Decadent_Spectre Posted August 21, 2005 Share Posted August 21, 2005 Firstly is it possible to hook up the THX Ultra2 system to a computer? also suppose someone wanted to lets say use a 7.2 configuration then what kind of sound card would he require? would a creative one do? Sorry if i asked some obvious questions but I'm not really an AV l337 master or anything but where better to ask about klipsch products than their forums? thanks in advance Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hooting_monkey Posted August 22, 2005 Share Posted August 22, 2005 Ok, first of all not to be rude but if you're not a 31337 AV guy then why do you asking about a $10K speaker system. Also, why would you hook a $10K speaker system to a computer with a $200 sound card? That baffles me. Sorry about being rude to you on your first forum post, but you need to be a little more specific. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Anakin26 Posted August 22, 2005 Share Posted August 22, 2005 If you really think about hooking the THX Ultra 2 system to a PC, it should be one high end HTPC. Anything else is a waste of money. I have seen quite a few HTPCs and most of them don´t even come close to mid-priced DVD-Players. Its kind of like asking if a Ferrari can be run with Diesel.... Nick Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Decadent_Spectre Posted August 22, 2005 Author Share Posted August 22, 2005 thats the thing i dont mean to sound very knowledgable because im not what i want to do is get the most sound out of my PC...and im willing to spend hence the question on soundcards as well because i much doubted that my current creative one would suffice to do justice to the THX and the reason i want to hook it to my PC is well because i spend quite a lot of time on there and most of my music is on there...so it would make sense for me to connect it to my PC Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Decadent_Spectre Posted August 22, 2005 Author Share Posted August 22, 2005 I have a pretty good PC as far as general specs go...I know a fair deal on computer hardware but not so much on AV equipment Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WMcD Posted August 22, 2005 Share Posted August 22, 2005 The audio outputs of computer cards are "line level" just like the output of a DVD player. So basically you can use them to drive an aux input of a receiver. I have done that and the sound is very good, depending on the source, of course. Sorry that I don't know about which sound cards support multichannel. There is a computer section farther down the forum. Maybe someone there can help you. Best, Gil Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DrWho Posted August 22, 2005 Share Posted August 22, 2005 ---------------- On 8/21/2005 11:57:26 PM Decadent_Spectre wrote: Firstly is it possible to hook up the THX Ultra2 system to a computer? also suppose someone wanted to lets say use a 7.2 configuration then what kind of sound card would he require? would a creative one do? Sorry if i asked some obvious questions but I'm not really an AV l337 master or anything but where better to ask about klipsch products than their forums? thanks in advance ---------------- Is the intended purpose targeted for gaming, movies or both? If you're doing strictly movies, then your creative card will be fine...Just run the digital output of your card into a reciever to do the decoding for you. If this is for games, then you will need to find a card with analog outputs and then you'll probably want to plug them into the analog preinputs on your reciever. Otherwise there will be no way for you to accomplish discrete surround sound (which is important if you're going to be dropping this much on the games already). So if you are going to do both, then I would try and find a card that can do digital and analog outputs without having to switch cables around (any of the newer audigys will be capable of this as long as you get the seperate front panel or seperate unit option). Sound quality for games isn't as huge a concern as movies so I think you'll be fine going with an audigy card for now. If you use the digital connection, then you won't sacrifice any sound quality whatsoever (or at least you shouldn't). There are those that don't like the audigy cards and all that, but I've never had problems with them. I would even claim the sound quality is on par with all the equipment I've used in the studio. Of course it's not better, but it certainly never leaves me unsatisfied or wanting more. And the fact that all computer software is written with creative in mind just means it makes that much more sense (at least for me anyway). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hooting_monkey Posted August 22, 2005 Share Posted August 22, 2005 You could look into a Dolby Live Encoder card. I know they exist, I'm just not sure who manufatures them. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Anakin26 Posted August 23, 2005 Share Posted August 23, 2005 I have done a little internet search. There is a PC from Dell that is THX certified. Yes... Georgy Lucas said it´s good enough! They are using a "Turtle Beach Santa Cruz DSP" sound card, so i figure it wouldn´t be a bad match for the THX Ultra 2 system. There is quite some information on the internet about it! Nick Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest BobG Posted August 23, 2005 Share Posted August 23, 2005 I suggest you go see the nice people at Heimkino if you can get to Vienna. They are experts on the THX system and will give you good advice about achieving your desired system goals. