Need help hooking up a Sound Blaster Live Value to an Onkyo hts-650 (1 Viewer)

[Mark_Su]

Hi!
I'm planning to hook my SoundBlaster Live Value up to my Onkyo HTS-650 receiver. The proposed gameplan is
to attach an adapter to a digital coaxial cable, hook that into the SoundBlaster, and hook the other end of the cord into the Onkyo receiver. I wish to ask four things:
1) What kind of adapter would I need?
2) Would the audio quality (I'm interested in hooking up both appliances primarily for MP3 listening) be
about equal to that of a device such as an M-Audio Sonica?
3) Are there any potential problems? I went over the forums and read about SBLive Values blowing up receivers
and causing popping sounds while connected via a Coaxial Cable.
4) A sort of unrelated question, but can/should I connect my receiver to my sub with a coaxial cable or is a regular A/V cable sufficient?
Thanks in advance for any suggestions and help; this forum is a godsend for a n00b like me.
-Mark

 

[Jonas Pearson]

Mark,

I just recently did this myself, I sort of pieced together how to do it from information on several different forums, including Dell's. You'll need an adapter: (Radio Shack) 1/8" RCA mini plug male and stereo female RCA connections on the other end. Don't get a mono plug, it has to be stereo.

Connect the 1/8" RCA male mini-plug to the digital out on the soundcard, a digital coaxial cable to the left (white) female RCA connector, and the other male end to a digital coaxial auxiliary input on your receiver. For the digital coaxial cable, I used 2 x 25' Acoustic Research (Best Buy) subwoofer cables, which I confirmed with AR are the same as their shorter digital coaxial cables.

After hooking up, click on your sound card controls, select "advanced" and click the box for "Digital Output Only." Not sure about quality comparison to an MP3 player, as I don't have one. The sound is excellent though (no different than using my cd player). I've never had any popping, and I'm not sure how a 1.5V digital signal could blow up a receiver.

Good Luck and enjoy,

J

 

[Mark_Su]

Thanks J,
One question though, you say "cables", isn't a coaxial just one physical coaxial cable?

 

[Jonas Pearson]

Mark,

I had to connect 2 x 25' cables to cover my 50' run. I went from one corner of the house to the other through the basement with no signal loss (impossible with a standard analog connection). If your computer is close enough, you obviously could get by with a shorter cable.

J

 

[Mark_Su]

http://www.radioshack.com/product.as...5Fid=274%2D378
Just to make sure, is this the right adapter that I'm looking for?

 

[Jonas Pearson]

No. I'm 99.9% sure that its this one:
http://www.radioshack.com/product.as...5Fid=274%2D883
The male part is a 1/8" mini plug, the phono's are red and white although you can't tell from this picture (hook up only to the white). I looked at mine but there's no part number on it.

 

[Mark_Su]

Alright thanks a lot Jonas, I'll be sure to pick up that particular adapter tomorrow at Radio Shack. One last question though, what's the difference between the white and red RCA inputs and am I losing anything from not having anything plugged into the red? I was always under the assumption that white was the left stereo channel and red was the right. Anyways, thanks again, you've been a BIG help.

 

[Jonas Pearson]

Mark,

I'm not 100% sure exactly why this works. Here's my guess: I think that a digital signal is not seperated (i.e. into stereo) with different parts of the wire, rather it is seperated after it is decoded. Can someone here more knowlegable explain why this works?

I know that I first bought an adapter like the one you initially provided the link to above, and it didn't work. I found some info on the Dell forum that used the adapter that I bought, connected to the white connection only, and wala, stereo digital sound!