is output (and like I say, I don't remember if left is input or output, theres some articles on the 'net about it, or you can just buy the TRS to stereo thing, plug one side in, if you get no signal, switch, and you've completed your scientific testing for the day)

 

[Battlecruiser]

 

[obobskivich]

battlecruiser:
what are you trying to post? it just kills the formatting and doesn't load any text or image....

 

[.Sup]

Battlecruiser enabling digital in control panel worked! But the bass is uncontroled, too powerful like I have bass boost enabled. Winamp says the signal is stereo so the mono plug did work but oddly digital only works in Entertainment mode. Also the most interesting part is when i move the digital slider in kmixer the sound is unaffected. Only when I move the master slide the volume level changes. So the question is do I really get digital. I connected the card to external DAC. Would I get any sound if this was ordinary analog? So I'm suspecting: analog sound>DAC>odd bass reproduction.