Question Connecting 5.1 speakers to a laptop

[tibsy]

Hi, I have a logitech z906 and z5500 5.1 systems. both the systems have built in control pods. The Z-5500 Digital's control module incorporates Dolby Digital, Dolby Pro Logic II, DTS, and DTS 96/24 processing. the problem is i dont have a way of connecting these to my laptop as they dont have a hdmi port. the z5500 has a 6 channel analog, spdif and coaxial. at the moment i can only use them as a 2.1 system. but how can i get a the 5.1 system to work as i only have a a single 3.5mm jack, usb type c , usb 3.0 and hdmi port on my laptop. the z5500 has a proper decoder built in which i have previously used with my pc before selling it and investing in a laptop due to moving to another place. i wanna be able to use all the effects of the z5500 or even the z906. it has stereo x2 and even dolby prologic 2 movie, music which used all the 5 speakers for listening to music or watching a movie.

Any idea how i can use these speakers and still obtain true 5,1 surround sound. NOT VIRTUAL. thank you

 

[dwd999]

Hi, I have a logitech z906 and z5500 5.1 systems. both the systems have built in control pods. The Z-5500 Digital's control module incorporates Dolby Digital, Dolby Pro Logic II, DTS, and DTS 96/24 processing. the problem is i dont have a way of connecting these to my laptop as they dont have a hdmi port. the z5500 has a 6 channel analog, spdif and coaxial. at the moment i can only use them as a 2.1 system. but how can i get a the 5.1 system to work as i only have a a single 3.5mm jack, usb type c , usb 3.0 and hdmi port on my laptop. the z5500 has a proper decoder built in which i have previously used with my pc before selling it and investing in a laptop due to moving to another place. i wanna be able to use all the effects of the z5500 or even the z906. it has stereo x2 and even dolby prologic 2 movie, music which used all the 5 speakers for listening to music or watching a movie.

Any idea how i can use these speakers and still obtain true 5,1 surround sound. NOT VIRTUAL. thank you

There is a wide selection of hdmi to optical or usb c to optical converters on amazon. You'll have to evaluate their claims and hope that whatever software is involved does what you want.

 

[hotaru.hino]

There are HDMI audio extractors that output optical and I did find one that outputs up to 7.1 analog (https://www.amazon.com/Optical-Converter-Analog-Surround-Decoder/dp/B07J49P1H2/)

 

[tibsy]

Would it actually work with my laptop. As ive stated, i only have a single 3.5mm jack, usb port and hdmi port. And would it give me true 5.1. I dont need it to decode but acutally act as a converter really because the logitech control pod astually decodes dolby but i cant directly connect to it as i dont have the ports

 

[hotaru.hino]

Would it actually work with my laptop. As ive stated, i only have a single 3.5mm jack, usb port and hdmi port. And would it give me true 5.1. I dont need it to decode but acutally act as a converter really because the logitech control pod astually decodes dolby but i cant directly connect to it as i dont have the ports

Well the product I linked claims to do this

Extract compressed digital Bitstream audio such as Dolby Digital, AC3 and DTS 5.1/7.1 embedded in HDMI feed and output through its optical audio output for further decoding by downstream device.