sound card for Dolby Digital Live system?

[mashakos]

A year ago, I entered the world of home theater systems. Bought a 7 year old used 5.1 system with a JVC rx-884v reciever. Since the reciever is so old it only supports Dolby Surround and Pro Logic, no DTS (which is what all onboard sound chips utilize apparently).

That gives me a great audio experience with DVD movies, but it is also a total downer playing games in stereo after listening to pure Dolby Digital surround...

I heard about Dolby Digital Live, and saw the logo in a few games, so I was wondering if there's a soundcard I could buy that can let me experience games with full surround?

Dolby Digital Live sounds nice, but it's not widespread. If a soundcard had a dedicated encoder/decoder, wouldn't it be concievable to have a soundcard that can output everything to Dolby surround?

Am I making sense?

summary:
-What's a good Dolby Digital Live sound card?
-Any sound cards out there that can output everything in Dolby surround?

EDIT:
Forgot to mention I'm using SPDIF

[Stanley Pain]

I'm not quite sure what you're asking here.

Does your receiver support DD/DTS? That is when you play a DVD do you get 5.1 discreet sound?

There are quite a few cards out right now that support Dolby Digital Live (DDL) and DTS Connect (DTSC). If you check newegg or ncix any card that does DDL/DTSC will output to 5.1 sound (encode on the fly) via a digital connection (Coax or Toslink).

[mashakos]

I'm not quite sure what you're asking here.

Does your receiver support DD/DTS? That is when you play a DVD do you get 5.1 discreet sound?
I was afraid of that, heh. Let me clarify:

My receiver supports DD only. So no DTS

I would like to have a sound card that can:
a) Convert game audio (EAX, Open AL for example) to DD, then send it to the reciever to decode.
b) Convert DTS audio to DD and then send it to the receiver to decode.


anything like that around?

I heard the X-Fi Prelude supports both DD and DTS, maybe it can take a DTS input and output it as DD for the reciever?

[Stanley Pain]

I was about to say that the Prelude is the card you are looking for.

Not only does it encode to DD & DTS , it also supports EAX5.0 and all that wonder stuff.

Remember, DDL and DTSC are mutually exclusive. Meaning that you actually set your card to output in DD 5.1 or DTS 5.1 not both at the same time :)

I have a Prelude and if the $199 price tag doesn't scare you, I'd say it's pretty much the BEST soundcard I've ever used (and I've been around the block a few times now) :D

[mashakos]

I was about to say that the Prelude is the card you are looking for.great minds think alike :D

Remember, DDL and DTSC are mutually exclusive. Meaning that you actually set your card to output in DD 5.1 or DTS 5.1 not both at the same time :)

I know, but see there are certain situations where... ok, here's an example:

You have Call Of Duty 4, a Prelude, and a home theater system that only supports DDL decoding. You look for the DDL option in the game and what do you find? DTSC :eek:

Now you wish your Prelude could decode those pesky DTSC signals internally, then send them to your receiver as pure DDL goodness.

Is that possible?

I'm a total audio n00b :rofl:

[Stanley Pain]

great minds think alike :D



I know, but see there are certain situations where... ok, here's an example:

You have Call Of Duty 4, a Prelude, and a home theater system that only supports DDL decoding. You look for the DDL option in the game and what do you find? DTSC :eek:

Now you wish your Prelude could decode those pesky DTSC signals internally, then send them to your receiver as pure DDL goodness.

Is that possible?

I'm a total audio n00b :rofl:


I see what you're getting at. I had no idea that COD4 had an option like that. I have it at home so I can actually test this out for you.

I'd say it can, because I don't think the game actually outputs a true DTS signal (I could be wrong though). I think the game has a "5.1" speaker setting though. So it would go something like this.

Game outputs DTS -> Soundcard Converts to DD via DDL -> Recveiver gets DD signal, decodes and plays your audio.

[mashakos]

I read somewhere that COD4 supports DTS. If you could test it out for me i'd appreciate it.

What OS are you using btw? I'm on Vista x64 and am worried about tge maturity of the Prelude's drivers.

[Stanley Pain]

Vista 65 Ultimate here. There's only 1 thing missing in Vista drivers and that's DTSC. They are still working on that.

However, DDL, and output of DD/DTS (when playing a DVD) works perfectly though.

[3lfk1ng]

Vista 65 Ultimate here.
:ROTF:, sorry, couldn't resist.

@OP
I would recommend the Prelude for a Dolby Digital Live system.

[Stanley Pain]

:ROTF:, sorry, couldn't resist.

@OP
I would recommend the Prelude for a Dolby Digital Live system.

Hahah, damn. I'll leave it like that. 65bits in my OS!