question about how to connect a 2.1 soundbar to 8 channel hd audio motherboard

[yazeed93]

hello all, i'm having a difficulty trying to connect a 2.1 soundbar to my pc via the 8 channel hd audio on my motherboard. 

 

first of all my motherboard is gigabyte z87x-hd3. i pulled this out from my motherboard manual. http://prntscr.com/pwd0n7

 

and this is the aux to 2 rca cable i'm trying to connect to my motherboard audio http://prntscr.com/pwd0x4. 

 

i'm not even sure if i can connect rca to my motherboard directly but it fits however i get no audio and i tried all the channels.

any help would be appreciated. audio is really not my strong point in pc's  

[Master Disaster]

The black 3.5mm Jack would go into the Green output on the board and the RCA ends (Red & White) go into the Soundbar.

[yazeed93]

No the aux is supposed to go into the soundbar according to the manual. But from what you said I assume those channels are for aux inputs not rca? So I would need aux to aux cable then

[Sajiko]

Do you have a link to the soundbar?

 

[yazeed93]

yeah it's Soundcore Infini Mini Soundbar By Anker. 
https://www.soundcore.com/products/variant/infini-mini/A3370111

[Sajiko]

Then you will need a cable like this one:

 

https://www.amazon.de/UGREEN-Klinkenkabel-Audiokabel-kompatibel-Lautsprecher-Schwarz/dp/B07HQ3SFF2/ref=sr_1_2_sspa?__mk_de_DE=ÅMÅŽÕÑ&keywords=aux+to+aux&qid=1573649704&s=ce-de&sr=1-2-spons&psc=1&spLa=ZW5jcnlwdGVkUXVhbGlmaWVyPUExWUlJV1pPNlZBWFBPJmVuY3J5cHRlZElkPUEwNTM5OTI0MTZDQTk4QkJETDQxRSZlbmNyeXB0ZWRBZElkPUEwODA3NjU4MkVLMFE1NERXSEgyNyZ3aWRnZXROYW1lPXNwX2F0ZiZhY3Rpb249Y2xpY2tSZWRpcmVjdCZkb05vdExvZ0NsaWNrPXRydWU=

 

One end into the Aux on the Soundbar and the other into the green port on your PC

[yazeed93]

i see thanks very much man

[mariushm]

You plug the stereo jack into front speakers out (green) on your motherboard.

You plug the two RCA connectors on your sound bar device.

 

edit: saw the links ... you need a cable with two stereo jacks ... see link above, or just search on Amazon for stereo male to stereo male cable or something like that.

 

 

The front speakers out is a line out , which has the same output levels the sound bar expects on AUX In ... AUX In is basically the same as Line In ... just some standard audio signal.

 

The sound card is smart enough to be able to re-configure all its outputs and inputs, so you can actually insert the stereo jack into ANY of the connectors and the application that comes with the sound card will detect what your sound bar is (microphone or speakers) and automatically pick the right option. You can also manually configure the connector from that application - usually you have a picture of the connectors somewhere in the application and you can double click on a particular connector and say "i put a microphone there" or "this is where i put the front speakers" 

 

Your sound bar takes just stereo signal (2.0) and automatically creates the bass from those two stereo signals, so in the application, you have to configure the output to Stereo.

 

Also, may be worth checking if your sound bar has Optical In  or Digital In (sometimes called Coax In)

edit: i saw the pictures, you do have optical in.

While your motherboard doesn't have optical out or coax out on the IO shield, it does have the header for SPDIF out and SPDIF in, so you could go on eBay and buy a bracket with the digital outputs, here's an example:

 

https://www.ebay.com/itm/SPDIF-Optical-and-RCA-Out-Plate-Cable-Bracket-Fur-ASUS-MSI-Gigabyte-Motherboard/173987139499

https://www.ebay.com/itm/SPDIF-optical-and-RCA-out-plate-cable-bracket-for-asus-gigabyte-msi-motherboa-WH/254406289637

 

(cable is supplied with the bracket)

 

Your motherboard manual is a bit confusing, because your motherboard has both SPDIF In and Out headers and either I'm not understanding it right, or they've put the description of SPDIF In with the SPDIF Out pictures.

Either way, it's super easy to connect the bracket : you have only 3 pins: ground, 5v and the digital signal pin. So you connect ground and 5v to the ground and 5v headers in either of the headers (spdif in or spdif out) and the signal pin goes in the SPDIF pin 

 

 

Then, you can use a plain Toslink cable to connect the sound bar to your PC: https://www.amazon.com/AmazonBasics-Rated-Wall-Installation-Toslink/dp/B06X3X6Q3Q/

 

The reason why you would want to go through the hassle is because the sound bar will then accept digital signal (so no quality losses due to conversions to analogue sound) and also, it will probably accept 5.1 sound directly from your computer.

So for example, if you watch a movie using a player like Media Player Classic Home Cinema, you can configure it's output to send the original 5.1 track as it is , or send 5.1 uncompressed signal to the sound bar, so you don't lose the original bass channel from the 5.1 audio track - the sound bar will only take those extra 2.0 speakers on the sides and merge them in the front left and front right speakers ... so it would convert the 5.1 to 2.1

[yazeed93]

huh that's interesting that it has optical audio since the soundbar came with a cable and it's in fact recommended to use it. sucks that they didn't include it in the i/o shield so i can just connect it but so far i bought an aux to aux cable and the audio is working so that's good but i'll definitely look into it because i'm upgrading my cpu and mobo when black friday comes i'm currently running a 4th gen intel cpu lol. thanks man for the great information