Analog audio over a digital cable?

[Old Yeller]

As of right now I've got my computer hooked into my PC and acting as an HTPC. I've run an hdmi cable to my TV from my graphics card and composite cables from my sound card to my receiver and everything works great.

However I want to change the cheap composite cables to an optical digital cable so I can take advantage of the digital sound.

My question basically is... can an optical digital cable also carry, non digital analog sound? Or, once I buy the new cable, will I still need to keep the old composite cables hooked up?

[OBCT]

Originally Posted by Old Yeller

As of right now I've got my computer hooked into my PC and acting as an HTPC. I've run an hdmi cable to my TV from my graphics card and composite cables from my sound card to my receiver and everything works great.

However I want to change the cheap composite cables to an optical digital cable so I can take advantage of the digital sound.

My question basically is... can an optical digital cable also carry, non digital analog sound? Or, once I buy the new cable, will I still need to keep the old composite cables hooked up?

I might be misunderstanding what you're getting at, but I believe the answer you're after is yes. It's kind of a confusing question, though, as sound processed by a computer is going to be digital no matter what (since it's stored digitally), and would have to undergo conversion to analog before being outputted to the composite outputs.

In other words, any sound can be stored or transmitted in either digital or analog format; it can also be converted between the two at will (and fairly easily these days), though theoretically, every conversion will reduce the audio quality a little no matter what.



All of that to say... no (the answer to your second question). One or the other set of cables will work. You will not need the composite cables in that case. Again, this is assuming you have a sound card installed (and working properly) with a digital audio output (likely digital coax / S/PDIF, or digital optical / TOSLINK <--- different names for the same thing).


If your sound card has analog outputs (and is working), it will output in analog. It does any needed conversions automatically. Same thing with digital. Some sound cards support analog and digital; some can only transmit one or the other simultaneously, while others have all outputs active all the time.

[Old Yeller]

Yeah I just confused the issue because I assumed that composite cable with RCA jacks just carries an analog signal? But it makes sense that the computer would obviously send a digital signal regardless.

So because my motherboard with onboard sound has an SPDIF out, I can just buy this:

http://www.monoprice.com/products/pr...seq=1&format=2

and run that to my receiver and replace my current setup of miniplug to rca jacks that run composite cable?

[Hack&Lube]

Yes, a toslink optical spdif cable is all you need for sound
there are also RCA style spdif so don't confuse the two

[cal_guy]

Originally Posted by Old Yeller

As of right now I've got my computer hooked into my PC and acting as an HTPC. I've run an hdmi cable to my TV from my graphics card and composite cables from my sound card to my receiver and everything works great.

However I want to change the cheap composite cables to an optical digital cable so I can take advantage of the digital sound.

My question basically is... can an optical digital cable also carry, non digital analog sound? Or, once I buy the new cable, will I still need to keep the old composite cables hooked up?

Note that it's possible to transmit digital audio via coaxial cables (the same type of cables that your using right now). Check your PC for a coaxial SPDIF output as a receiver for an input.

[Old Yeller]

Yeah it's definitely toslink, thanks for the help guys.

[onetwo_threefour]

The only thing I would add, (and you may already know this) is that you may have to assign the optical input in your receiver's menu to the correct video source. On my receiver, the optical audio inputs on the receiver are not associated with specific video sources and have to be assigned. (each video source has a composite audio, and RCA spdif input, but it just has two optical inputs off to the side by themselves which can be assigned to whatever source) If that is the case, then just plugging the TOSLINK cable in may not work, and you should check configuration options on your receiver.