totalz

I'm newbie, just heard of ASIO & kX today... did some research and play around with my Vista x64

Now I can use ASIO4all with onboard Realtek + foobar with SPDIF out not that I can hear much difference...

The problem is I want to output 5.1 for the game Dead Space through onboard SPDIF. U may say it's impossible at the moment, and I wouldn't argue with u...

UNTIL i read the below... Working 5.1 Dolby Digital Pass Through SPDIF For Games No More Goat Soup
In this article by Master Goat, and I quote "
I’ve tested it out in Guild Wars (with Audigy 2), and sure enough it creates perfect EAX and 5.1 channel surround via SPDIF digital coaxial connection. The quality was better than EAX in 5.1 analogue too. I’ve also noticed it outputs the same 5.1 channels from my onboard Realtek HD’s optical. Now there’s an added ASIO bonus.
"

So, there may be some way to get my spec to work with kX and output onboard 5.1 digital for games. Hopefully u experts can give me some suggestions on the matter.

and no, i don't need advice on how-to boil an egg with microwave, water or not

my spec:
Vista x64 (yes, i know, no signed x64 kX support...)
onboard Realtek HD (SPDIF)
Dead Space
dead microwave

djsubject

do you have a creative card?

Russ

I am not completely sure what you are asking...

The is no 64 bit version of kX.
kX does not support EAX.

As for redocneXk, I am not sure if it works with Vista x64 at all... All I can say about that is try it and see.

The info from that article is most likely about using redocneXk with the Creative driver (and I did not see anywhere in the article which OS was being used).

totalz

I have a really old SB Live! (Value!?)


Well, I don't mind using Vista x86.
Yes, I know it's about using redocneXk with the Creative driver. But I'm wondering on the aspect why 5.1 surround comes out from the onboard optical spdif!!

Russ

Hmm, the title of this thread mentions an Audigy 2?

In any case, AC3 passthru is not supported in kX with the SB Live! (or any 10k1 model), and the Creative driver for these cards (Live!) does not offer ASIO, so you are not going to be able to do what you want with that card. redocneXk needs a native ASIO driver (not ASIO4All because multiple separate ASIO channels are needed), and AC3-passthru to work.


SPDIF can only handle 2 channels of uncompressed audio data, this is why 5.1 audio from your games is not normally outputted to SPDIF. However, the 5.1 channels can be compressed and encoded to 2 channels (i.e. AC3, Dolby Digital, etc), and then can be decoded back to 5.1 by an external decoder/receiver. That is what redocneXk does. It listens for the 5.1 channels using multiple ASIO channels, encodes them to AC3, and then the sound card uses AC3 passthru to pass the AC3 signal to the SPDIF output (which again would need to be connected to some external AC3 decoder).

totalz

thanks Russ for the info...

Audigy 2 is Goat's spec

I did a bit more reading on the ASIO, and wondering why not all sound chips support it, such a useful protocol.

But I'm confused with the fact that redocneXk is listening to ASIO which associated with Audigy 2 that output the AC3 signal, then how come the onboard Realtek optical is outputting same signal!? That kinda gives me a slight hope.

Would you recommend those soundcards that can do realtime AC3/DTS encode? Would that solve the problem without the use of extra software(s)?

Russ

With redocneXk you can choose which ASIO driver to use for input, and which wave device to use for output, so I suppose you could use 2 separate sound cards to do it.

i.e.
One that supports ASIO but not AC3 passthru (i.e. your SB Live! (with kX)), and another that supports AC3 passthru but not ASIO.


Yes, that is probably your best bet if you really need to output 5.1 sound from your games from a single SPDIF output (and yes, no extra software should be necessary with such cards).

nomoregoatsoup

I'd be interested to see how it works out on Vista x64!

I'm using Vista x86 and Audigy 2 (as already mentioned) I'm using latest Realtek drivers and daniel_k's latest Audigy public release. I don't think redoconkX supports SBLive! either.

I also have my record device set to "Creative Labs; What You Hear" and my default playback is "Realtek Digital Output". I think it just outputs SPDIF universally from all outputs, anyway.

It doesn't work in every game, but as far as I can tell it works with all EAX titles.

totalz

"off topic a bit"... i kept googling and found that Realtek had released a little software like "creative" alchemy... can be downloaded from Realtek site.

I gave it a try with Dead Space and it was much better than expected. I'm not sure, but I think it takes 5.1 surround from the game and encode them into DProLogicII stereo, cause I used the in-game speakers test, and it comes out pretty good.

[COLOR=White]nomoregoatsoup[/COLOR], may be you can give it a try, tell me what u think

totalz

according to this page kX Project: Knowledgebase: kX Soundblaster Compatibility List

I should to able to use kx driver for my SB!Live Value to get ASIO support!! But then the problem will come down to no AC3passthru!!?

Russ

Yup, that's correct...

nomoregoatsoup

I installed SoundBack when it first got released. Soundback is still only in beta stage too, but works mostly. I compared the two, and ALchemy was better sound quality by far. Some games I tried didn't like it either. I believe daniel_k's ALchemy Universal does it best. EAX is supported more by game developers for PC. It should provide better directional sound effects than ProLogic II, unless it's a rare title with Dolby encoded content.