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5.1 Sound Card Delivers 3 Streams of iTunes
An anonymous reader writes "How do you distribute simultaneous streams of DRM-protected iTunes from a single computer to multiple rooms of the house? Autonomic Controls demonstrated a unique solution at the recent Electronic House Expo (EHX). The company's Media Control Server EX software turns a PC with a 5.1 sound card into a three-zone music distribution server. (Add a second card for six outputs). At EHX, the solution was demonstrated with a multiroom audio system from NuVo, whose keypads could be used to browse and select songs, playlists, genres, artists, etc. The Autonomic software merges WMA and iTunes files into a single library for easy access." I have mixed feelings about this: on one hand, this is a really clever idea and a cool hack. On the other hand, the fact that DRM makes something like this necessary is truly infuriating.
Whatever happened to the right tool for the right job? Screw iTunes and buy DRM-free music from Amazon.
I'm still waiting for a good solution to provide audio throughout my house.
I've always loved the fact that through Yahoo Music (or Rhapsody) you can access any music you'd like via subscription. Greatest Party Toy ever!
I've purchased many toys to try to accomplish bringing this to my livingroom, and my results have been varied. I purchased the D-Link DSM320 Media Lounge. This wireless player hooked up to a UPNP server on my computer and played music (and video) in my livingroom, with TV-Remote browsing. The problem: It only integrated with my personal library. No full 2-million track searching. This of course was a problem, because at parties, I want people to take full advantage of the 2 million tracks available (and I don't want to add justin timberlake to my personal library, just because people at a party want to hear him).
I've tried a sansa connect (mp3 player). This was the best solution yet, although it was a small mp3 player, it connects via wireless network and allows the full catalog search. Yahoo Music has just announced they're closing and the Sansa Connect no longer will offer this functionality.
I've tried Napster's Media Center Plugin- but it crashes regularly.
I know that Tivo now offers functionality with Rhapsody- but I don't have cable, and I don't want to pay Tivo's subscription (not to mention high price for hardware I won't use).
And of course there's Sonos- which has EXACTLY what I want, for about 4 times a reasonable price.
I've chronicaled my adventures for anybody looking to learn from my mistakes: Digital Wireless Audio Age , and my review of the DSM-320 and 520.
Belief? Hope? Preference?The Existential Vortex
If I recall some old experimentations, this is quite feasible technically with my good old SBLive and ALSA, by breaking out the outputs as different sound cards in your .asoundrc. Anybody got details?
:)
And yes, I realize having something "techically feasible" is completely different from "work like a charm with the click of a button"
Misleading titles? Inflammatory blurbs? Keep in mind that Slashdot is a tabloid.
The sound chips for those rear 5.1 outputs are often lower quality than the front on many 5.1 sound cards. Something to think about.
Even those who arrange and design shrubberies are under considerable economic stress at this period in history.
How do you distribute simultaneous streams of DRM-protected iTunes from a single computer to multiple rooms of the house?
Easy, download the MP3s from Kazaa or rip them from CD. The hard question is, why in Turing's name would anybody download something with DRM? That's just insane!
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
Form DRM Music no one has ever hacked a sound card Bypassing the Digial to Audio Conversion and redirect the Uncompressed Digital Signal to a storage medium.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
As much as I hate DRM, it's presence in this case does not "necessitate" this application in any way.
Fairplay allows up to 5 computers to share the same account key. As for larger households, well you asked for headaches anyway if you as parents have more than 4 kids who are the age most really get into music. I doubt you'll even notice one more.
So it's not about DRM created necessity, it's about enabling an alternative to duplicating a library up to 5 times and paying for up to 5 times the storage and 5 times the power to keep that storage active. I personally am happy this choice is open to consumers.
VLC FOR MAC IS DYING! IF YOU DEVELOP, PLEASE SAVE IT!!
So.... whatever happened to the iPod? You listened to music, and it worked in every room in your house!! Plus, if I walked into a room where someone else was - I could still listen to my music, while they listened to theirs. Plus - extra special bonus - it actually worked outside the house.
This sure looks like a solution in search of a problem to me.....
Oddly I had two Airport Express units in different parts of my flat at one stage when living with an ex. I was able to logon to my account on an Apple iBook stream to one of them. Then logon to a different account and then stram to a different airport express unit. No issues. I shared the same location on iTunes without any problems. Reckon you could do it with more and easily switch between users.
Stop violating other people's rights and this won't be a problem.
There is no "-1 offended" or "-1 you don't agree with me" mod options for a reason.
