# 5.1/spdif/optical connection and all I get is stereo in games



## Fred_Vie (Feb 24, 2019)

hey there,

I have a Realtek onboard and its connected via optical cable to my soundsystem that supports DTS-Interactive 5.1 and Dolby Digital Live 5.1 but that doesnt seem to do much except for movies. In games I get stereo. If I use stereo I at least have left/right/center but also no rear.

Is that normal because games dont support DTS/DDL or do I need another soundcard? 

OS Win10, drivers from https://www.techpowerup.com/forums/forums/audio-video-home-theater.76/post-thread


----------



## FreedomEclipse (Feb 24, 2019)

What games do you play and do you have a full 5.1 setup?


----------



## Fred_Vie (Feb 24, 2019)

Anthem, Battlefield 5, Black Desert Online, Apex, SW-tor. Anthem doesnt show any DTS/DDL logo, the rest I gotta check.

Yea I have a 5.1 soundsystem and (you didnt ask it yet but..) yes the games are set to 5.1, else my question would be rather stupid. My soundsystem can decode DTS and DDL thus I dont even need a software for it to work.

I tried DTS and DDL alone and even together with Dolby Atmos and Dolby Home Theater. Alternately ofc. All I got was stereo.

The only way I get a crap 5.1 is on stereo in the Realtek settings + Dolby Atmos (or Dolby Home Theater) but all that dolby does is copy sound from the front to the back. If someone shoots/runs/talks behind me its still louder in front which kinda defeats the purpose of a 5.1 system.

Just I cant use the analog output because both of my sound systems have one broken channel. Only on my older creative 5.1 system - even though the analog input has one broken channel - the optical+spdif connections are still working at 5.1. I tested it with 3 different soundcards now. 5.1 works flawlessly with movies and thats the only 5.1 I get on the spdif out until now.

Last time I was confronted with that issue was 20 years ago and afair back then Creative was the only soundcard producer who could even manage with an analog 5.1. Since then I got out of touch with that topic. I kinda assumed that 20 years later this shouldnt be an issue anymore... Guess I was wrong but I still hope I wasnt.


----------



## hat (Feb 24, 2019)

@Mussels 

Digital PC audio is tricky. I have a suspicion you are getting 5.1 from movies because they audio track is already DTS encoded. Your onboard audio would have no trouble passing along something that already exists in DTS format to your receiver, which naturally, is able to decode it properly and give you true 5.1 audio... however, for games, you need something that can transcode the raw audio into DTS on the fly. Your Realtek probably isn't doing that, which is why you are left with stereo. If you want working 5.1 audio in games, you're probably going to have to buy a sound card which can handle transcoding into DTS. I don't know which ones might have such a feature.

Another way to go about it is to use HDMI, but it's arguably even worse than optical. You have to have a receiver which supports the video resolution you want to use. 1080p60 shouldn't be a problem, but if you are going beyond 60hz or 1080p, you're going to need a recent receiver with the appropriate HDMI level that will handle it. That said, if I'm not mistaken, HDMI should be able to handle whatever uncompressed audio you want, so you can do 5.1 or even 7.1 or higher without worrying about support for codecs like DTS.


----------



## Fred_Vie (Feb 24, 2019)

hat said:


> @hat If you want working 5.1 audio in games, you're probably going to have to buy a sound card which can handle transcoding into DTS.


I feared as much. If there is even such a card... Guess I have to read up on soundcard tests.



hat said:


> @hat I don't know which ones might have such a feature.


If there is one I hope someone here can suggest some from experience.



hat said:


> @hat . You have to have a receiver which supports the video resolution you want to use.


Yea I cant have a receiver because they always include radio and I dont want to pay the monthly fee for having a device that can receive radio even though I dont listen. Also I'm planning to get a monitor with a higher resolution than 1080p and also a higher refresh rate than 60 Hz. And I dont even want to know what the input delay will be if I would have to connect the receiver first and go from that one to my monitor (if that works that way rather than with one connection to the monitor and the other to the receiver).


----------



## hat (Feb 24, 2019)

That's why I tagged @Mussels in the post above... he's the first one I think of when the subject of PC audio comes up.

You have to pay a monthly fee if you own something that can receive radio signals? That sounds absurd! Where do you live? That's right up there with the French TV Tax I recently heard of... Well, it may be a moot point, but I wouldn't think there would be any input delay... there is also supposedly a possibility of running one HDMI (or DVI, DisplayPort, whatever) to your monitor, and another to the HDMI, but the PC will see it as another monitor...

