[Mike Rivers]

Soundhaspriority wrote:

I think you are hoping that a Windows mixer with 6 channels of routing can
be made to pop up. But this is not a native Windows ability. Native Windows
support AT THE GUI LEVEL (pardon caps) is mono/stereo.

Yes, it would be nice if the mixer accommodated six channels, even just
as a fixed gain router. That's indeed the function I was hoping was
buried somewhere and I just didn't know where it was.

The multichannel functionality you seek will not
appear in the native Windows mixer panel.

What, then, is the significance of selecting "5.1 Surround sound
speakers" in the Advanced Audio Properties window of the Sound part of
the Windows Control Panel (or any of the other selections there, for
that matter)? Even when this is selected, the "Speaker volume" window
only shows two sliders. It must do something.

But at the ASIO driver level, multichannel is supported. There simply isn't
any routing/interface that comes with Windows to work it. All that is 3rd
party. Take a look at my first post and see if it means any more to you.

I understand what you wrote, but since ASIO isn't part of the Windows
sound "system" I figured that it didn't apply to my question. So how do
people play surround audio from their SoundBlaster cards? Does it have
an ASIO driver that Media Player recognizes? It's my understanding that
the Windows "sound" applications work with the default device that you
set up from the Control Panel. If I make that the SoundMax chip on my
computer's motherboard, that's where the audio comes out when I play
something with Media Player or WinAmp.

If I set it to the Mackie Satellite, then playing something with Media
Player or WinAmp comes out the Satellite's main stereo outupts (1-2).
The Windows control panel doesn't know about any other outputs that are
(physically) available on the Satellite. That could be a matter of how
the Satellite WDM drivers are written. That's a Mackie thing beyond
which we have no control. Are (for example) WDM drivers for a
SoundBlaster Audigy written so that six outputs are available to
Windows? And if so, where do they appear so they can be used?

Of course programs such as Sound Forge or Nuendo allow flexible
assignment of audio to any available outputs, and with ASIO, all of the
outputs are available.



--
If you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring and reach
me he
double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo -- I'm really Mike Rivers
)