Need help with receiver hooked up to PC

[Rodario]

Hello everybody

I'm having some issues with the new sound system I set up for my PC and I hope you guys can help me with this.

I hooked up an Onkyo TX-SR333 to my PC via HDMI, because I want true 5.1 and to my understanding, Toslink can only carry 2 channels and produce virtual surround at best. Also, this receiver is not high end enough to feature 5.1 RCI input, only stereo.

I did it in this fashion:

''''''''''''''''''''_HDMI out-> Receiver->Speakers
PC GPU<
'''''''''''''''''''''-HDMI out-> Monitor

So the receiver and monitor are both connected directly to the GPU, not GPU->Receiver->Monitor.
I did it this way to eliminate the chance of the receiver causing input lag to the monitor.

It's working well enough so far, apart from the issue of windows recognizing the receiver as a monitor and forcing me into a fake multi display setup.

Now to the issue that's been bugging me: The receiver loses its settings in Windows 7's "Playback Devices" every time the PC has been shut down for more than a few minutes. This means I have to reconfigure the receiver after every startup. This only takes a few seconds, but to have to do it every time is a real hassle.

I wasn't sure whether to post this in the Windows or HT section of these forums, but I thought the percentage of people in this forum that have a HT system hooked up to their PC might be higher than in the Windows forums.

Thank you for reading this and thanks in advance for any help you may be able to offer.

 

[americanaudiophile]

If the receiver is not on when the PC boots up then it reverts to a single monitor setup. Make sure the receiver is on first.
You can use an optical cable for 7.1 digital surround sound. Will not support lossless audio codecs but will be fine for regular DD or DTS.

 

[Rodario]

If the receiver is not on when the PC boots up then it reverts to a single monitor setup. Make sure the receiver is on first.

Thank you! At least the couple of times I've tried this, Windows retained the receiver's configuration. I mostly forget to turn on the receiver until I notice there's no sound. I'm just used to PC sound systems, I guess.

You can use an optical cable for 7.1 digital surround sound. Will not support lossless audio codecs but will be fine for regular DD or DTS.

That's just the thing. I have some lossless sources that I want to stay that way. Also, and more importantly, some games do not use DD or DTS, so I won't get true 5.1 for those.