Anyways, it sounds like the best solution for you (and most people) would be to find a sound card that can do DTS compression on the fly. I'm not sure which ones do that...


----------



## Jetster (Feb 24, 2019)

Optical can only handle compressed 5.1 or stereo


----------



## CityCultivator (Feb 24, 2019)

As you have just posted on a mod driver thread, I assume that you tried that.
Games themselves will usually not show any DDL/DTSi signs. They can report that a 5.1 out is being done. Games do not encode to DDL/DTSi by themselves.
It seems that you need only DTSinteractive; thus I would recommend you to use APO Driver
Home page: PureSoftApps: APO Driver
Support thread: Making Audio Enhancers Work on Windows
Download link: https://waa.ai/apodriver
Install stock drivers for your hardware first.
Install APO driver with option DTS Connect APO.
Open start menu->APO driver->FX Configurator
Select the digital out from the top drop-down selection.
Click Product Config Tool.
Apply DTS Connect.
DTS option is now in audio device advanced properties.
Note: Any encoding solution introduces latency and use CPU cycles. I do not recommend using that for games.


----------



## hat (Feb 24, 2019)

I'm not sure what CPU he has, but whatever load introduced from encoding DTS should be minimal... especially if he has a >4 core processor. Unlike video, audio is not hard to encode.


----------



## Shambles1980 (Feb 24, 2019)

afaia spdif is really only stereo anyway


----------



## CityCultivator (Feb 24, 2019)

hat said:


> I'm not sure what CPU he has, but whatever load introduced from encoding DTS should be minimal... especially if he has a >4 core processor. Unlike video, audio is not hard to encode.


The load will be minimal, but it will be there. Using any native method will have no load.
Latency on the other hand in unremovable.


----------



## hat (Feb 24, 2019)

CityCultivator said:


> The load will be minimal, but it will be there. Using any native method will have no load.
> Latency on the other hand in unremovable.


I wouldn't think the additional latency would matter much in practice, but you have a valid point. What happens if you have a sound card that does it though, instead of modded drivers that adds the capability by making the CPU do it?


----------



## bottlefedc83 (Feb 24, 2019)

hat said:


> I'm not sure what CPU he has, but whatever load introduced from encoding DTS should be minimal... especially if he has a >4 core processor. Unlike video, audio is not hard to encode.


I tried to tell you in the other post, you might have to have someone explain how to do It specifically, I'm not the best with walkthrough type stuff. The gyst is the Realtek enhancements throw it into HP mode, or it has been the culprit for me most of the time in the situation that you are describing. Easiest way to test and see if that is what is happening is put your endpoint on whatever 5.1 you have set up, DDL or DTSi, play a test tone to make sure windows grabs it, then head over and disable all enhancements. Then go test and see if you have 5.1 instead of just the two front. If you do I know  how to fix it, if not I'm not sure.



hat said:


> I wouldn't think the additional latency would matter much in practice, but you have a valid point. What happens if you have a sound card that does it though, instead of modded drivers that adds the capability by making the CPU do it?



Sorry didn't mean to quote this.



Fred_Vie said:


> I feared as much. If there is even such a card... Guess I have to read up on soundcard tests.
> 
> 
> If there is one I hope someone here can suggest some from experience.
> ...



I meant my last post to quote you, the OP.


----------



## CityCultivator (Feb 24, 2019)

hat said:


> I wouldn't think the additional latency would matter much in practice, but you have a valid point. What happens if you have a sound card that does it though, instead of modded drivers that adds the capability by making the CPU do it?


Latency is in the format. DTSi has less latency than DDL, but both have a fixed latency that is unremovable using any hardware in the world.


----------



## Fred_Vie (Feb 24, 2019)

CityCultivator said:


> Home page: PureSoftApps: APO Driver



I read up on it yesterday and tried to download whats needed but after the first download already the site kept bothering me to get premium for multiple downloads even though I just tried to down them one after another thus I cba anymore about this site. That even happend using a different browser. Seems like they make theyr money with that webhoster they link everything to. Maybe I try again later but I doubt it... too many packs to download and too many steps. I´d rather just get a soundcard that can do it instead.

My new cpu... as well as my previous one, rarely goes above 20 % cpu load. I doubt that there will be something that needs the 80 % in the near future. The old i7-2700k was mostly running at around 10 % load playing games. Makes me wonder why I bothered to upgrade. It's actually weird that the new one is under more load with the same games I played on the old cpu already at an average of 10 % load


----------



## FordGT90Concept (Feb 24, 2019)

Do your speakers have analog 3.5mm in?  If they do, changing over to them would be the fastest/easiest solution.  Optical is only suitable for stereo.



