g000fy

hi all:

first im going to be getting a different sound card pretty soon.

i have an nforce 4 (asus a8m32-sli-deluxe) that has the ALC850....which i had been using up until lately when i seen these softmod projects and broke out a couple of my older sound cards

sb live value! (number on sound card = CT4830) but to the info i have read it is really a CT4832 oem card
and
audigy ls

to my understanding the the sb live has a real DSP which is the 10kemu and the audigy ls really offloads all sound processing to the CPU.

more info i have learned (correct me if i am wrong):
the audigy LS does 64 voice (but not done dy any DSP) "SOFTWARE" while the sb live value can do only 32 (but it is done in the sound card DSP) "HARDWARE"

so my question is...what really is the better sound card espicially since the softmods.

what i mean by best...i mean i dont want a mod that makes my cpu do all the calculations....that is really cheating and can be done with any cpu and dont even involve the sound cards APU

how does the sb live value 4.1 softmod work that makes it 5.1? is it only done by the device code? by tricking the software into thinking it is really a sb live 5.1? BUT since that particular sound card (my 4.1) is "REALLY" a 5.1 only turned off because of its device id?

so that softmod is actually a good softmod because it lets me have a better sound card all done in hardware even though my sound card is from the factory at 4.1?


ok now for the audigy LS....it does not have any DSP correct?
so any software that does install is all done on the computer and not the audio card is this correct?

i know what you are thinking....you are going to say well if you have a powerfull enough CPU it shouldnt really make a difference....but this is not true....i play really graphics intese games and it will make my computer crawl already....

my system specs are:
win vista 32bit fully updated.
amd64 x2 4200+ @ 2.65Ghz
4*512 memory (2gigs total)
4*80gigers in a raid0 = 320gigs
2*8800gts g92s in SLI

i want to use optical out no matter what (i know i dont get 5.1 when i game because of no DDL for any of the audio hardware i have but i like only running one optical or one coax cable...

so from the sound cards i have what is the fastest one...

if i can get the sb live value 4.1 to do 5.1 so when i play movies it will output (over spdif) AC3/DTS i would be happy
since i also like to record vocals into Digital Audio Workstations LATENCY is also important.....i imagine the best again would be sb live value hopefully 5.1 softmod will not make latency higher cause it should not use my CPU as the CT4832 is really the sb live 5.1 but just restricted by the device id

the sblive value to get it to be 5.1 is one mod.....if i want higher then EAX(1) is all that offloaded to the CPU or does that card do it with no CPU usage added?
someone who can make sence out of what i just wrote...please repond.


i want the best sound card out of the 3 i listed above....
01 performace with ASIO while direct monitoring
02 performace in games....(high framerates)
03 optical/coax out to work in 5.1 mode for movies and output stereo for games
04 higher EAX then (1) for games if it dont really add to much to my CPU
05 i really could care less about any software apps from creative....just something so i can adjust my inputs and outputs for when i am creating music with apps like ableton live.

ok thanks and please dont skip through this and read it complete.
i dont write very well but i think my questions are pretty good.

thanks

Russ

I cannot answer all your questions but I will take a shot at answering some...

Regarding the 5.1 soft mod, I am not completely sure what you are referring to. I am aware of a mod that involves reprogramming the EEPROM, but I am not sure I would call it a soft mod since it involves desoldering the chip, etc. Additionally, I am not sure such a mod would even be necessary with kX. In any case, the mod only enables an additional SPDIF output, and probably would not be of much use to you with the way you are using the card (using a single optical out).

Also, regarding 5.1 from movies, since it is a single compressed signal (AC3/DTS) that is just passed through the sound card, I do not see why it should make any difference how many channels the sound card supports (i.e. you should be able to get 5.1 from movies via AC3 (without any modifications), provided that the card and driver supports AC3 passthru). In any case, kX does not support AC3 passthru with the CT4832.

kX does not support EAX.

g000fy

thanks for your fast reply...

didnt know kX didnt support EAX...but that is OK with me because all these years i had my spare computer hooked up (my nforce2 abit nf7-s V2.0 with soundstorm APU) and i had this computer speaker out of the ALC850 ac97 going to the soundstorm Line-in and then the soundstorm optical going to my reciever....you would think there would be latency doing this but the soundstorm liked winME and latency was almost zero....i now have nforce2 board installed with windows and i wont even attempt to try it because of the bad latency i got before....

anyhow i never had EAX after all these years as 5.1 surround gaming is way better then eax.

