i wanna get a surround sound system for my tv in my room!

[kenmasters1983]

i was thinking of buying a home theatre system but i have some problems.

1.my tv only has RF and rca inputs WHITE an YELLOW only!
2.i dont know what i need!
3.i see walmart.com has some surround sound systems for 50 bucks.
4. i already have a DVD player.
5.can i even use surround sound speakers? i thought you have to have both RED and WHITE inputs i maybe wrong though.
6. i just want sound all around me nothing fancy my budget is LOW cuz i dont have a job yet.
7.how do i use dolby digital sound from the surrond sound speakers when i get them? does i use my dvd player or my satellite reciver?

i couldnt find anywhere else to ask these questions.

[hushypushy]

1.my tv only has RF and rca inputs WHITE an YELLOW only!

that means it's monural.

2.i dont know what i need!

well you cant get TV surround sound. you can only get it from a DVD player (with digital out, or 6 channel analog) a PS2 or something. your TV is monural...and besides that cable TV is monural, digital TV is 2 channel.

3.i see walmart.com has some surround sound systems for 50 bucks.

they are shyt. sony has a nice one for like 130 or something, that one isnt too bad.

4. i already have a DVD player.

well it needs to have digital out. if its cheap, like mine, then it has only stereo out...and thats all you are gonna get.

5.can i even use surround sound speakers? i thought you have to have both RED and WHITE inputs i maybe wrong though.

yes and no. out of your TV, no, since it's monural and you dont even have TV out. you can use analog 5.1 but that needs 6 cords to go to each speaker....sooooo basically if you have a PS2 you can use digital out, to dolby digital decoder, to your speakers.

6. i just want sound all around me nothing fancy my budget is LOW cuz i dont have a job yet.

just get a stereo receiver. even CHEAP ones (read: stereo) have 2 channels. put both channels on and turn it all on. OR get speakers like mine (Z640) which are 5.1, they have an adapter, you can use them as 4.1 speakers (which is basically surround stereo...) OR get speakers like Logitech Z680 which have digital in. you wont need to buy more speakers or a decoder after that.

7.how do i use dolby digital sound from the surrond sound speakers when i get them? does i use my dvd player or my satellite reciver?

you need to go right in, like i said earlier, with digital. if your DVD player or satellite receiver dont have it you are screwed.

[Kazuya Mishima]

Your dvd player need to have digital out (its orange btw), you plug that to the speaker and thats all. Note that you can only use it for dvd movies as the tvs dont have 5.1. You can use it with your soundcard too if you have an ac97 soundcard built in or an soundblaster, audigy or some of those cards.

[Katsuya]

Originally Posted by Kazuya Mishima

Your dvd player need to have digital out (its orange btw),.

No, it's black for Fiber-optic digital and orange for coax digital

(PS2 is Fiber-optic digital)

[kenmasters1983]

well i looked at my cheap apex ad-1130w and on it i found these.

on the front cover of the dvd player it says dolby digitial and DTS digital out and on the back of the dvd player i have coaxial orange and optical out!

i didnt know i had all those features on my 40 dollar player.

so all i do is buy the 50 dollar surround sound speakers then i can have dolby digital surround sound??

where can i buy those speakers you spoke of kane??

[hushypushy]

well if you have a coaxial out then all you need is any sort of speakers with a digital in. the Z680s are pretty expensive (around 400 last time i checked), you might want to just go down to best buy or whatever and look at the dolby digital packages. sometimes they include DVD players already, so watch for the ones with only decoder + speakers and you'll get a better deal

[Fox5]

I'd like to point out a few things....
TVs can have surround sound, and stereo for that matter. Just watch the simpsons, it is transmitted in Dolby Pro Logic 2 surround sound(5 channels).
If your computer has AC 97 or whatever, you won't get surround sound with a receiver, it supports surround sound through 3 sets of stereo speakers, though some receivers have inputs for this. NForce2 motherboards equipped with the soundstorm chipset are the only motherboards capable of converting surround sound in PC games to dolby digital.

[hushypushy]

TVs can have surround sound, and stereo for that matter. Just watch the simpsons, it is transmitted in Dolby Pro Logic 2 surround sound(5 channels).

pro logic 2 is different than dolby surround. PL2 makes a pseudo surround out of 2 channel decoding. furthermore you need to have the digital cable for this (you cant get it with analog cable or antenna) but i know kenmasters1983 has satellite...and beyond that i honestly have no idea.

NForce2 motherboards equipped with the soundstorm chipset are the only motherboards capable of converting surround sound in PC games to dolby digital.

umm i dont know about that exactly. do you mean to say that nforce2 mobos have 5.1 channel sound? check out Soundblaster Audigy 1 and higher, they are 5.1 and have digital connectors which give you true 5.1.

[Fox5]

I'm sorry to tell you, but you are wrong about pro logic 2. Pro logic 2 does not require a digital cable(I'm not even sure if it can pass over it) but rather just standard RCA stereo cables plugged into a receiver which supports it. It is only 2 channels, but it does a very good job of seperating it into 5. Most surround sound receivers are also capable of taking a stereo signal, and splitting the different parts of the sound onto different speakers, and while not surround sound, it is immersive.