Fred_Vie said:


> Just I cant use the analog output because both of my sound systems have one broken channel.


Tell me more.


Movies work fine because MPEG2 by default used Dolby encoding on the disk to pack 5.1 audio channels into DVD5/DVD9 space.  Dolby in the computer space is virtually nonexistent.


----------



## CityCultivator (Feb 24, 2019)

Fred_Vie said:


> I read up on it yesterday and tried to download whats needed but after the first download already the site kept bothering me to get premium for multiple downloads even though I just tried to down them one after another thus I cba anymore about this site. That even happend using a different browser. Seems like they make theyr money with that webhoster they link everything to. Maybe I try again later but I doubt it... too many packs to download and too many steps. I´d rather just get a soundcard that can do it instead.
> 
> My new cpu... as well as my previous one, rarely goes above 20 % cpu load. I doubt that there will be something that needs the 80 % in the near future. The old i7-2700k was mostly running at around 10 % load playing games. Makes me wonder why I bothered to upgrade. It's actually weird that the new one is under more load with the same games I played on the old cpu already at an average of 10 % load


You need only this file.


----------



## Fred_Vie (Feb 25, 2019)

hat said:


> You have to pay a monthly fee if you own something that can receive radio signals? That sounds absurd! Where do you live? That's right up there with the French TV Tax I recently heard of.



Seems many countries in Europe got that. They tied it to "our right to get news" (even if those news are just half baked lies) and charge us for state TV/Radio. Now since people started objecting to that by not using those devices anymore they are inventing new rules every other year to force those who dont pay to join into the ripoff. Since the state tv/radio stations still want our money they made it a tax in Germany too and that will probably happen in my country too. Didnt yet but corporations get theyr way sooner or later. There is nothing nicer than having a fixed income that the payer cant object too. You can waste the money you get and just increase the fee/tax. Same old.. same old...



hat said:


> Anyways, it sounds like the best solution for you (and most people) would be to find a sound card that can do DTS compression on the fly.



Indeed.



CityCultivator said:


> You need only this file.


Thank you. I meant I was interested in other gui's that needed more downloads.


----------



## CityCultivator (Feb 25, 2019)

Fred_Vie said:


> Thank you. I meant I was interested in other gui's that needed more downloads.


Mediafire requires premium if you want to download multiple files as a group. It does not require payment if you manually download each file individually.


----------



## Fred_Vie (Feb 25, 2019)

FordGT90Concept said:


> Do your speakers have analog 3.5mm in?  If they do, changing over to them would be the fastest/easiest solution.


Like I said, the analog in is broken on 2 systems. One doesnt have base one doesnt have the right box. 5.1 just works on the opptical in (spdif). My newer 5.1 system has just analog inputs but I would have to send it to Germany to repair it and I cba because they rip off ppl by selling flawed electronics to make them replace the whole print every 5 years.



FordGT90Concept said:


> Optical is only suitable for stereo.


Thats maybe true for music and gaming (if games dont support it) but not for movies since they support both DTS and DDL is 5.1+. Although I never understood why DTS and DDL are too stupid to use all boxes on a 5.1 system when playing music (on PC's anyways, never had a 5.1 receiver to compare it to).



FordGT90Concept said:


> Movies work fine because MPEG2 by default used Dolby encoding on the disk to pack 5.1 audio channels into DVD5/DVD9 space.  Dolby in the computer space is virtually nonexistent.


I believe we are way past mpeg2 with mp4 and mkv. 
Movies work just fine on my optical connection but not the via the analog connection.
I'm not surprised that Dolby is rare on PC/in games because it's no real surround. Thats why I'm not satisfied with Dolby because the sound comes from the wrong side (mostly from all sides). I wasnt interested in Dolby but in 5.1 surround.



CityCultivator said:


> Mediafire requires premium if you want to download multiple files as a group. It does not require payment if you manually download each file individually.


Indeed thats what it is saying. But I tried it individually and it refused even using a new link in a different browser.


----------



## FordGT90Concept (Feb 25, 2019)

Fred_Vie said:


> Like I said, the analog in is broken on 2 systems. One doesnt have base one doesnt have the right box.


Can you detail these systems?  "Base" and "right box?"



Fred_Vie said:


> My newer 5.1 system has just analog inputs but I would have to send it to Germany to repair it...


