[Wysocki]

I have a Delta 2496 soundcard playing MP3s and DVDs thru the spdif output to my Denon receiver. The DVD sound from PowerDVD4 is MUCH lower than the other sound from the pc. It's a new Pioneer player in an external case which has a USB2-to-IDE converter in it. Could the USB translation be causing the low volume? I haven't found anywhere in the 2496 that I can separately adjust levels for the pc vs dvd.

 

[Neuner]

Turn the volume up

 

[Esben]

DVD sound is also low when you're using analog sound from a Delta 410.

 

[Wysocki]

It's not just low, it's LOWWWW! I rented "The Others" and at full volume on my Denon 5800 just normal conversation was enough to drown out the movie sound. Star Wars epsode 1 at full volume is not enough to drown out a normal conversation. It's depressing. (although normal conversation is usually much better dialog than SW1)

 

[Esben]

It's probably something with the "wide dynamic sound range for Dolby Digital". Perhaps if you turn on midnight mode, the dialog sound level will increase to a normal level. But then other parts of the sound will be attenuated as well.

 

[RSchermer]

Just out of curiosity, does everything else appear to be working correctly when playing a dvd, primarily does the receiver show that it is playing a 5.1 DD or DTS stream and not just two-channel? Can you play CD music through the DVD drive and if so is it also quiet? As a side note, although I don't know how it would be possible (and I also don't know anything about Denon receivers) but your description of how low the volume is reminds me of when my father accidently turned on Mute on the stereo I had given him. He complained it was really quiet and he had to turn the volume almost to max in order to listen to his music. I'm sure you don't have mute on since other audio plays fine but could there be a special setting somewhere on the receiver for DD/DTS volumes?

 

[Wysocki]

Playing an audio CD sounds ok, it's comparable to other audio sources in the receiver. But playing a DVD is about 10-15db quieter. I've tried selecting various audio options on the DVDs themselves and no significant improvement. I don't think there's anything on the Denon 5800 receiver to compensate for this either.

 

[RSchermer]

I'm not really familiar with how much "10-15db quieter" is but I will state that on my system (PC connected through optical) the DVD audio does play quite a bit softer than normal Windows audio. Although I don't have to turn the volume to max to get appropriate volume I do have to nudge it up several notches. If I forget to turn the volume down before shutting down the PC the Windows Shutdown melody can be extremely loud.


One other thing, you mention that CD audio sounds fine but is Windows extracting the audio through the USB2/IDE interface or do you have audio cables hooked to the external drive and plugged into the sound card? Also you didn't really confirm that the receiver is receiving a 5.1 data-stream when playing a DVD but I'll assume it is. If it is then I would guess that there isn't a problem with the USB2/IDE interface (as you questioned earlier) as everything else is working from the digital stream and there shouldn't be anything decoding it before reaching the receiver.