new sound card....no sound

J

jman15

Member
just bought x-530 5.1 surround sound logitech speakers for my computer. Realized i didn't have a 5.1 sound card. Bought one. Put it into PCI slot, loaded the drivers. But nothing. I check the card and there are lots of "needles" that look like they need somethign plugged into them. I have one white little "box" structure that looks like you plug in a really small... ide cable is it? And i had two needles with safety protecters and above it it said something about a subwofer. I want to know what kind of cables i need with this to make these work, i have none to fit the :box: and it came with no cables. Is this simply that my motherboard does not support them? How do i know? I am confused.


i have an audio excel pci 6 channel sound card. My speakers are x-530 surround sound logitech speakers. Both 5.1
 
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It's best that you provide the name of the soundcard so we can try to get pictures of it and see what these "needles" are.

However, try this in the meantime.

Control Panel -> Sounds and Audio Devices -> Audio (it's a tab) -> And makes sure Sound play back is selected to your new sounds card. Also, from the Volume tab, makes sure your 5.1 speaker option is on, and make sure no volumes are muted.
 
i have an audio excel pci 6 channel sound card. My speakers are x-530 surround sound logitech speakers. Both 5.1

I did what hylian asked and now the two front speakers and the bass work but the rear and center speakers still do no work. I don't get what is going on. Everything is color coordinated. If you need antymore info please tell me. Also, i just realized thsi was supposed to be a chaintech vid card :/ meh oh well. It should still work.
 
what sound card is it? is it creative? If so, i've had many problems with creative's drivers. I usually have to extract the drivers from the update on the soundblaster site, and have windows install those manually.
 
By you describing those needles, it sounds like that is the S/PDIF inputs and such on the card. Not essential for hearing sound. Two things, make sure your drivers are correctly installed and, if you have onboard sound, make sure it is disabled through BIOS.
 
how do i disable onboard sound through bios? And i have gotten sound to work but the center and rear speakers do not work. Maybe onboard has somehow taken control through the card, cause this is what hte on board did for me as well. Why would those speakers not be working?

And i it says the sound card driver is running properly, maybe i installed the wrong driver or something, i dunno. Ill do some more tests tomorrow i guess.

also, do i only get surround sound with certain movies/audio files?
 
jman15 said:
And i have gotten sound to work but the center and rear speakers do not work.
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Not long ago at all one of my friends had the exact same problem. It turned out that he was listening to mp3's, which are only encoded for 3 channels; left, right and sub-woofer. If you're only listening to mp3's/wav files, then that would explain it. I've read that you can get programs/plug-ins that will project the side channels through all 4 side speakers, and I believe that the middle speaker operates as a mono channel with most of those programs.
jman15 said:
also, do i only get surround sound with certain movies/audio files?
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Some movies (they have to be encoded for 5.1 surround sound) will utilize all the channels, but all the movies I've encountered that have 5.1 support are for DVD. If you're watching DVD's I'm sure you can use all speakers.

It's worth noting that the mp3/wav encoding issue is only one of the possible causes. If you got a program with your sound card that lets you test all the speakers to ensure they're working, then try using that.
 
i just palyed around with ti some more and now when i play mp3's it is as nueromancer says, only 3 channels are used. But when i play LOTRBME for isntance, i end up using 4 channels i think it is? All the speakers work but the center speaker. What is the center speaker for? When will it actually work?
 
jman15 said:
i just palyed around with ti some more and now when i play mp3's it is as nueromancer says, only 3 channels are used. But when i play LOTRBME for isntance, i end up using 4 channels i think it is? All the speakers work but the center speaker. What is the center speaker for? When will it actually work?
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If the game settings have an option for "speaker setup", or something to that effect, I'd check it and make sure it's set to 5.1 surround sound. If there's no option for that then I'd make sure that the speaker itself works (with my friend's computer the sound card came with a program that could test all the individual speakers). Also, have you tried playing different games? If so, are they too only projecting through the 4 speakers (plus the sub-woofer)?
 
Check the audio settings on the speakers. I have the Logiteck Z-5500 Digital speakers and I had the same "problem" at first. On mine there are different settings (Dolby Digital Music, Dolby Digital Movie, etc.). I think there are about 5 or 6 different settings. FYI, music is only two channels, so it will normally only play out of 4 of the speakers - not the middle one. You should be able to change the settings so that the speakers simulate surround sound... then it will play out of all of the speakers. Don't worry about it - it's not really a problem. If you were able to get it to play out of 4 of the satellites you should be fine.
 
GrandMoffTarkin said:
FYI, music is only two channels
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I shouldn't have said that music is encoded in 3 channels, that was my bad, but the subwoofer functions as a "phantom" third channel, since it's signal is derivitive of the left/right signals. While not specifically encoded for a third 'subwoofer' channel, the signal is routed through an extra speaker nonetheless, hence my (now edited for accuracy) statement that audio files have three native output devices; left, right, and subwoofer.

Edit: The center speaker is a mono speaker, so it should be playing along once you get it to emulate surround.
 
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hmm nt really sure how to emulate surroud. When my comp started with the drivers cd in i clicked an option for 5.1 surround sound, did the same under control panel sound options.
 
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