So there's three systems?  Repair it?



Fred_Vie said:


> Although I never understood why DTS and DDL are too stupid to use all boxes on a 5.1 system when playing music (on PC's anyways, never had a 5.1 receiver to compare it to).


Because they are encoding types.  Music -> 5.1 requires upmixing which is out of the scope of Dolby media encoding.  If you're using SP/DIF, the computer has to upmix the signal then compress it using Dolby algorithms before sending it out of the optical.  Hence the problem: Dolby wants money and most motherboard manufacturers are unwilling to pay so integrated SP/DIF is effectively stereo-only.



Fred_Vie said:


> I believe we are way past mpeg2 with mp4 and mkv.


Those are container files.  AAC have been used for virtually all production media since DVD spec debuted.  AC-3 is Dolby.  Discs can have both (AAC for stereo, AC-3 for 5.1).


----------



## Fred_Vie (Feb 25, 2019)

FordGT90Concept said:


> So there's three systems?  Repair it?


Still two. I had my newer one checked in a repair shop but they couldnt repair it and the producer refused to send over the broken electronic print insisting to send the sub to him (which is a joke it's 10 kg for the sub and like 0,5 kg for a print and 2 ways vs 1 way). The creative system is prolly 20+ years old, I doubt someone would repair it and I wouldnt know where to start. Also repairs nowadays are almost as expensive as buying new. Thanks to our throwaway society. I have not looked into a new system yet.



FordGT90Concept said:


> Because they are encoding types.  Music -> 5.1 requires upmixing which is out of the scope of Dolby media encoding.  If you're using SP/DIF, the computer has to upmix the signal then compress it using Dolby algorithms before sending it out of the optical.



Right! Now I remember that I had an addon on winamp that did exactly that when I tried the optical connection for the first time like 20 years ago. One could adress all boxes and one had stereo x2 + base.


----------



## bottlefedc83 (Feb 25, 2019)

I have had DDL or DTSi working on every system I have had since 2011. They date back to the original xbox and sandstorm in DDL case...so hardware support is there for most users. Licensing and money got in the way as always so vendors clipped it. I have never had problems with latency, unless the apo was causing it, and I have never had a problem with up mixing for 2 channel content. This is across multiple platforms from different vendors etc.  

I tried to present a way to possibly fix this issue you seem to have, you never reported back with anything so I assume you figured it out.


----------



## Fred_Vie (Feb 25, 2019)

CityCultivator said:


> It seems that you need only DTSinteractive; thus I would recommend you to use APO Driver



I did it and DTS connect is not in the advanced list. I ran it again, still not there, restarted, still not there.
DTS Audio is under "supported formats" but it was there before.

I ran the problem fixing codes in cmd, it asked for directplay to be installed, I installed it, DTS is still not in the advanced list.

What I dont get at all is that the advanced list has no 5.1 setting nor does the Gigabyte gui.

Does "Installation with virtual audio cable" mean an optical connection?


----------



## SoNic67 (Feb 25, 2019)

bottlefedc83 said:


> so hardware support is there for most users


Just because you had it, does not mean that everyone else has it.
The reality is that 90% of the audio setups don't have either of those two (DD Live, DTS Connect) because licensing costs associated. Although there is no "special" hardware, only specifically configured drivers, sometimes the audio chip has a different notation (internal configured), just to signal the drivers that it's licensing fee was paid.
Also the processing overhead and latency for encoding the sound in either of those two systems in not always acceptable.

A simple test is to enable the "ding" sound in Windows. Most of the encoding drivers are not able to keep the DD or DTS connection "on" while PC is silent. When that "ding" happens, it trigggers the conversion and sends the signal to receiver. By the time that receiver starts decoding, the PC sound stops and you hear... nothing.  The whole chain latency needs to be considered.

That's why  an analogic 5.1 connection to any receiver is better for gaming. If the receiver has it.


----------



## CityCultivator (Feb 25, 2019)

Fred_Vie said:


> I did it and DTS connect is not in the advanced list. I ran it again, still not there, restarted, still not there.
> DTS Audio is under "supported formats" but it was there before.
> 
> I ran the problem fixing codes in cmd, it asked for directplay to be installed, I installed it, DTS is still not in the advanced list.
> ...


1. Did you apply DTS Connect on the proper device? The dropdown selection in the top window (FX Configurator).
2. Don't bother with virtual audio cable; this wil not solve your problem.


----------



## Fred_Vie (Feb 25, 2019)

CityCultivator said:


> 1. Did you apply DTS Connect on the proper device? The dropdown selection in the top window (FX Configurator).