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Anakin26 Posted August 23, 2005 Share Posted August 23, 2005 Hehe... do you know the guys out here in vienna? I visit them all the time. Apart from beeing my local ht-dealer they have actually become friends of mine. The only thing is... I am not the one in search of a PC card for a THX Ultra II system. Nick Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Shade Posted August 23, 2005 Share Posted August 23, 2005 Check out M-Audio sound cards. I'm using an M-audio revolution card and have been quite happy with it. I would suggest you stay away from Creative cards. The problem is that they upsample everything to 48khz. Personally, I do not like what this does to the sound. M-Audio's cards do not automatically upsample the output, and are thus capable of outputting at 44khz. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Shade Posted August 23, 2005 Share Posted August 23, 2005 Almost forgot, if you're setting up a HTPC check out AVS forums. They have a forum for HTPC's. A lot of good information there. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Decadent_Spectre Posted August 23, 2005 Author Share Posted August 23, 2005 the purpose is a mix of gaming/music/movies "So if you are going to do both, then I would try and find a card that can do digital and analog outputs without having to switch cables around (any of the newer audigys will be capable of this as long as you get the seperate front panel or seperate unit option). " yeah i have a Audigy 2 ZS Plat Pro and I can switch between a digitial and analog signal anytime but theres no point to switch digitial as the speakers I have are analog I would look up M-Audio Cards or even turtle beach cards but so far I have been unable to locate them in India. Does anyone have any idea on if the new Creative X-Fi is a good choice for it? and how it performs on the musical front? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DrWho Posted August 24, 2005 Share Posted August 24, 2005 ---------------- On 8/23/2005 5:33:01 PM Decadent_Spectre wrote: yeah i have a Audigy 2 ZS Plat Pro and I can switch between a digitial and analog signal anytime but theres no point to switch digitial as the speakers I have are analog ---------------- But you are going to need an amplifier to power the speakers...and for the cost of 7 monoblocks you can go a simpler route and get a high quality reciever which will give you more setup options and sound about the same. So instead of performing the D/A conversion inside the sound card, the reciever can perform the D/A process and probably do a better job (thus giving you a better sound). I would say go with digital handsdown all the time, but then you won't get discrete surround sound in games, so you sacrifice the possibility for a bit of quality for the discreteness, but only in games. For digital sources of sound (everything in your computer is digital until it hits the DA chip), the largest impact on the sound quality occurs during the digital to analog conversion so investing more money there is the key to better sound. (btw, you can't just plug the speakers into the back of the card and expect them to work...every speaker needs its own amplifier). Before I moved off to college I had pretty much the same situation, even with the same sound card...I had everything hooked up through my reciever (via digital for movies and then analog for games...both digital and analog ran through the reciever). It was real nice because I could set all the volume controls to 0dB on the computer (73% if I remember correctly) and then I just used the remote for the reciever to control the volume. It was also real nice because I could always switch over to headphones by simply plugging them into the reciever and it would turn off all the other speakers (just about every reciever performs the same way). As far as the 48kHz upsampling thing...this is something native to all windows operating systems and has nothing to do with the specific sound card in question (unless something has changed since the last time I read up on it). There are ways of bypassing this (for example the pro audio standard ASIO output format which the audigy2 and up is capable of), but all your normal computer sounds are going to be using the normal windows based sound format (i wanna say the kernal mixer or something like that) and it will undergo the 48kHz upsampling. So unless the software you're using is taking advantage of some other format (like asio) then I don't see how a different brand card is going to change the way the OS handles the normal protocols. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest BobG Posted August 24, 2005 Share Posted August 24, 2005 Anakin, sorry for my brain failure. I don't personally know the guys at Heimkino, but I've worked with the Klipsch distributor in Austria for a long time and he is a big fan. I've been to their web site and know how they support Klipsch and the Ultra 2 system. Now if only the distance from Austria to India weren't so great. I know our distributors in India have sold a number of Ultra 2 systems. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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