And nforce2 motherboards that have the soundstorm chip(an audio chip made by nvidia) are the only computers capable of converting EAX(the standard used in virtually all PC games) and converting it to dolby digital, allowing you to plug it into your surround sound receiver. If you don't have a receiver that will accept 6 channel analog sound(either over a digital cable or by plugging in 6 RCA cables from 3 plugs on your sound card) then this is the only way to get surround sound from a computer onto a surround sound system. You could just hook up seperate sets of speakers though, as the receiver is doing nothing more than just passing the audio through when you're using 6 channel analog.
Any sound card with a digital out port can output Dolby Digital from DVD movies though, as they just pass the data straight through. Many can also decode dolby digital and transfer the signal to your multiple analog speakers, but only nforce2 and soundstorm can encode a PC audio signal into dolby digital so the receiver can decode it, it's the same way the xbox does it. There is no benefit from it(and probably a decrease in quality since dolby digital is a compression format), other than if you lack 6 channel analog on your receiver it allows you to get surround sound.

[hushypushy]

sigh...if only people would read my posts. i quote myself:

pro logic 2 is different than dolby surround. PL2 makes a pseudo surround out of 2 channel decoding.

and what i meant was not a physical digital (coaxial) cable but Digital Cable (you know, comcast, Cox, etc). regular Analog Cable Television is only monural.

by the way i didnt know that about dolby digital; i've never heard of that. that's kind of an odd thing, i dont really imagine anyone wanting to hook up their computer to a real surround system...i suppose maybe if your computer was the center of a home theater, then perhaps.

[Fox5]

Well you're wrong that you need Digital Cable to get Pro Logic 2, I have regular cable but I was defintely getting surround sound with pro logic 2, unless pro logic 2 can automatically seperate a signal but yet only does it on some channels.

According to Dolby's site, Pro Logic 2 can be transmitted over broadcast television or digital television. Dolby Digital is only available over digital cable.

http://www.dolby.com/Consumer/Techno...hnologies.html

http://dolby.com/professional/TVAudio/DSProLogicII.html

[hushypushy]

well it seems there is an incongruity in this. ill point out:

Features & Benefits: Processes stereo movie and music content into five independent playback channels of full bandwidth surround sound.

last time i checked, analog cable wasnt stereo. maybe im wrong? also:

that says 2 channels all the way across. i do agree that it works with 2 channels (it would be quite hard to dispute that...) but i do not see how it can work with regular (monural) analog cable.

[Fox5]

I'm fairly certain there are stereo analog cables, but they're more expensive. However, I'd imagine the cable people would make sure to use them when installing cable into your house, though if you did the wires yourself you might not have it.
But it's definetely possible to transmit stereo over a single analog cable, or your PC wouldn't output stereo sound and you wouldn't get stereo sound from a pair of headphones.

BTW, what is the cable called that is used for cable TV? I used to think it was coax, but now we have digital coax cables which look more like RCA cables.

[Kane]

Uh.... Hushy: Here in the UK, regular terrestrial broadcasts are in stereo and have been for at least ten years. It'd make very little sense for them to regress the technology for cable.

[hushypushy]

well my TV tells whether your broadcast is in mono or stereo. every single channel i flip to, the broadcast is in monural. of course it's possible to have stereo on one analog cable (exactly as fox5 pointed out) but in my experiences analog cable TV everywhere ive seen it is in monural.

btw Fox5: it is called coaxial cable, im sure of it because i remember getting some to hook up my sister's VCR.

[Fox5]

Originally Posted by hushypushy

well my TV tells whether your broadcast is in mono or stereo. every single channel i flip to, the broadcast is in monural. of course it's possible to have stereo on one analog cable (exactly as fox5 pointed out) but in my experiences analog cable TV everywhere ive seen it is in monural.

btw Fox5: it is called coaxial cable, im sure of it because i remember getting some to hook up my sister's VCR.

My tv also tells me if it is stereo or mono, and nearly every channel(except for like documentaries and the home gardening network) says stereo.
Maybe you don't have a stereo cable hooked up, or perhaps somewhere in your house you don't have a stereo cable along the line, or your cable company doesn't support stereo?

[Kane]

Perhaps your cable box is old hardware and doesn't support stereo?

[Fox5]

Originally Posted by Kane-Sama

Perhaps your cable box is old hardware and doesn't support stereo?

People still use cable boxes for non digital cable?(I'm assuming you're talking about one that goes on top of the tv, not the one that the cable goes into before reaching your tv)

I used to have a cable box for an old tv with dials, but on my current one I can just plug it right in. I probably could on the old TV as well, I think I just had that box so I could get all the channels and so I could use a remote.

[hushypushy]

Originally Posted by Kane-Sama

Perhaps your cable box is old hardware and doesn't support stereo?

well we just got an "upgrade" (i dont watch TV so i dont know, the only time i do is when i look at my sister flipping channels) but i guess there was an A side and a B side...now we have all the stations on one. none of the hardware (meaning side changer ) is old (in fact its brand new, i got it for my sister and it even has a remote). maybe we just have a crappy network provider or something.

[Kane]

Feck knows. I've only actualy used a digital terrestrial box, which hooks up via scart. Most people's I've seen are set top boxes tho. It may be an English thing tho, as IIRC we were somewhat late adopters to the whole cable/sky thing.