Hi 2C0J2H2 and welcome to Vista Forums

First things first. Please give people chance to have a look at your post. Depending on what they are doing, this may be almost immediately or it could be several days. Accordingly, I have removed your second post.

Back to your problem. It would assist us if you provided full specifications of your system (fill in your System Specs)

Originally Posted by 2C0J2H2

Sound functions but reciever is only detecting 2 channel output. Apon browsing RealTekHD audio properites I discovered that the only options for Digital Output(RCA) were all 2-Channel under "Default Format" tab. However my front pannel Audio Output Jack(HD Audio 2nd Output) has an extra third tab labeled "Speaker Configuration" and has options for up to 7.1 surround but these settings do not impact my Digital Output(RCA) channel. Now my reciever does have a multi-channel input that could take advantage of the Analog Outputs in the rear but the distance is to great and multiple wires are expensive.

My question is how can i configure my RealTek Digital Output(RCA) to ouput 7 channel sound?

have you tried configuring it in the realtek audio control panel, since that is nothing to do with windows built in audio device manager? see attachment below...

I stand to be corrected but I think this is the situation.

In on board sound the output can only be 2 channel (left and Right) as that's all the mother board stereo jack (line out) can support. For true 6 channel out you will need 6 jacks ( or 3 stereo jack? I dunno)

My system says the same as yours.

"Digital out" means that the signal is going out (obviously) so it needs to go out into something else. Perhaps something that can convert stereo to emulated 5.1. (which is what my TV does for example)

RCA is two channels anyway (two cables).

You don't really explain what you are trying to set up and why you need to digital out?

Hi 2C0J2H2,

Please DO NOT keep bumping your thread, especially after such a short period of time. You need to give people chance to respond, and repeated bumping will only put people off. Accordingly, I have removed the post (please see my earlier post as well). Can I ask you again to please provide your system specifications? We need that information in order to be able to help you. For example, we need to know how the front panel is wired to your motherboard, and whether there are any jumpers or settings in the BIOS that would affect its operation.

If for example you have a true surround sound commercial DVD movie playing on your PC...if your connecting your stero jacks in the RCA outlet (stereo) you cannot expect it to come out as anything other than Stereo out the other end....

I have the same problem...I have a modern Motherboard with surround sound and digital output just like yours and am very knowledgeable about computers, but don't know a whole ton about audio. After researching this problem for a week I discovered some interesting things...

I got 5.1 surround sound working using PowerDVD and Media Player Classic which comes with the K-lite codec pack and enables AAC/Dolby Digital. This works for playing DVD's/Divx and other media formats in 5.1 surround, even though Windows control panel it still shows only 2 speaker config as you mentioned, it plays in 5.1. The stock Windows Media player did not originally support AAC or one of the functions required to make it work, so it wouldn't play 5.1 at all. After configuring Media Player Classic codecs on my system I can now play files in 5.1 surround using the stock WMP... but who uses that anyways... its slow and glitchy.

However when I try to play games I cannot seem to get the 5.1 to work, they all play in stereo, however if I select analog output and hook up a surround sound set of headphones (via the 3 headphone jacks) it plays fine in 5.1.

So basically 5.1 surround works fine through the old analog jacks, but works only with certain applications through the digital SPDIF output.

From the reading I have done I understand that optical output only supports two channels, but encodes those channels (if the application supports it) into 5.1 dolby digital or DTS. Based upon what I have read Windows Vista does not natively support encoding those channels and therefore it shows up as only two speakers. If I am wrong feel free to correct me... I would love to get World at War working in 5.1 using Optical output.

Vista Ultimate
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Core2duo E8400 @ 4ghz (water-cooled)
8800GTS w/voltmod @800mhz (water-cooled)
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