Yea its always on the right device when I start the software. Probably because no other device is active. I deactivated the analog out because I dont want to see it in the mixer.

I brought it into my thread because trying to fix this in 3 threads is kinda excessive 



bottlefedc83 said:


> Factory Realtek  drivers are configured like so:
> 
> 
> 
> ...



Thats the first thing. the DisableProtectedAudioDG wasnt there.
After I restarted nothing had changed.
I still dont know if the option from the pic should be active or not. I removed the checker in my last tries because its not there in the vids.

I still feel I´m not getting something here since I´m supposed to delete something which - I thought - will be deleted applying your config file.
I dont know howto delete it because when I start fx config it shows nothing. When I load a config and save it, does it then remove those strings in the registry where I left an empty field e.g. mfx composite (I dont see any legacy)? I supposed it would.


----------



## bottlefedc83 (Feb 25, 2019)

Fred_Vie said:


> Yea its always on the right device when I start the software. Probably because no other device is active. I deactivated the analog out because I dont want to see it in the mixer.
> 
> I brought it into my thread because trying to fix this in 3 threads is kinda excessive
> 
> ...



I know nothing about your driver setup...did you have to patch your driver to get ddl and dtsi? does it come native?  when you test with dts interactive as the default format, by simply clicking test on the advanced tab, does it show 6 endpoints on the levels tab (you have to push balance to see)? Have you tried clicking the disable all enhancements, or sometimes its un clicking enable audio enhancements? That's always the first thing I do when testing to see if I'm getting proper sound to all speakers. If you don't have proper sound, go disable all enhancements then test again to see if it works afterwards.

lol now i that I look at your post again I see the question I just answered. It should only be clicked if you are getting sound through the front speakers, you then click it to see if it fixes it so you know how to proceed.


----------



## Fred_Vie (Feb 25, 2019)

bottlefedc83 said:


> I know nothing about your driver setup...did you have to patch your driver to get ddl and dtsi?


So thats the problem. I just have supported formats DTS audio and Dolby Digital. But those dont give me a 5.1 choice in the advanced list. So I have to install a DTS driver first? I thought DTS-Connect could be standing alone or be an addition to the DTS audio thats shown to me under "supported formats". So I guess I have to install a DTS universal driver /DTS digital entertainment / DTSi?



bottlefedc83 said:


> when you test with dts interactive as the default format, by simply clicking test on the advanced tab, does it show 6 endpoints on the levels tab (you have to push balance to see)? Have you tried clicking the disable all enhancements, or sometimes its un clicking enable audio enhancements?


I can just test DTS audio and Dolby Digital and they work..., in movies anyways. DTS music is pointless because it's stereo again (although while testing it sends 5 pings (not to sub) and my sound system doesnt let me switch to stereo x2 when it recognizes a DTS/DD source.




bottlefedc83 said:


> That's always the first thing I do when testing to see if I'm getting proper sound to all speakers. If you don't have proper sound, go disable all enhancements then test again to see if it works afterwards..


But I can just disable all enhancements when I use the config tool or load an ini file cant I?

Just activating "disable enhancements" while applying the ini or while using the product config tool? Or either of those?


----------



## bottlefedc83 (Feb 25, 2019)

Ok, woah you're all over the place now. I had seen in a previous post by you it looks like you have a gigabyte board with a 1220 chipset. So to take care of first question, theoretically if you were on a fresh install of W10 and audio drivers downloaded from gigabyte support installed would you have DDL and DTSi, or either one, as an option  in the advanced tab in windows for your optical endpoint? 

Next question after that is what driver do you have installed, and before you started playing with it did you have DDL or/& DTSi?


----------



## Fred_Vie (Feb 25, 2019)

bottlefedc83 said:


> Ok, woah you're all over the place now. I had seen in a previous post by you it looks like you have a gigabyte board with a 1220 chipset. So to take care of first question, theoretically if you were on a fresh install of W10 and audio drivers downloaded from gigabyte support installed would you have DDL and DTSi, or either one, as an option  in the advanced tab in windows for your optical endpoint?


I updated my win7. The drivers did not include DDL nor DTSi. I am shown DTS and DD under supported formats but I CANT CHOOSE 5.1! All I got is stereo, thats my main concern.



bottlefedc83 said:


> Next question after that is what driver do you have installed, and before you started playing with it did you have DDL or/& DTSi?


