Sending music only to receiver

[Scottes]

I am planning on hooking up my sound card to my receiver so that I can listen to music on my good speakers, over TOSLink. But I'd rather keep all other sounds going to my regular PC speakers. Is this possible with MM?

If so, I assume that I'll need some type of output plugin? Currently MM lists only the MM Directsound output, and "waveOutput output v2.0.2a." Where would I get the appropriate plugin to separate the MM music from all other Windows sounds?

Sound card is onboard my Intel mobo, model D975XBX2. It's listed as an Intel Azalia Audio Device. Windows XP control panel lists 2 audio devices, IDT 1 and IDT 2. I can't find any info about them - the help and documentation is next to non-existent. All I know is that setting IDT 2 as the default means that I don't hear anything out of my speakers.

If this sound card won't do what I need, can someone suggest an alternative that will? I have an older SB Live that I used to have installed, but that used to crackle a lot for some unknown reason. Removing it and using the onboard sound fixed that problem, though everything else remained the same.

[Eyal]

I am planning on hooking up my sound card to my receiver so that I can listen to music on my good speakers, over TOSLink. But I'd rather keep all other sounds going to my regular PC speakers. Is this possible with MM?

Hi Scottes
I don't think it's possible with a regular soundcard because it can't distinguish from Windows/Application sounds.
I use a Toslink connection to my receiver (see here) but get all sounds from the computer though.

However I know you can achieve what you want with an Audio Transmitter. Maybe this can help you: http://www.mediamonkey.com/forum/viewto ... =1&t=37626

Eyal

[Guest]

I don't think it's possible with a regular soundcard because it can't distinguish from Windows/Application sounds.

Actually, I think a post from you in that thread may have the answer.

OK. So it's just a matter of redirecting the sound to the proper output.

Use the the inbeded player in MM again and set the output plugin to play through the USB:

Do: Tools|Options|Player|Output Plug-Ins|MediaMonkey DirectSound Output -> Configure -> and select the output.

I did this, and have 3 choices for output: The soundcard's IDT 1 and IDT 2, and my Sennheiser USB headphones. I configured MM to output to the headphones, and it does what I want - music through the headphones and Windows sounds through the PC speakers.

So, if IDT 2 directs MM out the digital TOSLink - a wishful, wild-assed guess - then this will do exactly what I want.
Alas, if IDT 2 does something else then I am completely out of luck without a different solution.
I guess that I'll have to get a TOSLink cable and actually test this now.

[Robert Harris]

Get an Apple Airport Express ("AE")- ~$100.00
Get Eric Milles software - ~$25.00 (http://www.softpedia.com/get/Multimedia ... kers.shtml)

This will allow you to stream music from MediaMonkey to the AE but not change the sound routing of the PC otherwise

The AE has adequate analogue output or a digital output for a DAC as desired

I (ans several friends) have used it for nearly a year and it works flawlessly

You can have more than 1 AE also and stream to multiple devices, nearly simultaneously (millisecond delay)

Robert Harris

[Lowlander]

Are there any non-Apple solutions like the Airport Express?

[raharris]

-Soundcards as above will
-PC-> USB DAC arrangement is workable BUT the USB cable should be < 15' long, requires a DAC and I am unsure what happens to other PC sounds , ie where do they go
Logitech supposedly has a streaming device but I have not seen it
Slimdevices allows streaming but cannot use MediaMonkey and there software is, er, ah, less than spiffy in my opinion
Sonos is clever, cool, moderately expensive and does not use MediaMonkey

In summary, I can't find anything else that let's one use MediaMonkey

Robert Harris

[pushpull]

Try this - Check in the windows control panel under sounds for an option to use the pc speaker and select that if it is available. Then open the options for MM and go to the output plugin. Choose configure and then select you sound card instead of the "primary sound driver' selection.

[Scottes]

So, if IDT 2 directs MM out the digital TOSLink - a wishful, wild-assed guess - then this will do exactly what I want.
Alas, if IDT 2 does something else then I am completely out of luck without a different solution.
I guess that I'll have to get a TOSLink cable and actually test this now.

Well, that didn't work.