Just RTFA and I am pretty damn certain 3 modded xboxes on the same network as a PC downloading music through bittorrent could do the same thing for a lot less money. Why buy expensive equipment just to make something work with purchased DRM'd music?
Comment removed based on user account deletion
It's all about combining your various music file collections into one virtual collection. This device is cool because it can merge all your disparate collections into one big playlist, regardless of format (and regardless of whether some of the content is DRM'd).
BTW, it is *not* helpful to keep blaming DRM for everything and anything. It only dilutes the argument against DRM when your claims are false, giving ammunition to its defenders.
The more you regulate a company, the worse its products become.
Now I can be just like Lieutenant Commander Data and listen to six different classical compositions at once loud enough to rattle a star ships windows! Now I just need to make a pun about rattling a star ships windows while running Linux.
We are the Borg...
I though that 5.1 surround only had 5 channels (Front L & R + Rear L & R + centre), so how does this produce three stereo channels?
simon
I was under the impression that iTunes allowed music sharing to other Macs and PCs with iTunes. Shouldn't you just be able to use that? and, if so, is the DRM really hurting that much?
Add a third card for nine outputs
Add a fourth card for twelve outputs !
Installing the analog wiring in all my rooms would cost me thousands of dollars. This seems like a very expensive solution to a problem that doesn't impact most people. It might make sense if you run a museum or something, with independent audio pumped into each room - but that's it. And it seems quite fragile to run - too many parts.
I have setup VLC to stream music to multiple computers in the house. It has been a while but I used the http transport method, however I believe they had multicast options too. I do remember it taking a little effort to put together a playlist. It was functional, but not user friendly.
The best way I've found is to use a small FM exciter. The Ramsey FM25B works great!
http://www.ramseyelectronics.com/cgi-bin/commerce.exe?preadd=action&key=FM25B
You will have to assemble it yourself but if you've done any soldering it should only take 5-7 hours. Tune it to an open frequency,
set your output levels and listen on any FM receiver.
I wired it with an input selector to my pc and satellite receiver but you can also connect it directly to your portable mp3 player.
I typically use WinAmp to play from my library or something from ShoutCast.
If you live in a very congested area (apartments) you need to be careful to not step on any commercial broadcasters.
Today, after the woot-off, woot.com is offering a Razer Barracuda AC-1 Sound Card. As in NOT CREATIVE ;) 55$ for it's a good deal.
Click on the picture to see how they break out that massive weird looking port.
I dont work for them. I just go rabid over bags of crap.
I have a similar dilema for my home audio solution. I have a 5.1 PCI sound card (Realtek chip) and a 5.1 cinema amp. I would like to drive two different sets of speakers in different locations from my Windows XP server (I would prefer to stick with Media Player or Winamp). I want to be able to select in software which speaker sets are enabled and their relative volumes. At the moment I only have one set of speakers installed and use optical digital from the sound card ot the amp. I am prepared to use the analogue coenctions for ease.
Any suggestions for windows XP free software?
I have mixed feelings about this: on one hand, this is a really clever idea and a cool hack. On the other hand, the fact that DRM makes something like this necessary is truly infuriating.
I don't do DRM due to the incompatibility. It's up to the distributor to figure out how to provide a product the public will buy. DRM only works because enough people buy it. Otherwise DRM would be dead long ago.
Vote with your wallet. You vote counts. Quit voting against me. Down with DRM.
The truth shall set you free!
Why is all of this necessary. I just use a damn splitter.
[blockquote]Installing the analog wiring in all my rooms would cost me thousands of dollars.[/blockquote] These contractors you're hiring, they're getting paid by the hour, yeah?
What the hell are you talking about? I don't know where you shop, but last I checked you could get about 700,000 feet of suitable analog wiring (be it RCA, speaker wire or 3.5mm jacks) -- enough to wire my entire house, anyway -- for well under $100 at Walmart. And, you know, I'm talking wire of suitable quality as to not be any worse than the DSPs on this soundcard.
Got an attic? Basement?
Whale
Why do you need to activate fairplay accounts?
How can you possibly be having problems playing MP3s on multiple computers?
Or, just buy a Gigaport AG. It's $100 and does 4 simultaneous stereo streams. You can use any audio playing program that has ASIO support, and any music format that it can understand.
Not to let my inner fanboi take over, but I've been using multiple AirPort Express to do wireless whole-house audio for some time with great success. You don't even have to use iTunes to deliver the audio. I use Airfoil from Rogue Amoeba software. It is an elegant solution and one that can be done at a reasonable cost.
You can also burn the DRM music to CD in iTunes and then rip it into any format you want. It's a pain, but well worth doing. Not that I condone such behavior...
