What's new

detecting if a soundblaster live! has been upgraded to 5.1

sk8bloke22

roll for life
basically i got my live! card second hand a while ago, and the bloke in the shop (CEX in london) told me that my live! card, although not an official 5.1 soundblaster, had been upgraded to be used with 5.1 speaker setup. i just needed a sound card quick, so i thought this to be useful wheneva i wanted to upgrade to a 5.1 setup...

anyway, now my rusty old cambridge soundworks 4.1 speaker setup is getting old (one speaker input has fused or something, so now only 3 speakers work) i was thinking of getting some new 5.1 speakers. but im not so sure if my card really was upgraded by the previous owner of the card...how do i check?

these are the ports

1) Gameport
2) Rear Speaker Input <-- Gold
3) Front Speaker Input <-- Gold
4) Not Sure <-- Gold
5) Line In <-- Gold

help???
 

blizz

New member
the thing I'd recommend it to get a good look at your card, and check for a pic of your card online.
 

Redah

Go Sweden! Not!
Administrator
I'm pretty sure you have:

1) Gameport
2) Rear Speaker Output
3) Front Speaker Output
4) Microphone Input
5) Line Input

Even if the 4th isn't a Microphone Input, which I think it is, you still wouldn't have a 5.1 card. If you'd have a 5.1 card, the Rear and Front shouldn't have been next to eachother, but there should have been a Center plug between them. Front, Rear, Center.

These usually also are color coded.
 
OP
sk8bloke22

sk8bloke22

roll for life
Redah said:
I'm pretty sure you have:

1) Gameport
2) Rear Speaker Output
3) Front Speaker Output
4) Microphone Input
5) Line Input

Even if the 4th isn't a Microphone Input, which I think it is, you still wouldn't have a 5.1 card. If you'd have a 5.1 card, the Rear and Front shouldn't have been next to eachother, but there should have been a Center plug between them. Front, Rear, Center.

These usually also are color coded.

dang...goddman computer Exchange lying out of their arses again :angry:

ok im still not convinced though...ill continue to research...
 

Reznor007

New member
On the real Live5.1 cards, it goes like this:

MIDI Port(Joystick)
Rear(analog stereo)
Front(analog stereo)
Mic
Line
DigitalOut or Center/Subwoofer analog out depending on the settings in the SB Live Surround Mixer program


If your card doesn't have the digital output jack, then it probably won't work with the 5.1 audio.
 
Last edited:
OP
sk8bloke22

sk8bloke22

roll for life
Redah said:
If you'd have a 5.1 card, the Rear and Front shouldn't have been next to eachother, but there should have been a Center plug between them. Front, Rear, Center.

These usually also are color coded.

ah, but im not talking about a regular 5.1 card, it was an upgraded live! card (which is possible to do as the 5.1 later series were just a firmware update) which is why my connectors aernt colour coded, as they were modified by someone. i think the reason why the bloke told me that it was able to use 5.1 speakers, was becos it didnt hav colour coded connectors. if it was modified, then the center doesnt hav to be in between the front and rear connectors...i think...
 

Redah

Go Sweden! Not!
Administrator
Reznor007 said:
On the real Live5.1 cards, it goes like this:

MIDI Port(Joystick)
Rear(analog stereo)
Front(analog stereo)
Mic
Line
DigitalOut or Center/Subwoofer analog out depending on the settings in the SB Live Surround Mixer program


If your card doesn't have the digital output jack, then it probably won't work with the 5.1 audio.

Nope, not true, check the attached image for proof. His card is probably a regular SB Live! card, which has the ports I illustrated in my post above. The Live! 5.1 card, as pictured below, has from top to bottom:

Front (or Rear, dunno)
Center
Rear (or Front, dunno)

There's also another line of Live! 5.1 cards, which is the Live! 5.1 Digital series...

I think the salesman at the CEX meant that there's software now (I think it's on the CD) that will mix 5.1 signals into 2 outputs. It won't give you the real experience tho
 
OP
sk8bloke22

sk8bloke22

roll for life
although i think ur right redah...its not completely wat i meant. my card, according to the dickhead salesman, was not a typical soundblaster live! value card...actually he compared to another one, and the ports were different colours. he believed that someone had personally modified the card. i just realised that i can test this...my brother has a fucking amazing speaker setup on his new pc, hes going to america tommorow, so i can fuck around with it...i test his speakers on my pc. i once saw an article that showed and described how to modify the 1st generation live! cards to make them into 5.1 cards. ur probably right, and my card is just a regular crappy live! card, but maybe it was modified. ill check tommorw.
 

