5.1 on original Soundblaster Live! Value

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rally9x

[H]ard|Gawd
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Feb 7, 2003
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Is there any way to hook up an original soundblaster live! and hook it up analog to a reciever for 5.1. Reconfigure the ports or something?
 
you can hook it up so you get stereo sound, but not true 5.1.
 
Is this card a SB Live! Value, as stated in the title, an SB Live! as stated in your post, or an SB Live! with S/PDIF output as stated in your sig? ;)

A Value wont do 5.1 and neither will a regular Live!. A Live! with S/PDIF out will do 5.1 if it is an SB Live! 5.1 card. I think.

You may be able to find a converter to turn the digital S/PDIF output into the analog jacks. Are you sure your receiver doesn't support digital?

Better yet, buy a new card. SB Live! cards are pretty old and outdated...
 
I have the live! and a daughter board that adds spdif. My reciever has analog only. Yes both are getting a bit old but I would rather put the money into a good sub and rears if I can get away with it.
 
Originally posted by Mo_BurLy
Is this card a SB Live! Value, as stated in the title, an SB Live! as stated in your post, or an SB Live! with S/PDIF output as stated in your sig? ;)

A Value wont do 5.1 and neither will a regular Live!. A Live! with S/PDIF out will do 5.1 if it is an SB Live! 5.1 card. I think.

You may be able to find a converter to turn the digital S/PDIF output into the analog jacks. Are you sure your receiver doesn't support digital?

Better yet, buy a new card. SB Live! cards are pretty old and outdated...
Click to expand...

ive got a sblive value that has spdif onboard?
 
Well I don't think either of you are going to get true 5.1 out of those cards, since they don't support 5.1 to begin with. You'd be able to use the S/PDIF out for digital sound going to a receiver with a decoder, but you won't get 5.1 out of it. Maybe 2.1 or 4 speaker surround, or whatever those cards support. Unless there is some software program that will hijack that output and use the CPU to do the 5.1 sound processing or something.

EDIT: I just looked on Newegg and you could get a SSB Live! 5.1 card with analog out for $35...
 
Originally posted by rally9x
can the live! 5.1 actually decode 5.1? software or hardware?
Click to expand...
Yes it can do that in software. :)
So can the Live Value. The Live cards that have S/PDIF port can do dolby pass through as well. So in a sense they can do 5.1 audio. ;)
 
Thats my question...how can you do the decoding with the value?You say that it can be done
 
wasnt the point that it passed it through? wouldnt that mean it doesnt decode it??
 
Originally posted by rally9x
Ok....I've done spdif pass thourgh before but I want to do Analog now.
Click to expand...
i saw a guide once... youll have to rig a cable and hook it up to your parallel port. then you can flash the firmware on the card and itll add 5.1 functionality. but youll also have to solder on the card too because the extra leads have to come from somewhere. im not sure where the guide is but im sure google will pick it up. i hope to do this this summer (if i fail, and i probably will... (very low patience level), ill be grabbing an audigy2zs probably) ;)
 
that's a lotta work to get 5.1 out of a very old soundcard, might as well pay 30 bones for a live 5.1 or better...
 
Originally posted by ziddey
i saw a guide once... youll have to rig a cable and hook it up to your parallel port. then you can flash the firmware on the card and itll add 5.1 functionality. but youll also have to solder on the card too because the extra leads have to come from somewhere. im not sure where the guide is but im sure google will pick it up. i hope to do this this summer (if i fail, and i probably will... (very low patience level), ill be grabbing an audigy2zs probably) ;)
Click to expand...
Not quite.
You have to desolder the EEPROM from the card and then use either a PIC programer (witch (you are right) can use a Parallel port interface) or an old NIC to reprogram the chip and then resolder the EEPROM to the card. As far as adding another analog output goes....... it going to happen. You can interface a digital output with the S/PDIF IO header on the card but then you need something to decode those digital signals.
Why am I typing all of this? Just go read it for yourself. :D
http://www.digit-life.com/articles/livetolive51/index.html
All in all you are better off buying a real 5.1 capable sound card and throwing that 5 year old POS Live card in the trash.
 
Thanks X86.

but if I spend the money on that its going to take me even longer to be able to afford to buy a can amp from you ;). Yeah I'll probably just replace this card in a while but money is tight so I thought I would just check becuase I would hate to buy a 5.1 or something and then find out I could have just flashed to it or something. Thanks a lot guys.
 
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