What's the necessity of that (cool) hack? Why not just put 3 5.1 soundcards in a single machine, and pump their audio into 3 rooms, with 5.1 sound in each room? Why not put 5 5.1 soundcards, or more if the machine's got that many PCI and USB slots? Why not mix and match 5.1 and 7.1, cards?
Seems to me that while their hack is a superior hack, the superior sound quality and lower complexity hack is just using multiple soundcards in the "single" host that DRM forces one to use.
Of course, the idea that I bought some music that DRM prohibits me from playing in two rooms of my own apartment while I'm alone is a gross violation of my rights, merely to perpetuate the profit of the record company, without any defensible basis whatsoever. Since they've wiped out the boundary between actual rights and arbitrary privileges they grab, of course people will exploit any chance to push back at their flimsy artificial copyright "rights". They're going to lose this war of disrespect permanently, just as they've been losing every battle all along.
--
make install -not war
I'm quite sure it isn't a novel idea but I haven't seen much info about it on the internets. A few of my friends and I got together last year to set up a similar system where we live. We use a plain old Soundblaster Live! Value card hooked up to four different zones (bathrooms). It's connected through a network drive to our music server and has a simple web interface to control the music in each zone. The web interface just controls four different instances of mplayer with the appropriate flags for rerouting the audio to the single channels. I'm sure the sound quality isn't great, but it's perfect if you like to air guitar with Dragonforce in the shower.
We'll probably write up a guide on how to do it if we ever get slightly less lazy. It's really simple if you don't get hung up by Linux's sound support. But yeah, lazy.
You gotta find first gear in your giant robot car
When I read the title, I thought "bah, computers have gone downhill if playing 3 streams simultaneously has become Slashdot-worthy. I could play 5 mp3 at the same time in BeOS back in a Pentium II 300"... And then I read the blurb and realized it was about DRM. Man, things have *really* gone downhill.
The filesystem is the package manager
Ok here goes: It's like if you were to buy a car that only let's you drive on certain days of the week, to certain place, at certain times. And somebody made a box that would let you know automatically when you have permission to use the car, and help you plan your route so that you can get where you want to go under those restrictions.
Which you have to admit would be very convenient if you lived in that asinine fucking world.
expandfairuse.org
Why not throw a few Aiport Expresses about the place? You can play music through them simultaneously with iTunes for that multi-room audio experience.
That's way too complicated. I just play the music really loud until the neighbors complain, then back it off a bit.
What?
The music industry said "we'll charge less, but you'll get less" and millions of people happily went along with it.
[Fuck Beta]
o0t!
You don't even need to do that. Just burn your tracks to CD-RW and rip them again. You even keep the ID3 tags.
That would be bad.
I for one, welcome our glitter spandex endowed overlords and brought a marshmallow stick with me just in case this DRM thing blows up in our faces.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
..as music it would be interesting.
Imagine if every time you cooked a meal in your house you had to pay the recipe owner a royalty..
There would be two or three restaurants in the country and you'd eat there only. Every time you bought a frying pad you'd need to pay a fee to a McDonalds. Buy uncooked food that could be the basis for a meal that *might* infringe McDonalds and you'd pay a fee.
No sharing burgers with your friend...
There would be twenty or thirty "top" meals of the week. If you went out to eat you'd need to eat one of the top meals.
French fries would cost $15.
I'll just keep my couple hundred gigs of non-DRM music files on my server and stream then to the 360 in the living room or wherever else I like.
Except if you are not in US, then you are screwed. Apple doesn't even "offer" ability to buy non-DRM, so they are out. Amazon.com is for US only too. Essentially, you get screwed over up here in Canakistan. Instead of having DRM-free, they want to introduce a tax on all network connections so Britney can have more money as reported here before. http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/01/28/2043259
Where can I buy legal DRM-free online music in Canada? Yes, RIAA and similar, some people want to pay for good, DRM-free music for their non-iPod "iPods" (aka. mp3 players) and similar devices.
Yeah, I really don't want to run speaker wire all over my house, nor do I really care about broadcasting my music from some central source. The kind of solution I would find attractive is just something like a plain old amplifier that reads MP3 via a USB input, and that can manage MP3 music reasonably well (i.e., has the ability to select playlists, or build a playlist by searches on the fly). Right now, I'd like a reasonably compact stereo I could put in my bedroom that will play from a USB stick or USB magnetic drive. Is there such an appliance out there?
It seems to me that there would be a significant market for all kinds of USB-interfaced audio devices that could fill the niches that used to be occuppied by everything from boom boxes to living room stereos. Why do I have to have a computer to play my music at all?