about the CT4832 and this audigy LS

i was asking about the CT4832 primarly beciase it is hardware based DSP and i did see that hardmod about changing the device id and it would be recognized as a regular sb live 5.1 card...
in that mod he did not say if the current digital output connector would automatically output 5.1 ac3.....he continued the mod by hooking up output wires to the internal connector to pull of the center channel (ANALOG) to go along with the other (ANALOG) Jacks already on the board...

what i was thinking that the softmod did is change the device id in the drivers so it would make 5.1 work over the digital out as the card cant do 5.1ac3 when it is only a 4.1 card to begin with....(ie crippled 5.1 card because of bios identifier)

so what i was trying to say for the CT4832....if the driver makes it into making the 5.1 work over spdif the same way the hardmod "MIGHT" make the digital out work as 5.1 also?

i mean it should be exactly the same (as far as cpu usage shouldnt it) wrather the mod is done through the driver changing the identifier or the hardmod changing it.....

what i mean is would either one of those mods make my CT4832 ("4.1") card into a 5.1 AC3 card over the digital out connector on the bracket?

and if so should i then be able to use "redocneXk" to enable realtime encoding of ac3 gaming?

i been trying to get "redocneXk" working on my audigy LS using creatives official driver and no luck so far....

eax is ok....but DDL gaming is SWEET!!!! trust me i know because of my soundstorm that i been using since it came out....only everyone with x360s and ps3 are just now figuring out how sweet gaming is on 5.1

i know the original xbox had ac3 gaming but alot of people never used it.

Russ

As I said in my previous reply, if the card and driver supports AC3 passthru, then I do not see any reason why it should matter if the card is a 4.1 card or a 5.1 card since the card is not processing the audio, but rather it is just passing it to your external decoder (thus I do not see the mod making any difference as far as AC3 goes).

g000fy

ohhhi get it....its only 2 channel pcm 48khz when it leaves the digital out anyhow....so the sb live value 4.1 (should already do this since it has asio drivers) and that "redocneXk" will work because there are asio drivers right?

i mean i shouldnt need to use and hardmod or softmod just use the ct4832 and creatives official drivers and that "redocneXk" to encode the 5.1 first?

Russ

Right!

No, unfortunately the Creative driver does not include ASIO support for Live! (10k1) models, and while kX does give you ASIO, it does not give you AC3 passthru.

Right, you should not need any mods, and for movies that are already AC3 encoded, you should not have to do anything (just enable AC3 passthru in the Creative driver). "redocneXk" would only be needed for sources that are not already AC3/DD encoded (but as I said above (and in the other thread), "redocneXk" is not really going to work with the CT4832, because it needs both, a native ASIO driver and AC3 passthru, and neither driver offers both (for 10k1 cards)).

g000fy

you said just enable it in the creative driver and i should get ac3 passthrough for content that is already encoded.....im running vista 32bit....which driver can i check that feature on with?

can you link me to it precisely?
thank-you

Russ

No, I do not have a CT4832, and I never said that it supported AC3 passthru with the Creative driver. What I did say is that "if it does support AC3 passthru", then it should not matter how many channels the card supports.

With my Live! 5.1 (SB0228), there was an option in the Creative Surround Mixer that was labeled "AC3 Passthrough", or maybe "AC3 Decode" (something like that), that you use to toggle whether AC3 is decoded by the driver or not. If for some reason the Creative driver did not include that option with your card, then *maybe* reprogramming the EEPROM will enable it (with the Creative driver) for your card.

g000fy

ok look at this.

redocneXk (GUI version) released - Realtime 5.1 ac3 Encoder

http://pages.globetrotter.net/samaus...trol_Panel.png

my card is that EXACT same sound card "CT4832"

on that very same page...
http://pages.globetrotter.net/samaus...neXk_Mixer.png

why do i not get that same setting?

what is going on....that guide is made for my exact card....
is this a vista problem....if so it should be very easy to fix....cause we know the CT4832 CAN do it as that guide shows....

Russ

Right, kX does offer ASIO for the CT4832. I have no idea why you do not see the ASIO Control Panel in Vista with kX (I do not have Vista).

As for kX Mixer, as I said before, it (AC3 Passthru with 10k1 cards) used to be an option in kxmixer but it did not work, thus it was removed. That picture is from an older version of the driver, before that option was removed (but again, it was removed because it did not do anything).

g000fy

well from that thread alot of people said it did work....the only thing i can think of they were using windows XP

but they said it did work with what was it kx3538 or something?