It took a bit of playing to figure out how to get the digital output to work. I finally found that I had to set the mode using Intel Audio Studio. Setting the Digital Output Mode to either Inactive or ADAT made the system use the PC speakers. Setting it to either Dolby or PCM Stero actually sent output to the digital output, and got it to my receiver.

Alas, it does send ALL sounds to the receiver, music and Windows.
This is a bit of a bummer since I have to change this every time I want to listen to the radio and still hear Windows noises.

[Eyal]

You can achieve this by using two soundcards, same way you did with your headphones.
One for Windows, one for music only. You just need to specify in Win and Apps which one they should use.

The problem you had with your old SoundBlaster was probably because it conflicts with your onboard card.
You have to make sure each card uses its own interrupt/DMA and associated with specific applications. Not both.
(I also have an onboard soundcard but had disable it to use my SoundBlaster X-FI card).

But it should work.

[Scottes]

You can achieve this by using two soundcards, same way you did with your headphones.
One for Windows, one for music only. You just need to specify in Win and Apps which one they should use.

The problem you had with your old SoundBlaster was probably because it conflicts with your onboard card.
You have to make sure each card uses its own interrupt/DMA and associated with specific applications. Not both.
(I also have an onboard soundcard but had disable it to use my SoundBlaster X-FI card).

But it should work.

I had disabled the onboard one in the BIOS, but perhaps it doesn't get completely disabled for some reason.

Concerning the possible conflicts, what about using a USB sound card? Will these also conflict with an internal sound card?

[Eyal]

Concerning the possible conflicts, what about using a USB sound card? Will these also conflict with an internal sound card?

No it shouldn't conflict because USB devices are handled differently by the computer.

[MMan]

The solution that I used was to add a PCI sound card (ESI Juli@ in my case) but kept my on board card active. The Juli@ has ASIO drivers so I the ASIO plug-in for Monkey and if I select that output plugin, the music goes to my stereo (either through the multiple digital output choices (Coax and S/PDIF) as well as the RCA jacks. By keeing the on board card active, all my computer sounds still go to the onborad card and play through the computer speakers. If I want to play the Monkey output on my PC speakers, I just change the output plugin to one of the other standard Monkey outputs which are sent to the on board card. In my case, I ended up liking the DAC on the Juli@ better than the DAC in my Marantz receiver so I useded theJuli@'s RCA outputs to feed the analog signal to my receiver. An advantage of using the ASIO plugin is that it allows the output to avoid the Windows Kernal mixer which can introduce some latency to the feed. I am using Vista 32-bit, so I can't speak to whether it will work with XP. See this post for more discussion.

http://www.mediamonkey.com/forum/viewto ... 08#p178197

I spent $130 on the Juli@ and bought it online from Florida Music (http://www.floridamusicco.com/). Through the process, I called them and they were very friendly and helpful. I recommended them to someone else on the forum who was looking for a card to convert vinyl to digital and he had similar results with them. Good Luck.

[Scottes]

Well it's been a month, and I have since upgraded to Vista 64, and upgraded to a Soundblaster X-Fi Titanium. And now everything works exactly how I want, with one quick configuration option.

Tools... Output Plugins... MediaMonkey Directsound Output... Configure... and then I choose SPDIF Out .
Music from MM comes out of my home stereo, and all Windows sounds come out the PC speakers.


I'm not sure if this is Vista or the X-Fi making this possible. I can also change volume on a per-app basis now - 50% volume for Windows Sounds, 70% for Firefox sounds, etc. This feature is pretty useful.

[heartofhate]

thread is a bit old but i have the exact same problem.
i also have the titanium x-fi and i am running win7. i tried every MM output plugin i know (ASIIO, WASAPI and direct sound) but none of them were working properly.
first i set the desktop speakers in the control panel on "default".

in MM itself i have two choices for the digial out. first one is "digitalaudio (S/PDIF)" and secondly there is also "S/PDIF out (Creative X-FI).
the funny thing is that the first choice is actually playing but there isn't any sound noticeable and for the creative out nothing at all happens. MM just begins to skip the tracks like if they weren't found.

if i select "speaker" or "default" the music will be played on both speakers.

did i miss something?

edit:
found the solution by myself. by disableing "dolby digitaly live" or "dts cenntect" everything works how it should. didn't think about this