Can't get 5.1 Surround out of my Maximus IX Hero

[bfollowell]

OK, I'll freely admit that I have no experience with onboard sound. I've had a discrete sound card in every computer I've build since 1993. I say that to clarify that I'm probably doing something really stupid or missing something really obvious.

Anyway, even though I have all five of my audio cables correctly and firmly connected to my motherboard, all I seem to be able to get is Stereo, 2.0 sound. I don't even see a spot where I can change speaker configurations from 2.0 to 4.1 to 5.1, etc., let alone test the different configurations like I'm used to seeing in the Creative sound control app and like I've seen in videos for earlier versions of the Realtek software.

Like I typically do, I didn't even open the driver disc that came with my board. I'd already downloaded all of the appropriate drivers from the hardware manufacturer sites and installed the latest drivers from there. The only things that I seem to have, control panel-wise for the ROG SupremeFX Realtek S1220, is Sonic Studio III and Sonic Radar III. Am I missing something? I've been wandering around in Sonic Studio III looking for what I need, but, at least for me, there just isn't anything there. It really seems as if this control panel is missing half of what I need or that I'm just missing the correct control panel software altogether.

Any ideas?

Thanks.

[Chino]

Open the SupremeFX control panel and there should be an option called Speaker Configuration.

[bfollowell]

There is no SupremeFX Control Panel, at least that I can find anywhere. It wasn't installed when I installed the latest Realtek audio driver from the Asus support page. All I have, audio related, are Sonic Studio 3 and Sonic Radar 3, and neither of those have any sort of speaker configuration options.

Is there any special place I may go to look for the SupremeFX Control Panel, other than looking in my start menu for something starting with or including SupremeFX? Because it isn't there.

Thanks.

[Menthol]

There is no difference between how an add on sound card and on board sound works, there is typically 3 analog sound cables for 5 way speakers, front, back, center/sub, connect them the same way
If you go to Windows control panel, speakers, configure, you should be able to configure, 2 way - quadrophonic - 5.1 - 7.1 speaker systems the same way Chino said for the SupremeFX software

[Nate152]

At the bottom right of your screen click the arrow pointing up, then double click the speaker.

[bfollowell]

Menthol & Nate152, thanks to both of you. Yes, I had already figured out that I could change speaker configurations for my speakers, headphones, etc. using the regular Windows options. My problem was that I couldn't find the SupremeFX control panel that I was expecting to find. Thanks Nate152 for steering me to the speaker icon in the overflow area of the taskbar. It would never have occurred to me to double-click there to open the SupremeFX control panel. That got me what I wanted.

It still seems strange that there isn't a Start menu option for this, and that this is the only way to access this control panel though.

Still, this took care of me.

Thanks again guys.

[Chino]

Essentially, the SupremeFX control panel is like a revamp of the Realtek one. So they even share the same icon.

[bfollowell]

Well, mine doesn't have an icon, unless you mean the speaker icon in the overflow area at the right of the task bar, because I don't have a Start menu option for this. The only way I can get to it is by clicking on the speaker app in the overflow area. I can get to it though, and that's the main thing.

Should there be a Start menu group/option?

[Chino]

When you install the Realtek drivers from the ASUS website, you should see this icon in your system tray. Unfortunately, this is the only way to access the SupremeFX control panel.

[bfollowell]

OK, thanks for confirming Chino. It looks like everything installed correctly then. It's just that, after twenty years of Creative sound cards on Windows systems, I'm used to a separate control panel app with it's own icon in the Start menu so, when I didn't see that, I just assumed something hadn't installed correctly.

Either way, I'm planning on picking up a Creative Sound BlasterX AE-5 around Black Friday/Cyber Monday, so onboard sound is really just a temporary place holder anyway, just like the GTX 1050 I pulled out of another system until I get my Asus ROG Strix GeForce GTX 1080 OC edition 8GB 11Gbps GDDR5X in a week or so.

Thanks again for all of your help. I really appreciate it.