SPDIF passthrough?

[digitalbus]

Is there anyway in GameEx to enable SPDIF passthrough for audio so I can get DolbyDigital to my reciever? I'm currently using a Creative X-Fi Extreme Audio with Power DVD 7.3 and if I play DVDs in Powerdvd it works fine and my receiver encodes the signal fine, but with GameEx it can't do it . Is this possible to do without getting a whole new soundcard or being forced to just use PowerDVD outside of GameEx for DVD viewing? Thanks a lot

Brian

[LB11]

What decoder are you using for the audio? Whatever is decoding the audio has to be set to passthrough and also in the creative control panel.

[digitalbus]

I'm using SPDIF passthrough meaning my actual home entertainment receiver is doing the decoding itself. The sound card is just passing the signal out to be decoded there. Power DVD has the SPDIF passthrough option, but GameEx doesn't so I don't get Dolby Digital coming out of my receiver.

[Brian Hoffman]

  digitalbus said:

I'm using SPDIF passthrough meaning my actual home entertainment receiver is doing the decoding itself. The sound card is just passing the signal out to be decoded there. Power DVD has the SPDIF passthrough option, but GameEx doesn't so I don't get Dolby Digital coming out of my receiver.

I dont use spdif but I was reading a forum about issues and this seemed interesting this was taken from.

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/archive/ind...p/t-727578.html

I had a similar problem, but found the issue in the sound controll panel in windows, to make sure there is an s/p dif passthrough tick box, if not, then might require a registry tweak, or new drivers.

I actually Uninstalled the included drivers that came with the motherboard & had to force windows to use the 'windows certified' drivers, then I had s/pdif passthrough tick box appeared.

took a while as windows always seemd to reinstall the SB drivers, until I removed the inf out of the windows/drivers/inf folder.

might help... but it was a while ago now.

[LB11]

Yes, but gameex uses some kind of decoder for the file. Its apparently not the powerdvd decoder or it would have the passthrough preference set.

Just set gameex to use the powerdvd decoder. it might be using something else. Mine works fine.

[Michael]

  LB11 said:

What decoder are you using for the audio? Whatever is decoding the audio has to be set to passthrough and also in the creative control panel.

i know the simple answer for this the software provider has to pay to encode into dolby digital, the only way round this is to get a sound card with a dolby live encoder there are only a few around it, sound card link that sound card will let you have dolby digital output for all audio from a mic input to dvd and also in gameex.

[digitalbus]

  Michael said:

i know the simple answer for this the software provider has to pay to encode into dolby digital, the only way round this is to get a sound card with a dolby live encoder there are only a few around it, sound card link that sound card will let you have dolby digital output for all audio from a mic input to dvd and also in gameex.

I already installed a brand new soundcard and i can watch movies in DD 5.1 with PowerDVD, just not Gamex. I'm not going to get another card when the one I have is perfectly capable of 5.1 ....not to mention I had to dremel it to make it fit in my case lol so I can't return it now.

Perhaps add an option for SPDIF passthrough in a future release of GameEX

[bkenobi]

GameEx doesn't handle the audio or video internally, it uses codecs that are already available. You should be able to configure the codec to allow for spdif passthrough if it's an option. GameEx shouldn't interfere once you get it set up the way you want it.

[LB11]

You dont need a special soundcard or anything fancy for passthrough. Like I said mine works fine, with my onboard sound or audigy2zs. Make sure gameex is using the powerdvd decoder for the DVD's. It might be using some other codec you have on your system.

[daweinst]

  bkenobi said:

GameEx doesn't handle the audio or video internally, it uses codecs that are already available. You should be able to configure the codec to allow for spdif passthrough if it's an option. GameEx shouldn't interfere once you get it set up the way you want it.

I have a similar problem. I just installed WinDVD 9. When I play a dvd through the WinDVD player, I get dts dolby surround sound via my SPDIF output. In the GameEx setup wizard I have "InterVideo Video Decoder" set as my DVD MPEG 2 Coded. It's the only one available in the pull down menu. I can view dvds through gameex, and I get good sound via the SPDIF, but it's not surround sound.

Is the "InterVideo Video Decoder" the WinDVD codec? Any ideas how I can adjust it to play surround sound?

Thanks,

Dan

[bkenobi]

It's possible that GameEx is playing only 2ch audio and not surround sound. If the DVD has both surround and 2ch, but 2ch is default, you would have to pick the surround sound setting. That's my best guess.

[daweinst]

  bkenobi said:

It's possible that GameEx is playing only 2ch audio and not surround sound. If the DVD has both surround and 2ch, but 2ch is default, you would have to pick the surround sound setting. That's my best guess.

Even when I select the surround sound audio channel via the DVD's menu, gameex still does not play surround sound.

[bkenobi]

Doh...that could be a problem.