Russ

I have seen reports stating that ASIO works in Vista with the latest version of kX as well (nothing specific to the CT4832, but I do not know why that should make any difference), so maybe something did not install right, or something is not set right? I do not know, again, it would be best if someone who is using kX ASIO with Vista could offer some info.

g000fy

yes that would be great.

you know i was using "drive sweeper 1.5.5" to clean drivers before i installed kX....had creative drivers on before kX...anyhow i told it to clean creatives drivers and i think it might have grabbed some things it shouldnt have but im not sure....i was getting errors when it was reming files and some were in /sytem32/ i dont know if creative installs anything there or not....the system seams stable but i dont know maybe that is why i dont get that option.

with the ac3 encoder by Tril why cant it work with asio4all?
i remember you mentioned it only lists 2 inputs or 2 outputs...or something like that but i had asio4all work with digital output before when using some of those digital audio workstations.....i just select the 2 inputs or 2 outputs and the music would record (from the 2 inputs) or would play on the digital output (from the 2 outputs)....

it would be great if Tril would make a version for asio4all as alot of people use that and the non-kX drivers floating around the web for the ct4832 dont include the "asio" that comes with the creative drivers in winxp.

so the audigy LS cant work with kX and spdif passthrough...or is it that there is no asio driver for kX or i mean basically why cant i use the audigy LS with vista and kX and that ac3 encoding app?

Russ

ASIO has nothing to do with digital output. ASIO is used to transfer the audio to the encoder (in realtime), and then redocneXk encodes the 6 channels to AC3, thus 6 channels are needed (and they need to be the correct channels for each speaker positions, etc).

redocneXk would work perfectly well with ASIO4ALL, it will encode whatever ASIO4ALL is recording to AC3, but it will not be your 6 channels of game audio.

For that matter, redocneXk works perfectly well without AC3 Passthru too, it will still encode the audio to AC3 and pass it on to the driver, but without AC3 Passthru, there is no way to get it to your SPDIF output still encoded (i.e. you can have redocneXk encode it, and kX decode it (kX's AC3 decoder will work with your CT4832), but there is no purpose in doing so, other than testing.

g000fy

well....hmm...grrr....hmmmm

i forget....can the audigy ls work for trying to do 5.1 gaming on vista then?

i mean its a creative card whch means kx should work with it.....maybe its spdif passthrough option will appear in kmixer (the ct4832 wouldnt) and if it does then the next Q is does the kxdriver have asio driver for the audigy LS....im betting it does....so then next step is...Trils app....it should work right?

uninstalling and putting audigy ls in...

Russ

No, kX does not support the Audigy LS. kX does not support all cards made by Creative, it only supports cards that use the EMU10k1/EMU10k2 chip (and the Audigy LS is not one of these cards).

Honestly, for 5.1 gaming, I do not know what is so special about using the SPDIF output. It is only digital to the receiver, then it is analog to the speakers, so why not just use 5.1 analog speakers with the sound card in the first place (or use a digital speaker system (which is still analog to the speakers, but maybe has higher quality DACs than the sound card))?

g000fy

crap no audigy ls...

about the speacial part about digital out....its not special your right...

but my ht-395 only has L+R rca, coax and an optical in...

it dont have 5 seperate channel input for rca....if it did i would have been using that long ago
those are rare now that you can do everything over coax/optical....and they are more expensive...

you think its time to get a new creative card for me

i been looking trust me....i was thinking about getting an audigy 2 zs platinum with the external console.....but from what i read about it....it is limited to 16/48 even though it can do 24/96...something to do with the way it handles 44.1khz it upmixes or down mixes...etc....

so i looked at the x-fi cards and it seams you can only use that flex jack port with mic in or digital out....what if you want to use direct monitoring so when you speak into your mic you hear it over your speakers and record at the same time?

im kind of confused what to get....especially with all the softmods you can do to the x-fi line and then you have dell and hp oems on top of it....

i am a gamer first that wants 5.1 gaming...which you can buy the ddl part from creative for $5.00 which is GREAT but what about when i want to cerate music....that damn flex jack has to be the worst thing ever created dont it?

just installed my alc850 drivers again....only asio4all....guess this is probably the best choice out of the 3 (ct4832 audigy ls and alc850)

Russ

That is usually the issue, sound cards are not usually good for both gaming and for music production at the same time.

Do the internal X-FI cards use the flex jack too?

There are other cards based on the X-FI (if that is what you like) that maybe offer some things that Creative doesn't (i.e. different inputs, etc).

i.e.
IIRC, the Auzentech X-Fi Prelude 7.1 supports both DDL and EAX 5 (this is not a recommendation or anything, it is just an observation).