I have a 5.1 creative sound system at the moment linked to my PC. I am thinking of buying another computer, but have only been able to find ways of using stereo speakers with two computers. Is it possible, and if so what is the cheapest way, to link two or more computers to one set of surround sound speakers?
Hm...as far as I know this would be impossible, unless you purchased wireless speakers and were able to patch in to the speakers on both PCs at once.
you could make a switch box that switched the speakers from one computer to another, it shouldnt be too hard, you'd need some DPDT switches, and stereo jack sockets plus soldering and wire cutting/equipment, all of which isnt too hard to find EDIT: I think youd need DPDT switches, let me have a think
Okay i've worked it out, you can make one, you'd need: 6 Stereo Mini Jack sockets 3 switches with 6 connections to 3 connections (6pole-3throw i think?!) Wire Solder Soldering iron Some sort of box if you want a case This is going to be long but here goes. Basically on a stereo Jack socket you have 3 pins, and each one corresponds to a different section on a stereo lead. You want each switch to change from one set to another so you'l want it to do this: Now you'd need three of these because on a 5.1 system you'd have connections for Front left and right, centre and subwoofer and reaf left and right. You'd have to get the layouts of the switches but if you in america head to somewhere like radioshack and i'm sure they'd help, in the UK try maplin. You'd have to solder the right wires to the right places and switch all three switches to change each connection over, you could do it with one switch but you'd need something like 18pole-3 throw.
As far as i know all you need to do is to use a cable that is 1 socket and has 2 plugs, so you plug the orange/green/black connectors into those sockets, plug 1 plug into 1 pc and 1 plug into the other pc for each one. The only problem being that this might mess it up if both are plugged in at once, you might hear both sounds or something, but it shouldn't damage anything anyway. All you do is get one of these http://www.dgu.se/produktbilder/3963.jpg and get a couple of male to male adapters and one female to female adapter that should work sorry if i confused u
you could do but you could end up getting signals from the other computer coming through, for the best sound you'd need to be able to completely cut off the computer you're not using. Plus with Y-Splitters you lose signal and the audio quality isnt as good.