First Gigabyte, because it was stripped naked without equalizer (not even an UI) nor 5.1 I was trying different Realtek drivers who all had the same problem. 

Then I tried the driver from https://www.techpowerup.com/forums/posts/4001873/ where I had problems during installation already because an exe file stopped working. Still only stereo. 

Then I went back to the last Gigabyte drivers. 

Today I started trying with APO and didnt gain an inch in 8 hours. No matter what I'm installing its all just stereo... in the advanced tab. I cant seem to get past that and it pisses me off!


----------



## bottlefedc83 (Feb 25, 2019)

Ok I understand now, watch this video I made. Sorry for the no audio and stuff so you will have to pay attention to all I do. I start out like you need to be and do every step, from installing the APO driver to having to reset to get the disable protected audio. 









Do not worry about the supported formats tab, that is for passthrough only. You are worried about the advanced tab.


----------



## Fred_Vie (Feb 26, 2019)

bottlefedc83 said:


> Ok I understand now, watch this video I made. Sorry for the no audio and stuff so you will have to pay attention to all I do. I start out like you need to be and do every step, from installing the APO driver to having to reset to get the disable protected audio.



Hmmmkay, so basicly what I did all afternoon worked for you at the first try. The classic. I guess that means I dont have to bother with other dts/DDL drivers like I didnt at the start.


----------



## bottlefedc83 (Feb 26, 2019)

Fred_Vie said:


> Hmmmkay, so basicly what I did all afternoon worked for you at the first try. The classic. I guess that means I dont have to bother with other dts/DDL drivers like I didnt at the start.


Did you get it to work?


----------



## Fred_Vie (Feb 26, 2019)

It didnt work all afternoon, why should it now...

You install it, use the product config tool and it is there. I do the same and nothing shows up... so I guess thats it. I wouldnt know what else to do....

Once more I installed the Realtek original driver, installed the apo dts-connect driver, used the product config tool on the correct output with the same result, nada, niet, nothing. I cant believe I wasted 8+ hours on a 1 minute fix.


----------



## bottlefedc83 (Feb 26, 2019)

Fred_Vie said:


> It didnt work all afternoon, why should it now...
> 
> You install it, use the product config tool and it is there. I do the same and nothing shows up... so I guess thats it. I wouldnt know what else to do....



You have installed the service for DTS connect like I did at the beginning of the video correct? ….I think it would show up even if you didn't, it just wouldn't have any sound.

You said you have been installing drivers here and there, there is a decent chance that one of them came with a custom rtkhdaud.dat which does not remove it self unless you physically do it, head over to windows/system32/drivers and look for that file, if it is there delete it and restart the computer.

Other than that the only step I would have left is to remove everything related to the driver including booting into safe mode and deleting render and capture under Computer\HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\MMDevices\Audio, using DDU to uninstall after uninstalling, run cc cleaner registry clean every time you boot up uninstalling, booting into safe mode, and one more time before uninstalling. Use driverstore explorer to make sure no other related inf is there as well.

If using product config after all that doesn't work I would then be at a loss.


----------



## Fred_Vie (Feb 26, 2019)

bottlefedc83 said:


> You have installed the service for DTS connect like I did at the beginning of the video correct? ….I think it would show up even if you didn't, it just wouldn't have any sound.



Yea I did it right away and always looked at the advanced tab after. The only thing that I didnt mention was the activated "disable all enhancements" checkbox. But when I mentioned that I tried it several times without.



bottlefedc83 said:


> You said you have been installing drivers here and there, there is a decent chance that one of them came with a custom rtkhdaud.dat which does not remove it self unless you physically do it, head over to windows/system32/drivers and look for that file, if it is there delete it and restart the computer.



You are right. I removed the rtkhdaud.dat before installing the mod driver but not before going back to the original driver.
edit: but then again there is still none in the system32 folder so that wasnt it.



bottlefedc83 said:


> Other than that the only step I would have left is to remove everything related to the driver including booting into safe mode and deleting render and capture under Computer\HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\MMDevices\Audio, using DDU to uninstall after uninstalling, run cc cleaner registry clean every time you boot up uninstalling, booting into safe mode, and one more time before uninstalling. Use driverstore explorer to make sure no other related inf is there as well.
> If using product config after all that doesn't work I would then be at a loss.


I ran cc-cleaner from 00:00 to 02:00 a.m. making sure he doesnt delete something I need (since he did that already when I let it clean unchecked).
DDU seems to be a graphics driver cleaner, does it work for soundcards too?
I looked into that place in the registry. I doubt I could distinguish between those render/capture and other strings but I´m going to look at it again.

