Curiosity question for the SBLive cards

[Ruahrc]

I own an SBLive Value card. One of (actually the only one I know of) the "cost saving" features on it is that it lacks an SPDIF digital port on the card. I looked at the card the other day, and noticed something:

In the corner where the SPDIF port actually is supposed to go there is that white outline of where the plastic connector-receptor-thingy is supposed to go, and the words SPDIF IN printed somewhere near it. I presumed that on the non-value cards this is where the plastic dealywhop goes where you plug in your digital source. I also noticed that there were 2 metal headers to which the pins of the connector-receptor would have been soldered/attached, just like the regular analog inputs.

My question: if one was creative/handy enough with a solder or something- could one actually hook up a digital connection to these headers? As far as I can see all that is missing is the convienent port that you plug things into. The software drivers seem to support digital-in even on the Value, and I wouldn't think that Creative would actually go through the trouble of electrically disconnecting this digital port for Value cards. Perhaps one could even pull little jumper pins or IDE header pins from an old broken card or something and fashion himself his own connector for the digial port that is capable of recieving standard digital hookup cables?

Would it be safe to solder on the board? Or would the heat of the iron travel through the internal circutry, overheating and destroying the card?

Just a curious question- even though I might try it out someday.

Ruahrc

P.S. Now that I think about it- the 2 rows of pins on the side of the card used to attach the Live!Drive- are those direct-input pins as well? Or are they not just port pins arranged in 2 rows for the ribbon cable? (meaning if you could figure out which pin connected which type of device couldn't you use those as well?)

Did ANY of that make sense?

[darrell]

I cant say anything about the port working, but as for the soldering....

Years back i used to repair stereos and TVs. I used to replace parts like resistors and such by soldering them on the circuit board. I've never soldered computer equipment, but im sure its the same. Someone please correct me if im wrong. Anyway, what you want to do is if you put the port on there, put some solder on the pins of the port before you put it on the board. Then heat it up and then put it in the board without putting the soldering iron down on the board and heating it up. Hopefully the pins on the port will be hot enough to go thru there and hold in place. Another option is to use a small heatsink. Like i said its been a long time, but i think you can buy a small clip like thingy that you can clip onto the pin to draw some of the heat away. you could always try hooking up a FOP-32 to the pin to draw the heat off.. j/k. Im sure it would be safe as long as the circuits didnt get too hot though.

darrell

[JayMan]

As for the digital working, i dunno, i was thinking the same thing tho myself.

As for soldering, if people can modify their geforce/gf2 cards by moving a couple resistors, i don't think it'd be a problem soldering the SB card, also from experience at school in electronic i've never had any problem of o/heating a component mounted on a PCB. So if i had the needed socket i'd do it myself, but i don't, so i can't.

As for the 2rows of pins, as far as i know these are where the live-drive connects to, if you were desperate u could try soldering direct to the pins, BUT u can buy the live-drive as a stand alone unit to go with any SB LIVE card that it doesn't come standard with.

JayMan