# Creative X-Fi PCI-e with Xbox 360 Toslink Input Problem



## slychicken37 (Jan 15, 2009)

First off the Setup

Dell E530 (2.33 Ghz Dual Core E6500)
3 GB 667Mhz ram
256Mb 8600GT Video Card
Creative Soundblaster X-Fi Extreme Audio PCI-Express
Logitech G51 Speakers
Xbox 360 Pro, with Optical Out (toslink)


Currently I have my Xbox 360 hooked up to play through my computers audio system as well as plug into my computer LCD screen. All was fine until I decided I wanted to switch to fully digital 5.1 sound for my xbox experience. Originally I had a Y-splitter and ran both RCA jacks into a mini port with the Motherboards On-board RealTek 7.1 surround sound system, which worked fine but was not true surround sound as it was two RCA's into a 3.5mm mini plug. So, I went out and bought the Soundblaster X-fi PCI-e card because it had the Toslink Digital Input port, which I knew I could send a toslink signal cable from the xbox 360 to get true 5.1 surround sound.

However, it is not working. Once I hooked up to the Toslink digital input, I was able to get sound only when my xbox is selected on Dolby Digital (Stereo). As soon as I turn the xbox 360 to Dolby Digital 5.1 sound, the speakers emit a loud squeel until I reselect the stereo mode.

Originally I thought it was a conflict between the Soundblaster and the RealTek onboard sound, but even after going into the BIOS and disabling the onboard sound, I have the exact same problem.

Please help, as I am at my wits end. Honestly I am about to return everything and go back to my crappy 2.1 setup.

Thanks,

slychicken37


----------



## beaverboy56 (Jun 24, 2008)

I'm having the exact same problem! HELP!


----------



## slychicken37 (Jan 15, 2009)

Ok there is good and bad news.

Bad news First: From what I have researched it is impossible for this setup to work using the X-FI PCI-e and xbox 360. The reason being that the X-FI does not have the ability to decode streaming Digital input. Have you noticed that if you switch your xbox to 2.1 sound using the toslink connector that it plays sound?? That is because the Toslink works as an Input but only in Dolby Digital 2.1 and not the 5.1 channel. If you want you could output 5.1 sound with the Toslink connector to a receiver or such, but that does not help in our situation.

Now, the good news: You can find sound cards that have the ability to decode actual 5.1 inputs on the fly. They are a little more expensive, but have heard they will work. I believe the High-End Creative products will do it, and well as some other brands which I used to know but have since forgotten as I am know longer in the market.

If you want my advice, this is what I did. I returned my Creative sound card and went out and bought a logitech Z-5500 5.1 surround system, which has an optical input on the speaker control pod. I actually bought a refurbished system to cut down on the price (Amazon). It sounds awesome, and works very well with the Xbox 360. I just run a 3-wire surround sound from my computer into the control pod, and the toslink from my 360 into it as well. I think it still has a digital coaxial input left open, so for its size there are loads of inputs. That is what I would advise. This way if you computer fries, you will still be able to hear sound from your Xbox.

Hope this helps,

-Slychicken37


----------



## DarkSideMilk (Apr 13, 2009)

alright you silly people, here's the deal, I don't know about the titanium x-fi but by looking at the features on the sound blaster web page it looks like it does have dolby digital encoding for input, i have a x-fi platinum and it most certainly does, so here's how we take care of this problem, number one make sure dolby digital is enabled on the 360, heck even with wma pro, cause i'm pretty sure the x-fi's got that going. especially considering with the x-fi software you can make wma pro files. so next you need to play with the x-fi settings, the best place to do this is the creative audio control panel, this can be found in the start menu shortcuts of creative software, if you didn't put that there, go to the control panel, put it in classic view and click audio control panel, click on the spdif i/o tab, swicth the input settings to dolby digital/dts spdif-in decode, or i think according to creative some of them say input ac3 encode or something, if you don't have that option on there then you can't do dolby digital that way  also if you have the little 15 dollar dongle thing that has a 3.5mm to the dongle with optical and coaxial inputs, sadly you can't use that for dd or dts input encodings according to the x-fi website. but that should get you up and running with dolby digital, however fo course two problems are gonna come your way, one is audio lag, in movies and some games, i.e. guitar hero games and others there is an audio lag with dolby digital of about 150-165ms somewhere in there i haven't quite hammered it down, and frankly in guitar hero metallica i just use the setting to turn dolby digital off for that particualr game, cause i like the x-fi cmss-3d up mix and what not for the music games, i just do and it gets rid of the lag. However i find in games such as gears of war and halo 3, there is a problem with dynamic range where at loud parts it spikes and causes a static pop or cackle crackle, a bad noise whatever you want to call it. this luckily is also fixable go back to the audio control panel and click the decoder tab then click the dolby digital settings, put the dynamic range to night for games that have the messed up dynamics, don't worry you don't miss out on awesome sound or anything it still is very dynamic and ranged in this way, and it beats blowing out your speakers. So there you have it that is how you turn on digital in decoding and how you keep your speakers from exploding yay!