Damn, now I have to try again but not tonight. I'm fed up with this!


----------



## bottlefedc83 (Feb 26, 2019)

Fred_Vie said:


> Yea I did it right away and always looked at the advanced tab after. The only thing that I didnt mention was the activated "disable all enhancements" checkbox. But when I mentioned that I tried it several times without.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


The amount of hours I have in getting this all right is embarassing. I don't mind tho, I like figuring stuff out.

I'm a bit confused about you installed the service comment....Watch the video again what I do, when  installing APO driver you have check boxes to choose which APO to install. I was asking if you checked the DTS Connect one. Doing that alone would not make anything show up, it just puts the proper files and entries into the registry. You then have to go into FX configurator to ....configure it lol. You will only see the changes after you get done using product config tool, you wont hear sound until you make the protected audio registry entry and restart.

Check this screen shot: if you do not have these entries in your registry chances are you didn't check the box to install DTS connect before using product config.


----------



## Fred_Vie (Mar 2, 2019)

bottlefedc83 said:


> Watch the video again what I do, when  installing APO driver you have check boxes to choose which APO to install. I was asking if you checked the DTS Connect one. Doing that alone would not make anything show up, it just puts the proper files and entries into the registry. You then have to go into FX configurator to ....configure it lol. You will only see the changes after you get done using product config tool, you wont hear sound until you make the protected audio registry entry and restart.



I did that already before you posted the video and tried it again after I watched it. Like I said, after you used the product config tool you immediately had 5.1 available (in the settings), I still got stereo all the way.

Just saw in my installed programs that I actually have an DDL and DTS-connect pack from creative installed. I had an old creative card installed before I upgraded my PC but didnt put it back after I upgraded it since I dont have the creative connector for spdif and one of my analog in channels is broken. Maybe that the software was installed already is the reason that it doesnt work with the mod.

The other thing could be this. But I´m not sure because I upgraded to Win10 when I still had the old mainboard who didnt have an UEFI bios (and just made an image to SSD before I upgraded) thus I dunno if that could be the culprit- Plus I´m not sure howto check if it is in UEFI mode, I just know the new board has an  UEFI Bios:


Spoiler: UEFI Mode



Is your Windows 10 installed in UEFI mode? If yes, go to Settings> Update and Security> system recovery; It will have an area called Erweiterter Start; Click Restart Now.
After the POST BIOS, you will see a list of system startup options. Press the 7 key (Disable Driver Signature Enforcement) and wait for the system to boot.
After that, install the driver again, then you will see a box similar to the one below. Click the option below (Install this driver software anyway) and wait for the driver installation to finish. When complete, just restart the computer normally.


----------



## Tatty_One (Mar 2, 2019)

I had a similar issue last year after a Windows 10 update, I doubt very much that your solution will be as simple as mine turned out to be...… the update changed my system in windows settings under "sound", it had defaulted back to just creative speakers as opposed to the SPDIF option.


----------



## Mittenz (Mar 3, 2019)

Take analog out to the receiver, or use HDMI.


----------



## erpguy53 (Mar 21, 2019)

many games will always play stereo sound rather than 5.1.
if the games use Xaudio DLL files, then those files have to be patched to get 5.1 sound
https://blog.klauspost.com/xaudio2-dolby-digital-live-patcher/


----------



## SoNic67 (Mar 22, 2019)

The games don't ENCODE the sound in surround format.
They generate 5.1 uncompressed PCM streams, and those don't fit in the bandwidth of the optical connection. One digital audio (optical or coaxial) can carry only stereo uncompressed (2 channels).
That's why you have to have the driver that ENCODE in real time all those uncompressed streams into a single DD or DTS stream that fits in the bandwidth of the optical connection.

Playback of video files is different (reverse situation), here the driver does DECODING of the compressed audio from video. That's because compression (encoding) was done in studio, when the video was authored.


Creative Labs had a sound system that was able to take three separate digital audio cables from their PC sound card and this way was streaming 5.1 uncompressed audio to their sound system.
Some receiver systems might be able to use uncompressed streaming over the HDMI connection,  with nvidia or AMD sound drivers. Personally I didn't try that avenue yet.


----------



## Fred_Vie (Apr 2, 2019)

Mittenz said:


> Take analog out to the receiver, or use HDMI.


As mentioned earlier:
I cant use the analog output because both of my sound systems have one broken channel. Only on my creative 5.1 system - even though the analog has one broken channel - the optical+spdif connections are still working at 5.1.

