My ears are alite

[pariah]

Hi there all, first post so be nice Looking to get a new sound card, Im after something that will do real time dolby digital encoding. Heres the score. Ive got an audigy hooked up to my 5.1 amp with spdif, if my amp (or most amps that Ive seen) does not recieve a dolby didital input, it will default to prologic, which is terrible when listening to audio or playing a game with a non digital stream. So I'm in the market for something that can encode dolby digital, real time, into stereo, positional audio (for gaming), or 5.1 for DVD's. BTW, i cant stand using all six outputs to six channel input on the amp, no control over delay etc, plus 3 headphone to rca leads feels like a bodge and a loss in quality.

Thanks for any advice in advance.

[BUFF]

Hi, welcome, etc.

Sounds like a job for SoundStorm on an nForce2 board - might want to see if it suits your needs. You can buy a board with it for £50 (less s/h) & a decent CPU for £50 if you aren't an AMD user at the moment.

Just a thought...

[zaphod]

nForce2 soundstorm is the only sorce of real tim DD5.1. I had a Abit NF7-s with soundstorm etc. Have a 500w Dolby digital/DTS amp w/150w Yamaha sub hooked to the Abit but the board just died last week! Can't find a NF7-s anywhere (which is proble one of the best AMD boards going) so I settled for an Asus.

If you are buying a nForce2 board just make sure it has obviously a S/PDIF out and and "MPT-C" southbridge. With the MPC-T there is no Dolby Digital...sniff sniff!!!!

Abit AN7 or Asus A7N8X-E Deluxe are proble the best nForce2 boards with Dolby Digital encoding

[unrealrocks]

Yeah - SoundStorm is the only consumer soundcard that'll do it (you can get professional ones that'll do it but it'll cost you upwards of £300). I use SoundStorm because of this and find it works great with my Denon decoder

[zaphod]

Denon decoder......oh nice! What kind of cards do ac3 encoding? haven't heard of and.

[BUFF]

Can't find a NF7-s anywhere (which is proble one of the best AMD boards going) so I settled for an Asus.

Unlucky you - they are in stock & on special at Scan for £53 incl. VAT!

[pariah]

Thanks for the .nfo guys, Im constantly amazed how much sound is over looked in PC's. Ive got an old Athlon 900 slot A running in my second system with an awe 64 gold, still better sounding for music than my audigy I reckon. My main system is currentley a P4 2.8, maybe time to upgrade to Athlon 64. is the Asus A8v gonna do my audio?Still not sure which boards do real time encoding.

Cheers

[Tom]

mate if u want to upgrade to A64 you'll have to wait and see if Nforce4 carries soundstorm, because Socket A's Nforce and Nforce 2 are the only ones that do the on the fly encoding, for some reason they took it out of the 64 bit nf3 You'd have to 'downgrade' to a 32bit 3200+ and nf7-s

[pre]

Apparently NVidia is bringing Soundstorm II on NForce4... PCI-Express though.

[zaphod]

You mean a PCI-E sound card?

[unrealrocks]

Yeah - its really odd that people (Creative) haven't really cottoned onto the fact that alot of people have digital audio systems that just can't be used (apart from SoundStorm) properly :|

pariah - Yeah, I did a big roundup of soundcards in January, and found the Creatives are great in games but quality wise they just can't cut it, personally mAudio or Philips cards sound much better

zaphod - Heh, I have my TV/DVD/all the usual junk next to my main PC so just use one set of speakers/amps SoundStorm is the only consumer card that encodes AC3

[zaphod]

Nice to know i can get s PCI-E card that will encode AC3. regular pci hasn't got the bandwith to do the encoding I think, so thats one reason for creative not releasing one.

I've got a Technics Dolby Digital/DTS 5.1 reciever with Boss speakers hooked up to a nForce. from a sound stand point it's heaven! It's the reason I'm not upgrading to nForce3.

[pre]

No I meant Soundstorm II looks like it will only becoming out on NForce4 boards which are PCI-X. Thus meaning a GFX, mobo, CPU upgrade unless you have an A64.

[zaphod]

Oh sorry picked you up wrong. If I am going nForce4/PCI-E it is going to be an expensive upgrade.