----------



## DarkSideMilk (Apr 13, 2009)

a couple other notes on x-fi, if you want to avoid distortion in other areas of sound with your x-fi card, i understand that if you keep the wave mixer down to about 45% especially for digital input, and the master volume never above 80% you can avoid a lot of problems, And you can still crank it up pretty loud with those settings, well somewhat dependent on your speakers, but my gigaworks t40's still can blow the house down even turned down like that, yay separate speaker volumes. So yeah that's just another word of advice. Oh and you can return the dynamic range to full when you watch movies and such, if you can handle the audio lag, it doesn't bug me much, though at times it does look like a poorly dubbed Japanese film, it's all good though.


----------



## DarkSideMilk (Apr 13, 2009)

woops i read the wrong post you didn't have a x-fi titanium silly me that was the google search result below this one, so i looked at the sound blaster website on that one, and it looks like you have to download the decoders, which is free with your purchase of that card, so i'd head over there and figure out how to get that, and then you should have your problem solved


----------



## slither916 (Apr 19, 2009)

DarkSideMilk said:


> woops i read the wrong post you didn't have a x-fi titanium silly me that was the google search result below this one, so i looked at the sound blaster website on that one, and it looks like you have to download the decoders, which is free with your purchase of that card, so i'd head over there and figure out how to get that, and then you should have your problem solved


I have a question, im using an optical cable from my xbox 360 to my Xfi Platinum I/O input and I have all those stupid problems you mentions above. Do you think if I get the Dolby Digital Live pack that you can buy from creative will solve some or all of those problems? I notice my SPDIF I/O tab only had DTS -in decoding and not DD. But then again doesn't the Xbox do the decoding or no since im using an optical cable? I'ts a pain in the ***!! LOL How can I resolve those damn problems!?!?


----------



## DarkSideMilk (Apr 13, 2009)

well the dolby digital live pack would do nothing for you actually, cause that's for dolby digital output to a reciever, if you have like a surround sound system or a speaker system with an optical input you can hook your x-fi up through an optical or a coax cable probably too and get dolby digital everything, but it does nothing for input, as far as i have now found you can get passed the cackle except in games where you can turn down the game volume, the problem is that the 360 volume output is too high, I myself have given up and realized that hey i paid for the sound card for the fancy x-fi sound more than the digital decodings so i'll stick with digital stereo crystallized and up mixed, to me it kinda sounds better, but too answer you other questions the xbox sends the digital signal that has too be decoded by the sound card,as far as dolby digital decoding missing, make sure to check in the audio control panel as well to see if it is missing there, if it is, i think there's something in the knowledge base at creatives site on that, but i don't know cause i haven't had that problem, i would guess a reinstall is probably the case, or just a driver update or driver reinstall or something of the like, but check creative on that. So yeah i find that with the exception of movies, you can't use the 360 dolby digital with the x-fi, not really sure why they don't like each other but they don't and it only happens with the xbox games, not movies at all which is weird, but i never had the problem going straight to a reciever, it's a problem that creative hasn't addressed in a good 3 or 4 years now, and they aren't the best at customer support, they make awesome products, but they seem to count on them working, and spend no money on support, if you can even get to phone support, if you either have the extended warranty or it hasn't been 60 days, they don't know jack about electronics it's some lady in india who can barely speak and or understand electronics let alone how to solve a problem, so yeah stick with what works i guess, unless you can turn down the game volume, sadly it's a feature that halo 3 doesn't have, but hey guitar hero's got it, and so does resident evil 5 and i think the orange box, so for the most part you can make it work but not all games, of course you could also risk blowing out your sound card and speakers, but hey that's your choice


----------