Reznor007

New member
Redah said:


Nope, not true, check the attached image for proof. His card is probably a regular SB Live! card, which has the ports I illustrated in my post above. The Live! 5.1 card, as pictured below, has from top to bottom:

Front (or Rear, dunno)
Center
Rear (or Front, dunno)

There's also another line of Live! 5.1 cards, which is the Live! 5.1 Digital series...

I think the salesman at the CEX meant that there's software now (I think it's on the CD) that will mix 5.1 signals into 2 outputs. It won't give you the real experience tho

No, it's true. I have a SB Live 5.1 Xgamer card, and can verify that. The center/sub output is also the digital audio output jack. I have my card outputting into a home theater receiver for 5.1 in games. Look at my setup(old pic though...many new toys added since that pic :) )
 
OP
sk8bloke22

sk8bloke22

roll for life
goddamn arsehole shitty CEX ... Ok i dunno if its a 5.1 card or not, the centre speaker did work, pretty much as it should, but the sound card is most probably a regular 4.1 live! card. ok thats not the problem. i thought my speaker port had fused or something, but no, i had the exact same problem in my brothers top-notch digitheatre LC speakers, where the Front-Right Speaker was VERY VERY faint. they sold me a dodgy sound card the arseholes. well, im gonna part exchange back to them...i only really lose £10 as they'll take £30 for it and i originally paid £40. so thats not too bad. ill trade a few more games in so i can get something else..

im not sure about the audigy, as it costs £70 and i dont think ill be able to afford it...wat are other good choices at a slightly cheaper price???

/me looks at renzor's pic

oh my flipping god, those speakers are bigger than my dog.
 

Allnatural

New member
Moderator
I think the best way to check would be to install the card (if possible) and pop in a DVD, preferably one with the THX Optimode. Do the speaker level test. If it's a 5.1 card you'll get discrete channels, even if using an analog 4.1 setup (you'll have a phantom center channel of course). You just need a DVD program that allows output of the SPDIF stream (WinDVD works). That way you'll know your card is doing the DD decoding and not the DVD player.
 
OP
sk8bloke22

sk8bloke22

roll for life
ah, i screwed the shop over. :) i gave in the live! card they gave me, i bought as a live! value, but they bought it from me as a normal live! so i earned £7. which went towards my shiny new audigy...and now all my speakers work. the card they had given me originally was definitely a dud, and obviously when they test their hardware, they dont test it with 4/5 speakers otherwise they would hav found that one input wasnt working correctly. anyway, the audigy kicks ass. just wondering, wat does the SPDIF do exactly. i connected the lead to my dvd drive. and i can select that as an option in powerdvd XP, but i havent really xperimented with the card that much, so i was wondering wat the difference is between using the SPDIF option and a regular 4 speaker option...i thought it was just for digital 5.1 speakers.
 

Allnatural

New member
Moderator
SPDIF sends the digital stream to your sound card for decoding (assuming it supports DD/DTS of course). Choosing the 4 or 5 speaker option in PowerDVD lets the DVD program decode the signal. There is probably no advantage to using one over the other, but you would need SPDIF output if you were sending the signal to an outboard decoder (such as a home theater receiver).

I brought up SPDIF just as a way of testing whether a card was actually a 5.1 model or not.:)
 
OP
sk8bloke22

sk8bloke22

roll for life
Allnatural said:
SPDIF sends the digital stream to your sound card for decoding (assuming it supports DD/DTS of course). Choosing the 4 or 5 speaker option in PowerDVD lets the DVD program decode the signal. There is probably no advantage to using one over the other, but you would need SPDIF output if you were sending the signal to an outboard decoder (such as a home theater receiver).

I brought up SPDIF just as a way of testing whether a card was actually a 5.1 model or not.:)

cheers. now i really do hav a 5.1 card. dunno if ill get some nifty 5.1 speakers yet. sound is great on my 4 speaker setup. just watched 2001:Space Oddyssey and the sound was just incredible (need to find an explanation for the film though, had no idea wat the fuck was going on).
 

Top