Digital CD playback with SB Live Value

[walrusbonzo]

How do you do Digital CD Audio playback with the SB Live. With my ESS Solo I could do Digital CD playback, as in I didn't need a cable from the CD Drive output to the sound card. But now that I have my SB Live I have to use this cable as I can't get it to do Digital CD playback...

I mean whats the point the Digital data being converted to analogue, back to digital and then back to analogue. When you can read the CD and the digital data is sent digitally via the IDE bus to the soundcard and then converted to analogue... The sound quality is so much greater that way!!!

how how how???

There must be a way..

Thanks!

[Thundrchez]

It's all in the mixer. By default the digital-CD is muted. Enable it, and you should be in business.

[ayoub_ibrahim]

correct me if I'm wrong but the sb live value doesn't have a digital cd input connector for digital connection to cd drive!

[Nuno]

I don´t know about the value, but the live player 1024 (or x-gamer) has 2 connectors for cd output: one analog and one digital. I have both conected, one from the cd-rom and another from the burner. And they both work. Yes, it´s a matter of selecting it in the creative mixer. I think cd digital is disabled by default.

[Hunsow]

Windows media player 7 (oh no) plays cd's digital, but I think you must enable it first in the device manager. There is also a winamp plugin that allows that, don't have a link handy though. Both work for me.

[spazm_1999]

ayoub_ibrahim, the SB live value has a digital cd input.... but I couldn't ever try it since my DVD rom doesn't have a digital out.

Spazm

[ayoub_ibrahim]

spazm_1999,I believe that you are confusing the retail card(X gamer or player 1024) with the OEM card(value)!

[walrusbonzo]

Well whatever my SBLive is (Value? 1024 Player?) it has a Digital CD input on the card. Is it called SPDIF or something?

Both my DVD and CD Writer have Digital CD output but for some reason I can't play CDs digitally on either..

And yes I have the right cable connected and yes the Digital CD and SPDIF are NOT muted!

What am I doing wrong...

[ayoub_ibrahim]

I'm not at my computer now but if memory serves me correctly, in tne mixer, you have to click a small + sign just above volume & check digital out!

[kjliew]

Walrusbonzo,

Check Creative site for CD-ROM/DVD-ROM compatibility with SBLive SPDIF digital audio input. Certain models of CD-ROM/DVD-ROM may not be compatible even though they come with SPDIF digital audio output. Mostly, this can be fixed by a simple CD-ROM/DVD-ROM firmware updates.

My 32X LG CD-ROM SPDIF was not compatible with SBLive as shipped. But LG provides a software to upgrade the firmware inside the CD-ROM from the host PC. After that, its SPDIF out now works on SBLive.

[walrusbonzo]

Thanks but I'm now using a plugin for Winamp which does digital extraction and plays the CD digitaly :-)

:-)

:-)

Yeah! No SPDIF cable needed!!

[Ali]

Cool, I never knew you could do this.

All my CD drives (CD ROM, R/W and DVD) are in a seperate SCSI box, and I couldnt think of a nice easy way to get the CD cable down to my tower case. Looks like I dont need to.

[Wombat]

Yep, but you're killing your bus bandwidth.

What OS are you trying to do this with?

[dZeus]

c'mon... how much bandwith does raw cdda requires? 187Kbps???? I don't call that 'killing' bus bandwidth

[Wombat]

I'm sorry. Let me elaborate.
It's not the bandwidth exactly. It's that he's got constant frequent accesses to the bus. The interrupts alone will be a PITA. Also, the IDE channel will be clogged. It's the repetitive access that bothers me, not the raw # of bits.