Help please - which card for TrueHD output over HDMI?

[hurdy]

Hi,

Hope an expert could help me without too much effort. I built my HTPC a while back based around a Gigabyte GA-MA78GM-S2H mobo. This was fine and dandy hooked up to my old amp for 5.1 sound via optical.

I have now purchased an Onkyo 607 and now want to output video and audio over HDMI. I have spent ages playing around with it, and it seems the best I can get from this mobo is two channel stereo over HDMI with a Dolby Digital passthrough via Powerdvd at a push.

I figure I need a new video card that will support the output of TrueHD audio over HDMI, but I'm stumped when it comes to choosing one. I don't need it capable of games as I don't use the system for that - I just play blurays and MKVs through it.

Can anyone give me some simple suggestions for a way to get TrueHD into my new box of tricks please?

 

[Woggle]

I posted on almost exactly the same thing earlier today:

http://www.avforums.com/forums/home...75289-arcsoft-tmt3-dolby-truehd-gigabyte.html

Sounds like it's the motherboard rather than the sound card which needs changing. Would be interested to find out which way you go - just about to trial the Arcsoft TMT3 Platinum with a view to purchasing later down the line (once I've had a look at upgrading the motherboard).

Still a bit confusing though.....

 

[jameson_uk]

depends on what you mean by TrueHD. If you are talking about the amp showin up as TrueHD you are limited to a few combinations of hardware and software.

If you are talking about decoding TrueHD on your PC and outputting as LPCM or analogue you have a lot more hardware available to you.

Read the HD audio FAQ in my sig

 

[hurdy]

Thanks for your answers - very detailed reply in your sig too jameson which helped explain a lot.

When I say I want TrueHD, I mean I would like the best quality audio track from the bluray disc, whether it is TrueHD or DTS-HD. If I understand correctly, if I want to do this via bitstream this will mean I need a card such as the Xonar HDAV 1.3 slim (ebuyer have this for £105) and some software on top (although this comes bundled with TMT which does the job.

If go LPCM I can get away with an ATI 4xxx series card, output it via HDMI and the only downside is that the Onkyo won't flag it as TrueHD or DTS-HD.

The third alternative I thought about was just buying the £80 Sony bluray player from Amazon and leaving my HTPC for mkv rips until the Xonar comes down in price.

LPCM seems to be cheaper, and is still a one box solution so I can take advantage of improved TrueHD audio rips. Can I ask, if I went and bought an ATI card, would I need an specific software, or could I choose to output LPCM from the sound controls and carry on using PowerDVD 7 Ultra to playback the discs? I currently use KMPLayer for mkv files, could I carry on using this?

 

[FlatStanly]

lo hurdy,

i got me a hdav slim a while back and it does what is says on the tin. I can play my blu ray rips from folders using tmt3 and the true hd and dts hd sound more richer than lpcm.Also with that setup you shouldn't have any refresh rate problems between blu ray and dvd's.
The price of the hdav will probably drop in the future but spending 80 notes now then buying hdav at say 60-70 notes later on may not be a good financial choice

 

[hurdy]

Ta matey - having spent the last couple of hours looking further at the options, I think you might be right. The slim asus card is only 25 quid more than a bluray player, so on reflection that might be the best way to go.

Only wish I'd come to that conclusion before I mentioned buying a bluray player to the other half - she'd have been none the wiser to a new sound card in the back of the PC

 

[ND40oz]

I'd probably look at a 5670, should be cheaper then any of the dedicated audio cards that do true-hd over hdmi and you get a video out of it too.

 

[hurdy]

I'd probably look at a 5670, should be cheaper then any of the dedicated audio cards that do true-hd over hdmi and you get a video out of it too.

Looking at a good shout matey - around 80 squid at overclockers. Just reading into it now. I'd need to upgrade to powerdvd 9 though (on powerdvd 7 ultra) from what I understand from jameson's post and that would be another 40 quid?

 

[hurdy]

lo hurdy,

i got me a hdav slim a while back and it does what is says on the tin. I can play my blu ray rips from folders using tmt3 and the true hd and dts hd sound more richer than lpcm.Also with that setup you shouldn't have any refresh rate problems between blu ray and dvd's.
The price of the hdav will probably drop in the future but spending 80 notes now then buying hdav at say 60-70 notes later on may not be a good financial choice

I take it the 24fps problem has been sorted out for this card then?

Can you confirm that TMT3 comes bundled with the card as well? I'm edging towards this cost-wise, but if I have to shell out for software too then I might change my mind.

 

[jameson_uk]

Looking at a good shout matey - around 80 squid at overclockers. Just reading into it now. I'd need to upgrade to powerdvd 9 though (on powerdvd 7 ultra) from what I understand from jameson's post and that would be another 40 quid?

Would be interested to know if anyone has got a 5xxx card which came bundled with a working version of PowerDVD? Guess this bumps the price up quite a bit if it doesn't

Can you confirm that TMT3 comes bundled with the card as well? I'm edging towards this cost-wise, but if I have to shell out for software too then I might change my mind.

Not sure what it comes with but certainly a version of TMT3 is available as anb update from Asus (not quite the full retail as misses out on SimHD and the 10' Media Centre interface)