I also can't use HDMI because all receivers have embedded radio and I can't have that without paying a monthly fee to the state radio/TV station which I refuse to do because I don't listen to radio.



erpguy53 said:


> if the games use Xaudio DLL files, then those files have to be patched to get 5.1 sound
> https://blog.klauspost.com/xaudio2-dolby-digital-live-patcher/


Thank you, I tried patching even though it is for win7 and then used the xaudio test but still just got stereo + center/base. Also I would have 9 dll's to patch but that patcher doesnt patch the dll's 8+9. I run win10.

I gave up, I´ll just buy a new soundcard and sound system because I need 5.1 for gaming. Not to mention that running a 5.1 sound system that only plays 2.1 except for movies is pointless .


----------



## SoNic67 (Apr 2, 2019)

Fred_Vie said:


> I also can't use HDMI because all receivers have embedded radio and I can't have that without paying a monthly fee to the state radio/TV station which I refuse to do because I don't listen to radio.


BBC still does charges you that? In this century?


----------



## Roma PX Development (Apr 2, 2019)

To enable surround sound in games you must use dolby digital PCEE4 with dolby digital output over spdif with MOVIE profile selected on dolby home theatre v4 you can get it here https://www.techpowerup.com/forums/...ek-hd-audio-driver-mod-for-windows-10.232921/


----------



## AAF Optimus (Dec 2, 2019)

Try my latest Realtek mod, and don't forget to look at the spoilers at the end of the first post, which deal with Dolby / DTS activation.








						Realtek DCH Modded Audio Driver for Windows 10/11 - Including Realtek USB Audio Devices
					

Greetings to all sound enthusiasts, who want to have a better audio experience on their PCs but don't want to spend a lot on physical upgrades. I present to you the AAF DCH Optimus Sound:  Downloads & Updates Here: https://github.com/AlanFinotty/AAFOptimusDCHAudio-Realtek/releases  Realtek USB...




					www.techpowerup.com


----------



## Deleted member 193792 (Oct 15, 2020)

CityCultivator said:


> The load will be minimal, but it will be there. Using any native method will have no load.
> Latency on the other hand in unremovable.


Does anyone know if Realtek drivers have any form of hardware (DSP) acceleration?

Does the driver use CPU AVX256 at least?


----------



## FreedomEclipse (Oct 15, 2020)

jermando said:


> Does anyone know if Realtek drivers have any form of hardware (DSP) acceleration?
> 
> Does the driver use CPU AVX256 at least?



Hardware acceleration (at least with soundcards) died with Windows XP. Despite that. I dont think Realtek ever had hardware acceleration with their hardware but Asus an Creative did actually use Realtek chips on their soundcards but i think those came out after windows XP so no hardware acceleration but Creative had a program called 'Alchemy' which would restore some hardware acceleration functionality but only on software level. (it functioned as a layer or a wrapper that intercepted the signals and converted them)

Asus had their own version of hardware acceleration though their implementation was more of a an 'emulation' or at least thats how Asus called it - they didnt want to pay licensing to creative to use EAX.

AVX is an SIMD instruction set that has more to do with "data parallelism" (aka vector operations) and floating point operations like video encoding/decoding video with Adobe photoshop and such. Otherwise it normally takes over decoding duties when you have your system set up as media server.


----------



## Deleted member 193792 (Oct 15, 2020)

FreedomEclipse said:


> Hardware acceleration (at least with soundcards) died with Windows XP. Despite that. I dont think Realtek ever had hardware acceleration with their hardware but Asus an Creative did actually use Realtek chips on their soundcards but i think those came out after windows XP so no hardware acceleration but Creative had a program called 'Alchemy' which would restore some hardware acceleration functionality but only on software level. (it functioned as a layer or a wrapper that intercepted the signals and converted them)
> 
> Asus had their own version of hardware acceleration though their implementation was more of a an 'emulation' or at least thats how Asus called it - they didnt want to pay licensing to creative to use EAX.
> 
> AVX is an SIMD instruction set that has more to do with "data parallelism" (aka vector operations) and floating point operations like video encoding/decoding video with Adobe photoshop and such. Otherwise it normally takes over decoding duties when you have your system set up as media server.


Realtek Ethernet cards support hardware offloading of some functions, but I don't know about Realtek audio/Azalia, that's why I'm asking.

Audio operations use something called FFT and SSE/AVX is very useful for that. 

It's a shame consoles have dedicated audio DSPs and PCs have regressed that bad. :\


----------

