Media PC
 

Hope someone can help point me in the right direction.

Want to build a pc to plug into my Home Cinema DVD box. Building the pc is not an issue, however i have a question regarding sound input. The vacant sound inputs on the Home Cinema box are phono\RCA, obviously sound card outputs are mini jack from 5.1 (or 6 or 7) cards. Is it possible to hook up and get decent sound??

I'd have thought the optimum method would be if your soundcard (or motherboard) has an SPDIF digital audio output and then connect it digitally to your home cinema.

That's how mine is setup. I have a Asus NF2 motherboard with the Nvidia Soundstorm stuff on it. The motherboard has a coaxial (phono) type SPDIF output, home cinema system (Sony DAV-S800) has a optical SPDIF input. I found a little converter box that Maplins sell to go from coax to optical. Job's a good un :D The sound system on the motherboard feeds the sound over as either PCM or Dolby Digital (5.1). In the Dolby mode I can fiddle around with all sorts of special surround effects and stuff, if I want to, to make my MP3s sound strange :D

If you haven't got digital in/out then your home cinema system will need to have analogue inputs for each amplifier channel. Most seperates systems have, but it sounds like your box may not.

Graz - I do have optical, but is being used for Sky+. I could use an optical switch box to split the input, however it means getting out of my chair to do it.