Home Audio People: Got a Question

I was given a set of speakers for a 7.1 surround sound system. I'd like to hook these to my computer.

What would I need?

 

Thread moved to Accessories.

 

YOu need this.

 

Well,

You didn't give too much detail about the speaker system you received. The most important piece of information would be if is the system is already "powered" (amplifiers for all speakers are built into the subwoofer). If they are a computer speaker system, they almost always include the power for the speakers on-board. However, home theater speaker systems usually leave the amplification up to you. It sounds like from your subject that these are home theater speakers.

Also, you'd need a sound card which supported 7.1 surround. If you have a 7.1 card, and the speaker system is indeed intended and designed for a computer speaker system, hooking them up is relatively simple as some of them use something similar looking to a serial cable.

If it is a home theater system and you have a 7.1 receiver/amplifier you are using to power the speakers, you'll need to output a digital signal from your PC to your amplifier. Some newer MB's and Soundcards include an optical/digital output but some of them do require you to purchase an additional dongle for that output.

 

I use my home theater amp & speakers on my PC its much better than buying PC speakers since they are generally cheaper for what you get and higher quality, plus you leave yourself more room to upgrade.

I just use a 1/8" headphone jack into RCA adapter its like a $2 part. I have no idea why you would want a usb sound card like linked above. Your onboard is probably a better quality than that. Plus I personally use a X-Fi card.

Keep in mind my connection is analog, so thats what I use. If you have a digital receiver then you may chose to use a digital connection instead. That means a sound card with a digital out.

The big difference between analog and digital is that analog your sound card is responsible for all the sound quality (well in large part your amp is still important) but if you use digital the sound card does almost nothing, its the decoder on the other end that is going to be responsible for most of the SQ and thats why I stay away from say $100 digital speaker sets like logitech offers as the quality suffers. The next thing that may/may not be a big deal is that using an adapter like me your only sending stero not surround so you have to upmix it to use all the speakers. I have a dolby prologic reciver so it works well but I just use 2.1 for everything as all 5.1 speakers is overkill.

 

It's a home theater system. I have no amplifier. I already have the 3.5mm to RCA adapter. I dont really care for surround sound, I'd be happy with just sterero over the 6 speakers and sub.

 

You need a card that can support 7.1 and most computers do not have that. I would go to creatives web site and find on that supports 7.1.

 

I ended up stopping by walmart and looking at what they had. There was a Durabrand home theater system - it's a 2 channel system with a sub and center speaker, 4 sattelite speakers.

I bought it and tried it with the 7.1 speakers I have. Sounds great like this. So I'll probably end up using this.

 

I am not sure.

But doesn't a 7.1 speaker setup require a sound card that supports 7.1 channel audio?

Even in the case of an external amp, how would an external amp pump out 7.1 channel audio if the output from the computer is through the standard headphones 3.5mm?

The standard headphones 3.5mm does not support 7.1 channel audio.