On board audio question

[jtr1888]

Morning peeps, I have an Asus IV Formula mobo which has toslink spdif output, I also have a Sweex sound card that gives me both toslink & coaxial spdif ( currently fitted in a different pc)

Now, as I use separate Marantz AV receiver for my sound, does it really matter which source I supply the spdif from ?

Im asking as I want to connect pc to both my Marantz & Onkyo AV Rec'rs at the same time, best setup for me would be fitting the sweex so I can use Tos & Coax at same time via the Sweex card, however, if u guys feel the sound processors from the onboard sound would be better than the card, especially as Mobo's have come on leaps & bounds over the last year or so, Im happy to go buy a splitter to split the Toslink, but b4 I go spending, thought I'd ask here 1st

BTW, standard IV mobo not ROG SE

Cheers oh' wise ones

 

[ncc74656]

i useto use spdif years ago, never had an issue with my onboard sound cards. i use MSI exclusively thus all my onboard cards are Realek.

 

[jtr1888]

Doesnt really make any sense to me bud ? I presume u only use the analogue ports from PC for sound then ?

 

[ncc74656]

no, i used SPDIF-coax and then optical for many years but that is no longer able to handle my audio setup so i use HDMI now.

 

[jtr1888]

ah I see, yes, my Onkyo can handle HDMI audio but my Marantz cant, as Onkyo is in another room, cheaper for me to run a Coax lead as alread had a long DVI lead

Makes sense now, ta

 

[ncc74656]

i useto run a technics 5.1 but now i run a yamaha rx-v765 7.2 and i need to use HDMI for that one. also with my 46" samsung monitor it just makes sense for me to drop SP/dif and run it all hdmi.

in either case the onboard card should be fine for what you need to do, i know realtek's let you split SPdif outputs for differnt channels but not all do so if you want to have 2 outs you may need to add a sound card.

 

[jtr1888]

Cool, I will add the card for the safe bet, only need DD from PC as all PCM done thru PS3, thx for pushing me in either direction, a light was all I needed, cheers