Can't Get AC97 And Digital Speakers Working

C

calver

Member
Hi all

I've got a 2.1 channel Boston Acoustics speakers (model BA735) and onboard sound ALC883 on a Gigabyte 965GM-S2 motherboard. The thing is, I can't get sound working on it. Looking around the net, I've found out that it's because my speakers are digital. I'm not sure if my sound card can output a digital signal though. Can anyone tell me if it can?

If it can, the problem is that I can't seem to find an option in the settings to switch on "enable digital output". I had an old Sound blaster Live! card which had this option and all I had to do was enable it in order for my sound to work, but with this sound card, there appears to be no such option. This leads me to believe either a) this onbaord sound doesn't support digital speakers or b) i need to find the right driver which has this option. Hopefully, it'll be option b but I guess it's no biggie to install the old sound blaster card into my new system.

tia
 
Computer Guru said:
Hi Calver, welcome to NeoSmart Technologies.

According to Realtek, your card *does* support digital audio, but it may be that the drivers currently installed don't. Did the drivers come with Vista or did you have to install others?

Here's the document I'm referring to: http://www.realtek.com.tw/products/...;PFid=28&Level=5&Conn=4&ProdID=44
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Thanks for the welcome and response! It's great news to know it's supported! Now I just need to find the right drivers :smile: I have tried installing the latest ones (WDM154) for winxp - direct from realtek's website to no avail.
 
Computer Guru said:
I can't guarantee it'll work, but try the drivers linked here: http://neosmart.net/blog/archives/104
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Hi Guru

I've already found that link but didn't try out all possibilities. For the VIA drivers, I found a whole bunch of codecs. Could you direct me to the right one?

http://www.viaarena.com/default.aspx?PageID=2&OSID=1&CatID=1010

I suppose the latest audio codec versions would be my best bet so I've gone ahead and downloaded the VIA HD Audio Codec and the VIA Vinyl audio codecs. I'll tell you what happens when I get back home and try them out again.

Another thing, I'm a bit unsure whether I should be installing the HD codecs or the AC97 codecs. I find that after I install the AC97 codecs and reboot, Win XP starts complaining that there's new hardware but no device drivers installed. BUT, when I install the HD drivers, everything goes smoothly after the reboot except for the obvious which is no sound.

This driver business is driving me insane 8|

Thanks for all the help so far

EDIT: It seems my speakers won't work for this card afterall as I've found that my old sound blaster live! value had digital din jacks, which meant it could toggle between sending a digital/analog signal through the din jacks. The realtek sound card doesn't seem to offer digital signals through the analog jacks. :frowning: No wonder there's no option to enable digital output. Realtek seems to split digital and analog sound output whereas my Creative card merged the two together. I'm pretty sure I'm correct on this, but I'm open to correction.
 
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