Audio signal over HDMI

[Guest]

If I use the HDMI output on my laptop and feed it to my A/V receiver, which of these will be doing the decoding and processing of the audio signals?

a) The default sound card on the motherboard
b) The inbuilt sound card of the graphics card
c)The processor in my A/V receiver.

I *want* it to be the third option because neither my sound card nor my graphics card has dolby-digital decoding capabilities. What I want is to bypass these by feeding the undecoded signal to my receiver which has the capacity to decode the true 5.1 signal and feed it to my home theater system for accurate results.

So, long story short : If I use HDMI out from my computer, am I bypassing the processing of the audio signals to the receiver or am I just feeding pre- processed audio for my receiver to blindly play.

 

[alyoshka]

The correct answer is (b) The inbuilt sound card of the graphics card.
And if you use the HDMI cable you'll be feeding the pre-processed audio signal to your receiver which will further decode and encode it according to the setting you want it to play it in....
Eg. In my case, I'm using a Sony Muteki 6.2 thing, the feed that is sent into the receiver is shown on the display... I then like the receiver to do it's job to fine tune the signal according to the way the speakers are setup in my room and the way I like to hear my stuff....
Well, it does a pretty good job of it , I must say.... specially with AC3 5.1 feeds it's amazingly clear and real....

 

[americanaudiophile]

If your laptop is feeding a 51. or 7.1 channel signal the receiver will do the processing and analog to digital conversion. If you send a 2.0 PCM from the laptop then the receiver will do the digital to analog conversion.

 

[VincentP]

If I use the HDMI output on my laptop and feed it to my A/V receiver, which of these will be doing the decoding and processing of the audio signals?

a) The default sound card on the motherboard
b) The inbuilt sound card of the graphics card
c)The processor in my A/V receiver.

I *want* it to be the third option because neither my sound card nor my graphics card has dolby-digital decoding capabilities. What I want is to bypass these by feeding the undecoded signal to my receiver which has the capacity to decode the true 5.1 signal and feed it to my home theater system for accurate results.

So, long story short : If I use HDMI out from my computer, am I bypassing the processing of the audio signals to the receiver or am I just feeding pre- processed audio for my receiver to blindly play.

Laptop should send a digital signal (usually PCM) over HDMI, which is then decoded by the AV receiver.
Option c from your list.

 

[VincentP]

The correct answer is (b) The inbuilt sound card of the graphics card.
And if you use the HDMI cable you'll be feeding the pre-processed audio signal to your receiver which will further decode and encode it according to the setting you want it to play it in....
Eg. In my case, I'm using a Sony Muteki 6.2 thing, the feed that is sent into the receiver is shown on the display... I then like the receiver to do it's job to fine tune the signal according to the way the speakers are setup in my room and the way I like to hear my stuff....
Well, it does a pretty good job of it , I must say.... specially with AC3 5.1 feeds it's amazingly clear and real....

Nothing is "pre-processed" by the motherboard sound card. It plays no part in this process.
The graphics device becomes the sound device you see in Windows.
There is no CODEC required on the PC when using HDMI for audio because the sound is not decoded to analogue audio by the PC.
The digital audio signal is sent to the AV receiver over HDMI and decoded there to analogue audio.