Thinkpads Forum

i just got the advanced mini dock to go with my T60 and i was wondering if the spdif will output multichannel to say a 5.1 setup. i mean come on, there must be a reason for giving us a quality output right?

anybody have an answer? what would happen if i connected it up to a logitech z-5500 which has a digital decoder

You'd get 2.1 Sound out of the optical.

Most computers do not output a DTS/Dolby 5.1 Optical signal at all- that requires the surround sound to be encoded by your computer (in retrospect, the Z5500's control center is the decoder).

There are no applications or games I'm aware of that can encode to DTS/Dolby for 5.1 Surround on the fly, realtime.

DVD's, on the other hand, have pre-encoded DTS data tracks for audio that can be "passed through" your computer and out the SPDIF port, which your Logitech's would pick up as a 5.1 Surround signal and thus give you true surround.

You'll still get frickin' wicked audio out of that SPDIF port in terms of quality, in my opinion... Even if it's just 2.1, with the speakers set to Prologic II or 2x Stereo (basically, fake surround), HalfLife 2 and Quake 4 are simply amazing when cranked, as is standard music.

-SC

so the thinkpad won't touch the sound information if it is outputted via SPDIF and will send all information that is available out that cable?

I'd like to know whether it is possible to play DVD and send AC3/DTS track via SPDIF to external receiver. I tried this but to no avail. I always get stereo. I'd like to persuade the Thinkpad to send AC3/DTS passthrough SPDIF. Is it possible? With my SoundBlaster Live-24 Bit External (USB) it is possible. THX

i've never really tried it but as far as i know, audio output using SPDIF wont be touch, it would just be the straight stream from the disc or content. That's the whole point of SPDIF anyways, the CPU doesn't decode anything then.

SHoTTa35 wrote:i've never really tried it but as far as i know, audio output using SPDIF wont be touch, it would just be the straight stream from the disc or content. That's the whole point of SPDIF anyways, the CPU doesn't decode anything then.

The disc/content is OK because if I use external soundcard everything works great. I think there must be some option in driver or something to enable passthrough.

pavelz wrote:

SHoTTa35 wrote:i've never really tried it but as far as i know, audio output using SPDIF wont be touch, it would just be the straight stream from the disc or content. That's the whole point of SPDIF anyways, the CPU doesn't decode anything then.

The disc/content is OK because if I use external soundcard everything works great. I think there must be some option in driver or something to enable passthrough.

There has been talk on this site or notebookreview about ac3filter being able to pass through the audio. http://ac3filter.net/