P150hm Digital output problem

Guys, please help.

i have 150hm

im wondering if the optic cable (toslink) alone is enough to get 5.1 Sound? i mean should i to use mic/headphone and spdif ports together to get 5.1? or just the S/pdif port is enough for 5.1?

 

good question

 

I too am interested, cause I have a logitech z5500 collecting dust after my PC went to heaven

 

i did a lot of research and found out that we need an usb exterior sound card in order to get 5.1 through 1 optical cable. This is the only way... or connect your system to each port on the laptop ( 3 ports, s/pdif port is only usable if you have 7.1 bull)

The proper and cheapest models are:

Asus xonar u1
Soundblaster x-fi pro

 

Yeah I had to research to find out about Sagers poor audio outputs. I work very extensively with sound, I have a Rane audio card 2 channel mixer for professional DJing, but for home/portability use I plan on buying a simple 5.1 or 7.1 usb sound card.

Does the poor output on the Sager models affect the end sound quality even with a good sound card plugged in?

 

sorry but slightly off topic replying to ST4R

over the years theres been a lot of talk about the various sound output quality from clevo's. (clevo is the make and sager are a american reseller).
ive got a 3 year old m860tu and the sound is ok when it comes to in built speakers.
for home i use a 5.1 x-fi card plugged into the express card slot with a docking port for all the speakers. i know quite a few of the newer lappys dont have a express card slot so that blows that one out the window. now the x-fi are plugged into a usb slot but i have no idea what these are like.

im retired from dj'ing now but i used to use it with various mixers and sound wattage from my 1000watt rms a side dj set up to a 25,000watt arena system. from the laptop it was run through the headphones out socket. comparing the sound quality to the technics 1210 decks and the twin numark mixer and cd player there isnt a lot of difference when you are playing it that loud.

 

I recently hooked up my P150HM via the S/PDIF jack with a TOSLINK cable to my AV receiver and it works fine. S/PDIF will do surround sound by itself so long as it is a compressed format like Dolby Digital or DTS. For Blu-Ray specific uncompressed formats such as TrueHD and DTS-HD, you'll need to use HDMI. I personally just use my S/PDIF port to output stereo PCM while gaming. Then my receiver matrixes it to 5.1 with Prologic II.

 

+1 for spinning vinyl!

I work with a Rane TTM57 Mixer so it would be a shame if I couldnt DJ or record at least 24bit audio on a new laptop.

 

Really? i want 5.1 sound especially for games like Battlefield 3, Modern Warfare 3 e.t.c did you try any of them?

 

SPDIF will only do 5.1 that is encoded in Dolby Digital or DTS. That means you'll need something to encode to these in real-time as most things will, at best, only output 5.1 as discrete channels. The easiest way is probably to get an external sound card. Software methods like Dolby Digital Live and the DTS equivalent should also do this, though I think the sound processor has to support this. I'm going to investigate if our onboard sound supports this when I get home later. That would be interesting.

HDMI as a specification will also do it, but I haven't tried that with my laptop so I don't know if it works properly in this case.

The various sound jacks on the these laptops do support discrete 5.1 of some kind though, through a combination of multiple jacks. I never looked into this so I can't say anything more about it.

 

hmm got it. i also think that the best way is an external sound card. i don't have hdmi input on my sound system but i have hdmi input on my Sony LCD TV, it has digital toslink output which is compatible with the input of the soundsystem.

Laptop to TV by HDMI
TV to Sound System by toslink digital output

but this is just a fantasy i dunno if it will work or not. i'll give it a try when i receive my laptop. How dows it sound? is this possible? i'm also waiting for your experience.

 

This will depend on your TV model, but my Samsung LCD TV (2-3 years old) will not pass through the original audio signal from the HDMI inputs to the SPDIF. My specific TV will only pass stereo PCM in this manner (if I remember correctly), regardless of the audio format my HDMI connection is carrying.

To say for sure, you'd have to check on your specific TV model. For this to work, your TV would have to encode the multi-channel PCM from the HDMI into Dolby Digital or DTS and pass it to the SPDIF. Then your receiver or what not would decode the Dolby/DTS signal and convert it to an analog signal for the speakers.

Of course if there is some way to use a real-time encoding technology like DDL and DTS-Connect with the on-board Realtek, you can skip this song and dance entirely.

 

I'm waiting to find out. I used a USB X-Fi with my old laptop, and was hoping the toslink output on this one would allow me to output the audio portion of DVD and videos to my speaker system (which decodes AC3 and DTS) without needing to use the external box. I know the machine won't transcode and output 5.1 from a non-surround source like an MP3, but am hoping I can use VLC and output A52 over SPDIF successfully. Just waiting on my mini to toslink cable to arrive.

 

i'll check and let you know.i hope that HDMI works on my sony bravia. i have to wait until 16th January for my laptop. if nothing works there are 2 options:

External sound card like i've posted on my first message or maybe 5.1 headphones (i don't prefere it)

 

What model is your Bravia?

 

it's KDL-32S5550

 

According to page 33 on the manual from this link:
Sony : Support for KDL-32S5550 | KDL-32S5550 technical support

The HDMI inputs on your TV will only handle two-channel PCM. So, it is effectively equivalent to just using your TOSLINK cable and bypassing the TV. Even if it did handle 5.1 PCM, I doubt any TV would be capable of re-encoding it to the necessary Dolby Digital or DTS for the SPDIF output.

I also haven't been able to find anyone who has gotten DDL or DTS-Connect to work with our on-board Realtek ALC892. Supposedly the support is there but their drivers don't enable it? I don't know.

 

Thank you for your effort. i also think that they don't do it but it's sure possible to do by drivers Well an external sound card seems to ne inevitable for a good 5.1 experience.

Asus Xonar U1 is a cheap model and supports 16 bit however soundblaster's model is 24 bit and seems to be better but i think asus should be enough for gaming.


here is the asus xonar u1 official page:
ASUSTeK Computer Inc. - Multimedia- ASUS Xonar U1 Audio Station

 

As a follow-up, I got my cable tonight and can report that it works properly - I can output A52 over SPDIF and my speakers receive an AC3 Dolby Digital signal properly. I've not bothered to reinstall my X-Fi USB.

 

Nice, thank you for your finding