Major ac3 problem

[Scorpius]

Hi!

I had ac3 passtrough installed to my system for a long time, but now when i had to install sound font banks I screwed it and my passtrough is gone! :( I now have 4 speaker output in powerDvD and NOT spdif out!!!! weird...

I have:
soundblaster live! value 1024
Windows ME

I used to get ac3 passtrough like this: installed only that patch driver (SBLWMEDrv.exe 5321KB) whitch fixes sound blaster 1024 ac3 passtrough problem, then run registerfilter.bat and then used use-waveout-not-dsound.reg.

But now I have 4 speakers option instead of spdif out option in PowerDvD and NO ac3 sound. Tried also bsplayer and microdvdplayer without succes.

I tried to uninstall SB drives and install them again, tried different speaker settings in SB config. Tried practically everything. Hell, I even removed whole sound card and added it again without succes and istalled windows again!

This is really inportant to me, so Please help me and tell me what to do because I still believe the is some clever and easy way to fix this. I don't want to use method: Format C: and install everything again! :(

Thank You

[MaTTeR]

hmm..you could always check the sound control panel and see how many speakers it's configured for.

As a last resort it might be worh uninstalling PowerDVD and then reinstalling it to see if it will set the filters back properly. Have you tried playing your movie with BSplayer or the new PowerDivX 3.12?

[Scorpius]

already tired all that. My latest tests were with Graphedit and I did what doom9 guide told me to do but in WMP6.4 I can't select SPDIF OUT!!!!
I can't choose 4 latest options!!!
Not Funny :(

[MaTTeR]

It sounds like your filters are either hosed for some reason or not registered problem. Can't really help you as I don't use Sound Blasters at all.

However, I would definitely stick to using BSplayer while your trying to get this going again. It seems to be the most reliable for SPDIF going IMO. Did you check BSplayers prefs to make sure it was set for SPDIF? Also, I've had much better luck with WinDVD's filters than PowerDVD's.

EDIT- I've found that the best filters to get AC3 going are here-
http://www.divx-digest.com/software/tsunami_pack.html

[Trick McKaha]

I had a similar nightmare. Finally, I got it fixed by repeatedly reinstalling the Soundblaster drivers. The ones that worked for me were SBLiveXPDrvUpdate.exe dated 12/12/01 and of size 9256 KB. An earlier (and smaller) version with the same name did not work for me. The driver that worked required the computer to reboot, then on startup the drivers actually were installed. The driver that finally worked did not work for SPDIF the first time I installed it, nor the second, however.

Oh, I also clicked on the program Creative Restore Defaults, which is under Soundblaster Live! menu. Then I opened the surround mixer and adjusted the volume and mute settings so as to be correct, and clicked on Digital Output Only, and under the Advanced button, made sure AC3 decode was not checked (not yellow). And then I reinstalled the SBLiveXPDrvUpdate.exe and it finally worked, at least in Bplay.

Yes, I also struggled with the iviaudio.ax file, and there are wrong ones of that you can have, too. I had to delete the (wrong) copy that was in System32 folder, then reregister one that had the SPDIF capability. You will know if the copy of iviaudio your computer has registered has spdif capability by loading the filter in graphedit and right clicking on the box, as doom9 describes at the end of his AC3 guide. Mine is dated 3/27/01, is 288 KB in size, and I think I got it from PDivXNG256.exe.

I spent days and weeks and months working on this problem of getting SPDIF pass through in Windows XP. I suffered system crashes, in XP that took me right back to a warm boot, Bigga Badda Boom. I am pretty sure the Creative Soundblaster drivers have been squirrely and at fault. Good luck.

Trick

[BlackSun]

The iviaudio.ax which come with PowerDivX 2.56 will work fine for SPDIF