Right now, there's only 2 ways I can listen to my music: either sit by my computer (which pipes the music to a home-theater quality receiver via an optical out), or tediously load it onto my MP3 player (not an iPod). Why is this so fricking primitive and complicated at the same time?
Great men are almost always bad men--Lord Acton's Corollary
On the other hand, the fact that DRM makes something like this necessary is truly infuriating.
It's convenient because you can buy one computer and one sound card and have music in three rooms, instead of buying multiple computers or really expensive Sonos appliances.
-mkb
impeach who? on what charge?
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
The DRM'd streams go to analog outputs, yes?
Get some 1970's technology (a couple of old stereos) and route the output of the sound card to the stereos, which route that to multiple pairs of speakers placed about the house.
I'm certain that the components can be had for cheap at a thrift store.
Just like with 'hard copies' of music, you are limited to playing back digital music (DRM or not) only in places where you have the proper equipment. Just like with any of those 'legacy' formats, they are useless without some sort of playback device, which for digital music is a computer, ipod, zune, etc.
If I buy a CD, when I want to listen to it in another room, I have to take the CD to that room and put in the CD player. Just because I have a CD in the stereo in my bedroom doesn't mean I can listen to it when I am in the kitchen, or the family room. Why would I be able to listen to an MP3 in the livingroom if my playback equipment is in the bedroom?
If I want to listen to an MP3 or iTunes download away from the computer it is currently located on, I can copy it to my ipod, connect the ipod to my receiver, and I am good to go. Or I can copy the song to another computer in another room (iTunes DRM allows you to authorize 5 computers). I can burn that music to a CD and play it in any cd player, anywhere. I can stream it to a wii or a xbox using freely available software.
Hear! Hear!
I'm glad to see someone else with a decent head on his shoulders.
"Wireless audio" this and "digital transmission" that... 99% of the time, a setup like yours does the job more than adequately.
"On the other hand, the fact that DRM makes something like this necessary is truly infuriating."
DRM has nothing at all to do with this. If you want to the same stream in three different rooms, it doesn't make a lick of difference if the music is hindered with DRM. Get your head out of your ass, CmdrTaco.
Access your iTunes library, and get video too! I was skeptical at first, but this little box is really cool.
Quick rundown of The Feature List to pique your interest:
Plays and transcodes on the fly (at any bitrate) to:
More Geeky Specs (an impressive list!)
I'm not affiliated with Jinzora in any way, it's just a software package that blows my socks off. And, it runs on Linux. Did I mention it's GPL'd? Oh, yeah, and it streams video, too.
If I mod you up, it doesn't necessarily mean I agree with what you've said, sorry.
Does the base channel sound like the other audio channels?
This can be done much more cheaply, of course.
1. Save all music in a music folder.
2. Use a player that can handle the audio files you use. (I've been satisfied using Audacious for a while now.) Or convert DRM to non-DRM formats, using the analog hole as the last resort.
3. Use qjackctl to send the output of different players/instances to specific 5.1 channels (to direct a stereo mix to front LR, one to rear LR, and I assume they're combining the center and low frequency channel.)
4. Run a stereo cable from the appropriate soundcard output to speaker inputs in the room needed.
OR, you could shell out the $ for a this software, a "NuVo Grand Concerto or Essentia E6G multiroom audio system", and don't forget your Windows license and the licenses for your music.
Your choice.
I've owned mp3 players that could take thumb drives (mine was kinda shitty but there are better ones). You could probably pick up some of them and a few old ghetto blasters with mic inputs (garage sales? ebay?) and basically have what you want. I know it's not as slick as an all in one unit but you could super glue the mp3 player to the cassette doors since you probably won't use them anymore. I use this kind of a setup as my main computer speakers and it works ok.
From the Kx Audio Drivers FAQ
These issues pertain to all Creative cards, but not to the E-mu APS and some Audigy2 Platinum Ex cards. Creative audio cards based on the EMU10kX audio DSP require a DAC (Digital to Analog Converter) in order to produce analog output. In general, this task is typically performed by either AC97 Codecs or I2S Codecs.
As a rule, Creative audio cards use the AC97 Codec for Front and Center/Subwoofer outputs, and I2S Codec for Rear output. The AC97 Codec is also used as an ADC (Analog to Digital Converter) and, thus, is responsible for all on-board analog inputs. (Note that LiveDrives and other DaughterBoard cards use different schemes).
