5.1 audio check working, but in real scenario only two front speakers

Rojlani

Estimable
Feb 5, 2015
3
0
4,510
hi all,

just plugged in my 5.1 home theatre (with its 3 jacks) and chose a "5.1 surround" from the Control Panel where the sound check is. The check lets me hear every channel separately.

When i play a track, a movie or a game i get only the two front speakers without the SW.

It is the software, but what exactly - i have no idea.

: : :

Thank you for the time you took to read this
 
Solution
In Realtek Hd Audio manager under Speaker configuration also try checking Speaker Fill which can make stereo sounds hearable in multi channel speakers.

boju

Distinguished
Whats your audio card/onboard, is it Realtek?

Control panel i think you're referring to either Realtek Audio manager or Windows playback devices > speakers > Configure?

What happens if you set to 7.1 and play a game or watch a movie?

Modern games will have surround sound support so im a bit surprised by this.

Music/movies will depend how the sound was encoded. Music is in stereo mostly. If your speakers has a button to turn all speakers to stereo then do this, i can understand music only playing in 2.1.
 

ZippyPeanut

Honorable
Dec 26, 2012
28
0
10,590
What kind of speakers do you have, and do they come with a hardware control box? Also, do you have a sound card, or are you using on-board sound? I had the same problem with my Logitech Z906 system and dug around in software for several hours and consulted the Internet for several more hours. But the only thing I needed to do to get the surround to work was to push a single button on the control box.

-----------
i7 3770K OC @ 4.2Ghz / ASRock Extreme 4 Z77 / evga FTW 670 2X-SLI / Creative SB Audigy SE PCI Sound Card / 32 GB Corsair Vengeance 1600 / 500GB Samsung EVO 850 (boot) / 128 GB OCZ Vertex 4 / 2 TB WD Caviar Black / 2 TB Seagate Barracuda / Asetek 510LC Liquid Cooling System / LG 14X Blu-ray R/W / Corsair 1000w PSU / AzzA Genesis 9000 full tower / Windows 7 Professional 64 / 144hz 1ms 24-inch Asus monitor / Logitech Z906 Surround Sound
 

Rojlani

Estimable
Feb 5, 2015
3
0
4,510
1. Onboard audio, probably Realtek

2. Genius SW-HF5.1 5200

3. It has a "CD", "DVD" and "TV/Game" modes using 2, 6 and 2 inputs respectively. I am using DVD.

Before, i used it with CD and every speaker was working (although stereo).

My goal is:
When there is no 5.1 output from the PC, to have every speaker working, yet stereo. That is, make the PC output every channel the same.

Just tried a driver from Realtek, but this thing doesn't even launch after installation.

(Installed on Win8. Same PC's main HDD is with Win7. So i'd like this to work on both.)

For the games - latest games my rig can play are from ~2011. Can i make that old games' sound 5.1 (which dont have it as an option)?

Thanks
 

boju

Distinguished
Ok these speaker sets aren't the usual pc speakers :) im guessing you have 3x RCA to 3.5mm jack cables?

Front Left/right connected to Green jack
Cen/Sub connected to orange/yellow
Rears connected to black

It should work, maybe sound quality is set too high for the unit? try set sound quality in Windows to 16Bit DVD 48K hz. Under Windows audio playback devices > speakers > properties > advanced.

Did you try setting Windows audio playback devices to 7.1? Reason i asked is a while back Win10/Realtek switched black/grey jacks around, if it helps try the grey jack for rears. Think its been fixed but check that.
 

Rojlani

Estimable
Feb 5, 2015
3
0
4,510
Hmm ... Uhhhhh ...

Thanks for the help but ... just tested some original 5.1 movies. They do not, crap, work. After the sound test i was sure they will.

Do you know some other way except the Control Panel and the driver software to test the 5.1? .. I mean, could it be because of the player(MPC-HC and made sure it is 5.1).

And if i get to play 5.1 movies, will i get only the two front speakers sounding again when playing stereo?

And what are the chanses of everything getting as wanted after adding a dedicated audio card?
 

boju

Distinguished
You'll get the same result with a sound card, theres no difference between that and onboard sound in audio jack arrangement.

Setting Windows playback devices to 5.1 is all you need to configure your PC to 5.1. Setting Windows playback devices will also set Realtek and vice versa.

It will be the genius end. Your speaker unit has separate volume controls for each channel, check your surrounds aren't too low.