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Topic: Bought a Asus Xonar D2/PM soundcard today. (Read 2132 times) previous topic - next topic
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Bought a Asus Xonar D2/PM soundcard today.

Because I assume that there are more Xonar D2/PM (or D2X) owners here, I hope I can get some answers about it.
I would like to use this card mainly with the analog outputs connected to multichannel input of my av receiver and for music and movie playback with winamp or foobar, powerdvd and MPC (with ffdshow audio decoder). I read that the Xonar should have a very good DAC and this way I can make use of it instead of the DAC in my receiver. Am I right so far ?
And am I right that the Xonar can not/does not decode Dolby Digital and DTS  and that has to be done in the software player (PowerDVD, MPC/ffdshow) ? When buying the card I was under the impression that it could decode, but when I disable the AC3 and DTS codecs in ffdshow I don't get sound at all in multichannel. Of course that is not a big deal, because I still use the DAC of the card, but I would like to have some clarity about it to have a better understanding.
 

Bought a Asus Xonar D2/PM soundcard today.

Reply #1 –
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And am I right that the Xonar can not/does not decode Dolby Digital and DTS and that has to be done in the software player (PowerDVD, MPC/ffdshow) ? When buying the card I was under the impression that it could decode, but when I disable the AC3 and DTS codecs in ffdshow I don't get sound at all in multichannel.
I think you might be right...  The web site says:
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Real-time DDL and DTS Connect encoders for amazing gaming and surround sounds over your Home Theater System
 

Usually, the decoding is done by the DVD-player software, or the signal is passed-thru to the S/PDIF connector, and the decoding is done by your receiver.  I think some soundcards have Dolby Pro Logic decoders (or a similar non-Dobly alternative) as part of their driver/utility package, but I'm not sure about AC3 or DTS decoders.

P.S.
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DTS Connect is comprised of two DTS technologies:

DTS Neo: PC™ takes 2-channel (stereo) audio and transforms it into a full-bandwidth matrix of your speaker layout (upto 7.1 channels)

DTS Interactive™ encodes digital audio sources into DTS Digital Surround, which can then stream out to your Audio/Video Receiver using a S/PDIF connection.


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Dolby Digital Live

Enjoy audio from your PC or game console through your home theater with Dolby Digital Live. A real-time encoding technology, Dolby Digital Live converts any audio signal into a Dolby Digital bitstream for transport and playback through a home theater system. With it, your PC or game console can be hooked up to your Dolby Digital-equipped audio/video receiver or digital speaker system via a single digital connection, eliminating the confusion of multiple