# Video card HDMI just for sound?



## Sinzia (Apr 17, 2013)

Not sure if this goes in here or in video cards, so let me know!

I have a spare Pioneer 5.1 receiver, with HDMI in. I'd like to use it for surround sound with my gaming PC, but I use DVI for my 4 monitors.

Can I use one of the spare HDMI outs (Like from my 650 Ti) just as a sound card?

I.E. there's no monitor hooked up to it, just audio.

Thanks folks!


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## FreedomEclipse (Apr 17, 2013)

Sure you can.

should work fine with a 680


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## Sasqui (Apr 17, 2013)

I think you're only going to answer the question by trying it out!


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## Sinzia (Apr 17, 2013)

Sasqui said:


> I think you're only going to answer the question by trying it out!



Heh, I was thinking about that, but I was hoping I could get some confirmation first!


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## Sasqui (Apr 17, 2013)

Sinzia said:


> Heh, I was thinking about that, but I was hoping I could get some confirmation first!



...Sounds like an off-situation, I'm assuming you have one card, 4 monitors connected to DVI ports and want to use a spare HDMI on the same card to pump out the HD Audio?  Just not sure.

If it was two cards, one dedicated to HD audio only, there may be a conflict if the card for video also has HD Audio.


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## Sinzia (Apr 17, 2013)

Sasqui said:


> ...Sounds like an off-situation, I'm assuming you have one card, 4 monitors connected to DVI ports and want to use a spare HDMI on the same card to pump out the HD Audio?  Just not sure.
> 
> If it was two cards, one dedicated to HD audio only, there may be a conflict if the card for video also has HD Audio.



I'll just have to try and see I guess.

This makes it seem like it's at least possible:

So I have a possible workaround/solution which I will post in case it helps anyone else.

Whichever graphics card I tried (520 or 670), if I connected HDMI->receiver->projector, audio would not work. Adding a second card meant I could go HDMI->receiver and HDMI->projector and HDMI->receiver would pass audio. My solution therefore was to separate the audio and video separately on the same card, so I did HDMI->receiver and DVI->projector (It was a DVI to HDMI cable). This meant I had to set duplicate desktop on both DVI and HDMI and in the nVidia control panel set audio to just be on the HDMI. I then had to play a little with display settings to make sure I was driving both at 1080p60 (I did originally get tearing as it was truing to drive displays at 59Hz).

Anyway, this is acceptable, and certainly better than having to go through an RMA process. Still seems like a bug to me somewhere though.


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## Sasqui (Apr 22, 2013)

Sinzia said:


> My solution therefore was to separate the audio and video separately on the same card, so I did HDMI->receiver and DVI->projector (It was a DVI to HDMI cable). This meant I had to set duplicate desktop on both DVI and HDMI and in the nVidia control panel set audio to just be on the HDMI.



I susepected it would be "wonky".  No idea how the cable sensing (Audio vs Video) works on the HDMI cable.  I bet that had something to do with it not working with the pass-through, and it could be something to do with the reciever.

Now I'm curious how AMD cards might work in the same config.


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## Sinzia (Apr 30, 2013)

So I got it working, I used the 650Ti because if I used it on one of my 680's Nvidia Surround would stop working.

The trick to get it to work was I had to "clone" my 17 inch HP display to the Sony receiver! Once I did that all was right with the world.

Included is a screen shot of how it looks inside the Nvidia Control Panel.


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## FreedomEclipse (Apr 30, 2013)

so you are now running 3GPUs?


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## Sinzia (May 1, 2013)

FreedomEclipse said:


> so you are now running 3GPUs?



I always was.

Oh, It seems my system specs are not up to date, I'll fix that now!

Thanks for reminding me, Freedom!


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## FreedomEclipse (May 1, 2013)

does that setup boost 3d performance? or does that 650 function as a dedicated physics and 'audio' card?


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## d1nky (May 1, 2013)

sounds very interesting, basically a dedicated sound card but hdmi out. and i would like to know about the performance/physx scaling also?!

if you get a spare smaller monitor you could also have an independent temp/stats monitor for gaming and benching etc!


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## patrico (May 1, 2013)

should work fine,, no??


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## Sinzia (May 2, 2013)

I've been using it for physx, and also to drive a 4th monitor to show system stats (Precision's monitor, AIDA64, CPUz and GPUz) before I thought about using it as a sound card.

I switched to this over the onboard or my xfi titanium because both of those were crackling and distorting the audio after a few hours of playing.

I'm sure it doesn't hurt, but I doubt it would help with physx considering that I have dual 680's in the system.


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