Computer to receiver via optical, PCM

MaynardJK · 06-18-2008, 10:28 PM

Hello,
first off let me say I have a good understanding of computers and a pretty solid understanding of audio components. However, I am at a bit of a loss with this one. I've done some google searches but I'm not quite satisfied with what I have found, so here goes...

I have a fairly decent Yamaha receiver(RX-V800) that is a few years old but still sounds great. What I *was* doing, was connecting my laptop to the receiver via headphone jack from the laptop and 2ch rca plug into the receiver. The sound was pretty crappy...but it worked!

Well, I recently got a new PC and thought it would be a good chance to use my old machine(2 yr old AMD X2) as a multimedia PC and hook it up to my LCD TV and the stereo setup. As a sidenote, the resolution on the TV is OK...but not as high as I expected! DOH! Anyways...I got a new Creative Soundblaster X-Fi Xtreme audio card in the machine and it is going from an optical cable into my receiver. I gave it a test run and it sounded pretty damn good! ...except that I am only getting sound from my 2 main speakers and not my surrounds or center! The display on the receiver shows "PCM Stereo 96k". I have done some research and heard that PCM only does 2ch...but surely there must be a way to get the other speakers to work?! I would even be fine if the rear/center speakers were working along with the mains as 2ch!

I have played around with the software and settings of the soundcard and it appears that everything is good from that end, so it seems like the 'problem' lies with the receiver. There aren't a lot of options either with that input type...'auto' or 'analog'...and obviously analog gets me nothing at all.

Any ideas?

MaynardJK · 06-20-2008, 12:21 AM

After a little more searching, I found the original manual online for the receiver(I'm sure I got the original somehere) and it states that 96k inputs will only play on 2 ch. So in the soundcard settings I brought it down to 48 and everything was dandy!

06-18-2008, 10:28 PM	#1 (permalink)
MaynardJK Registered User Join Date: Jun 2008 Posts: 2 OS: xp_sp2	Computer to receiver via optical, PCM Hello, first off let me say I have a good understanding of computers and a pretty solid understanding of audio components. However, I am at a bit of a loss with this one. I've done some google searches but I'm not quite satisfied with what I have found, so here goes... I have a fairly decent Yamaha receiver(RX-V800) that is a few years old but still sounds great. What I was doing, was connecting my laptop to the receiver via headphone jack from the laptop and 2ch rca plug into the receiver. The sound was pretty crappy...but it worked! Well, I recently got a new PC and thought it would be a good chance to use my old machine(2 yr old AMD X2) as a multimedia PC and hook it up to my LCD TV and the stereo setup. As a sidenote, the resolution on the TV is OK...but not as high as I expected! DOH! Anyways...I got a new Creative Soundblaster X-Fi Xtreme audio card in the machine and it is going from an optical cable into my receiver. I gave it a test run and it sounded pretty damn good! ...except that I am only getting sound from my 2 main speakers and not my surrounds or center! The display on the receiver shows "PCM Stereo 96k". I have done some research and heard that PCM only does 2ch...but surely there must be a way to get the other speakers to work?! I would even be fine if the rear/center speakers were working along with the mains as 2ch! I have played around with the software and settings of the soundcard and it appears that everything is good from that end, so it seems like the 'problem' lies with the receiver. There aren't a lot of options either with that input type...'auto' or 'analog'...and obviously analog gets me nothing at all. Any ideas?

06-20-2008, 12:21 AM	#2 (permalink)
MaynardJK Registered User Join Date: Jun 2008 Posts: 2 OS: xp_sp2	Solved--Re: Computer to receiver via optical, PCM After a little more searching, I found the original manual online for the receiver(I'm sure I got the original somehere) and it states that 96k inputs will only play on 2 ch. So in the soundcard settings I brought it down to 48 and everything was dandy!