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ATI HD audio question

F

fsh42na

[H]ard|Gawd
Joined
Jul 13, 2004
Messages
1,472
I recently jumped on the ATI bandwagon after being with Nvidia for the past 5 yrs. I purchased both a 4870 and a 4850 for an upcoming upgrade to 2 pc's.

The "problem" that I discovered is that these Ati HD cards have an audio chip that sends its signal out through a HDMI signal. If you don't want the use this signal because you want to onboard mobo audio or a separate audio card then you have to disable the audio. I tried to uninstall the HD audio, but it reinstalls itself on reboot. I guess having a red "x" through the HD audio in my device manager isn't a big deal though. I discovered this while building a cheap pc for a family friend when I used an HD 3450 card. I couldn't get the mobos onboard audio to work till I decided to take out the video card and try the onboard video. After that I "discovered" the card HD audio and disabled it.

My questions are:

(1) Are these cards geared towards the home theater crowd?
If you use the HDMI with an LCD monitor, its seems that you'd have to use a monitor with speakers since the HDMI cable also carries audio.

(2) For those using these cards for regular pc/gaming, is there a way to remove the HD audio from the device manager without it popping back up on reboot. The Powercolor HD 3450 card I used came with piss poor documentation and their website sucks too.


Thanks for your help and input. Next time I do a little more research before I buy:(
 
Why do you have to uninstall the ATI HD audio for your onboard to work?

I'm currently using my onboard audio with Vista with the ability to switch to the HD audio whenever I want.
 
You don't have to disable it... just change the default audio device to the card of your choice.

Alternately, if you want to use HDMI to connect the card to a monitor or something, you can pick up a DVI to HDMI cable at monoprice or some place pretty cheap and use that. The only DVI to HDMI dongle that will pass Audio is the one that came with your ATI card, you won't get it if you use a different cable or adapter.

However, as I said, you should be able to choose a different default audio device, leave the HD Audio component installed and be happy.

Personally, I love the HD Audio output.. I get up to 7.1 channels of audio sent to my receiver from the ATI card without the need for any other sound card.. it is pretty sweet :)
 
Apparently, the HD audio on the video card conflicted with the onboard audio from the mobo. I couldn't figure out what the heck was going on. The mobo bios is barren by my standards so I couldn't check out IRQ's. In my device manager, there was a reference to HD audio so I "discovered" the audio capabilities of the video card. It then occurred to me that this ECS POS mobo had onboard video so I took out the video card and I had sound!

I then popped the video card back in and again no sound. I scouted around the software that came with the video card and I couldn't find anything to disable or not install the audio. I did leave out the installation of the audio driver the second time around and instead of an exclamation mark, I had a question mark in my device manager.
 
Andrmgic said:
You don't have to disable it... just change the default audio device to the card of your choice.

Alternately, if you want to use HDMI to connect the card to a monitor or something, you can pick up a DVI to HDMI cable at monoprice or some place pretty cheap and use that. The only DVI to HDMI dongle that will pass Audio is the one that came with your ATI card, you won't get it if you use a different cable or adapter.

However, as I said, you should be able to choose a different default audio device, leave the HD Audio component installed and be happy.

Personally, I love the HD Audio output.. I get up to 7.1 channels of audio sent to my receiver from the ATI card without the need for any other sound card.. it is pretty sweet :)
Click to expand...


So are you using a separate sound system/receiver for your pc? I'm still in the dark ages and just hook up audio via output to a set of bookshelf speakers:eek:
 
I personally Love the audio option on this card, Less cables running to my tv when i am in the mood for cod4 on a 63inch 1080p tv, I just purchased a 4870x2, the manual mine came with came with a trouble shooting guide if you have audio issues after installing these cards it tells you to go to the sound properties in your control panel and select with component you want to use for audio
 
If your card doesn't support the HDTV for HDMI audio output, you'll have to choose an alternative audio choice on the PC.
 
fsh42na said:
So are you using a separate sound system/receiver for your pc? I'm still in the dark ages and just hook up audio via output to a set of bookshelf speakers:eek:
Click to expand...

Are you going into the Sound and Audio Device Properties in the control panel and switching your default device on the audio tab back to the onboard audio?
 
ND40oz said:
Are you going into the Sound and Audio Device Properties in the control panel and switching your default device on the audio tab back to the onboard audio?
Click to expand...


I've tried doing that on the budget pc build. I tried to select the mobo's onboard audio, but I don't get any sound if the videocard's audio is enabled in the device manager. In fact, I just tried it again this morning. I enabled the HD audio and tried to fiddled around in the audio/control panel settings to get sound from the onboard mobo audio instead,but no go. The only thing that works for me is to disable the HD audio and things seem to work fine. I guess this is a functional work around, but it just bothers me to have this loose end (even though this pc is even for me:()
 
bfellow said:
If your card doesn't support the HDTV for HDMI audio output, you'll have to choose an alternative audio choice on the PC.
Click to expand...


Sorry, but I purchased this card for it's video. The audio was a surprise (my fault)extra that has turned into a bit of a pain. I just want to use the video card for its graphics and am content to listen to the mobo's onboard non-audiophile sound. I'm just hoping for a clean workaround that doesn't involve disabling things in the device manager.
 
Ah the only thing I can think of is switching audio devices to "ATI Rear HD Audio Output" in Sound and Audio Devices" in the Control Panel and choosing the appropriate source: headphones, speakers, 5.1 speakers, etc.

Sometimes it requires a systsem restart for the card to "see" the TV speakers for the audio portion.
 
bfellow said:
Ah the only thing I can think of is switching audio devices to "ATI Rear HD Audio Output" in Sound and Audio Devices" in the Control Panel and choosing the appropriate source: headphones, speakers, 5.1 speakers, etc.

Sometimes it requires a systsem restart for the card to "see" the TV speakers for the audio portion.
Click to expand...

bfellow,

Thanks for the advice. I'll give that a shot when I get home. If it wasn't for the fact that I'm going to be using some ATI HD cards for my next 2 upgrades, I probably wouldn't have even bothered posting here. This cheap pc is for the daughter of a family friend. Think of a female "Eddie Haskell" from "Leave it to Beaver" (not sure if you're old enough to know that show). If you are familiar with the show, then you'll understand my not really wanting to go out of my way to make things perfect. Unfortunately, my anal retentiveness won't allow me to just let it go.

Thanks again:D
 
Thanks for all your help people. I solved the problem. I thought I checked the audio system settings carefully to look for the ability to specify my audio. Apparently, I didn't look close enough. I found a tab and a drop down menu that allowed me to specify the mobo's onboard sound. All is good now.

Thanks a bunch:D
 
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