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[kosmicken]

Since most sound cards these days, including onboard sound, feature 6-8 channels, I'm wondering if a receiver is necessary if you are going to use an HTPC in a home theater environment. Sure, there are multi (more than two) channel computer speaker packages, but all the ones I've seen seem to be for the desktop environment, not the theater environment. Can you use "home theater" or "stereo" speakers with a PC? If so, how would they be connected? Soldering 1/8 plugs onto speaker wires would not be a problem for me, but since PC speakers are generally powered externally, whereas stereo or theater speakers get their power from the receiver/amp, I'm sure there would be issues with levels.

I don't currently own a receiver or an HTPC, and I want theater sound in the living room, so I am looking at all options.  I was originally under the impression that one of the concepts of using an HTPC was to have everything all in one box, but it seems that might not include audio. It would be nice if I'm wrong, though.

[Matt]

You'll need to power speakers somehow.  It takes a lot of energy to move air and produce loud sound, especially bass.  Normally a soundcard or DAC can only output a few watts, which is nowhere near enough.

The most common approach to power speakers is to buy an audio receiver that can take HDMI, SPDIF, or analog inputs from a computer and amplify them for the speakers.

Another approach (that I like) is to use a dumb power amplifier that takes analog input from a computer and amplifies it for speakers.

Yet another approach is to use powered speakers.  Computer speakers are normally powered.  There are also some very good studio monitor setups that fall into this category.

If you're on a budget, you might look for used equipment.  If you're willing to do the audio decoding and processing with your computer, you don't need a fancy stereo.  The computer speaker approach would also be budget friendly, although I don't have personal experience with how well you could fill a living room with a setup like that.

[kosmicken]

I don't suppose any sound cards exist that have powered speaker outputs, so that you could connect home theater speakers to your HTPC as you would to a receiver?

[Matt]

I don't suppose any sound cards exist that have powered speaker outputs, so that you could connect home theater speakers to your HTPC as you would to a receiver?

I've never heard of a powered speaker output soundcard.  Some cards have headphone amplifiers built in, but I think we're still talking about a watt or two.

But it does seem like this could be possible, since it's not uncommon for a PCIe video card to draw 300+ watts when gaming, I would think a sound card could do the same to power speakers.

[kosmicken]

Right. Question is, does it exist? I'd rather spend the money on an HTPC, but if I need a receiver anyway, doesn't seem like I'd need an HTPC since I have a network BD player.

[jmone]

You are never going to get a sound card that can delivery the power required to fill a room with decent sounding HT volumes.  This power amp is a bit over the top (I'm working on how to justify it.....) but you get the point, where are you going to put 54lbs of torodial transformer and capacitors (and this is a Digital Amp so it is very effecient) -other option is mono blocks and they will take even more room up!

[Scolex]

IMO yes and below explains why.
I have Klipsch ProMedia Ultra 5.1 which is one of if not the best PC speaker set ever produced and it wouldn't cut it as a theater setup, it just doesn't have enough deep bass extension to fill a large room.
Granted I am more than pleased with it for music when in the computer room but it doesn't hold a candle to my rather modest HT audio system.

Curious what kind of budget are we talking about here? Might have suggestions as I recently did quite a bit of research. Obviously you don't have to answer.

[glynor]

I have Klipsch ProMedia Ultra 5.1

The Klipsch ProMedia Ultra little bookshelf speakers are quite nice for what they are.  They had decent frequency response for little speakers of that size and price.  Nothing stupendous, but not too bad all things considered.

If you replace the Sub with something "real" and get an external amp, they're quite nice.  I'm using them at home in my Living Room.  After the crappy amp in the system went out for the second time, I replaced the sub with a separate, replaced the front mains with some real speakers (though nothing that amazing), and I'm eventually going to use the extra two speakers for front highs or for rear surrounds in a 7.1 setup (but I'll need a bigger room to justify that).

I've even replaced the original crap amp in the old Klipsch sub/amp system from the set with a Dayton and I'm using it on my "gaming/server" PC in the basement man-cave.  Works great there!

[nwboater]

I'm very happily using a receiverless setup in our 5.1 home theater. Our soundcard outputs go straight to our external power amplifiers. Our Klipschorns and Danley DTS-10 sub love this as do we.

The only complication for us is not having the ability to send an external input (VCR or whatever) to the PC. MC15 can't handle it. Rumor has it they may be working on that piece of the puzzle. I and many others sure do hope so!

Others are correct that there's no way to squeeze decent power amps into an HTPC.

As someone else asked it would be helpful to share your budget for this. That way responses can be much more tailored to your situation.

Rod