The AC97 Codecs used in SBLive! cards are rather noisy devices (when compared to I2S Codecs), and this leads to some quality problems. As a rule, SBLive Rear outputs have much better Signal To Noise Ratio (SNR), Total Harmonic Distortion (THD) and Channel Separation (acs) since they use the I2S Codec. So, if you want to get better sound quality for music playback it is recommended that you plug your speakers into the 'Rear Out' and enable the 'Swap Front and Rear' kX Mixer option (the swap is enabled by default).
The Audigy and Audigy2 cards use both AC97 and I2S Codecs for Front output and this theoretically gives you rather good Front quality. But nevertheless, the AC97 Codec causes some distortion and thus the same procedure is recommended for use with Audigy / Audigy2 cards as well.
Certain Audigy2 Platinum Ex cards lack AC97 codec and thus don't require Front and Rear outputs to be swapped.
Of course, the above should be considered as a recommendation only.If I mod you up, it doesn't necessarily mean I agree with what you've said, sorry.
1. Open Disk Utility (Applications/Utilities)
2. Press "New Image"
3. Change the "Size" setting to 660MB (CD-ROM 80 min)
4. Name the file in the "Save As" box, and
5. Press "Create".
Built into every Mac for the past half-decade.
...I never really thought of my apartment as small. But here I am going "I don't see what the big deal is, my computer's 7.1 speakers already fill my whole place with music..."
:P I think this sounds like a neat solution, though I don't care about iTunes at all.
j/k j/k I know the difference.
Friend: "The NIC is misconfigured..." Me: "No prob, I'll just telnet in and fix it." *Silence*
Apple's iTunes let you share your playlist to several computers. This solution is completely unnecessary. Keep in mind DRM only came about because you'd rather steal media than buy it.
You can get them from ebay, half.com, used record stores, everywhere. I never pay more than 9.99 for a CD, which is what a DRM crippled album at a poor bit rate costs at iTMS.
You can rip them at any quality for any device, resell them,and you aren't hosed if your hard drive dies.
Meanwhile, I still can't play an mp3 on my 5-month-old Vista machine without frequent sound glitches.
It's just a shame you can't share your playlist with friends.
Keep in mind DRM only came about because you'd rather steal media than buy it.
I own 1200+ original CDs. At an average of 10 tracks per CD, when you've downloaded a paid for 12000+ iTunes tracks, you and I can then talk on the same level about putting money into the music industry.
Please do not be blinded by your love for Apple - someone who hates DRM and iTunes is not automatically a music thief.
Gentoo Linux - another day, another USE flag.
They work under Linux as USB speakers, so I've got a MySQL DB of my MP3s and the music queue, a Apache/PHP front end to queue up the songs, and I use a shell script and mpg321 to take the tracks from the queues and play them. And if nothing is queued up, I've got a semi-random music selector program to keep the sounds coming - if you punt a song in the Web Gui, it gets played less often.
Cost for a 3 FM channel system? Under $150 for the hardware, and half a day's coding.
Anyone with a bit of programming/scripting skill can do this with a Linux box. The NuVo gear is mostly just an extreme remote control, and they've been selling those for years (they're quite nice).
Splitting a 5.1 sound card into 3 stereo streams is nothing special, as that's how the outputs present themselves in the first place. The 5.1 is merely one interpretation of six outputs. In fact when you're playing a game that outputs 5.1, the game engine itself may refer to sounds in 1.5D/2D space, but the sound engine processes and mixes it all down to 6 plain old mono streams.
(from the article) "There is no other company that can do multiple-output iTunes"
Simple: give Apple a ton of money and ask them nice. Or skip iTunes entirely and use a non-crippled player and format. Any sound daemon worth its compilation time should be able to route three different sound players to their own output jacks... piece of cake! The fact that iTunes does not support that operation by default is a design limitation, not a technical one.
-Billco, Fnarg.com
Just one stream away from Zaireeka!
Get a Sonos and get better sound, open formats and 32 zones.
I guess I am just smarter than you. I can stream my iTunes bought songs AND CD bought songs to my friends and to other rooms (Which the the guy who posted is infuriated about. The article is not about streaming to friends or over the 'net. But you failed to understand that too.)
And if you serious bought $12,000 worth of DRM protected music AND you dislike DRM, your simply a fool. But I think you are exaggerating.
And if one of those friends says "Ooh, I like that track, can I borrow a copy?", what happens then Mr "Smarter than me"? I can just run upstairs to my study, fetch the CD off of a shelf and say "Here you go then."
And if you serious bought $12,000 worth of DRM protected music AND you dislike DRM, your simply a fool. But I think you are exaggerating.
It's a shame you're not smart enough to read my comment fully before acting on gut reaction, isn't it? Because had you read my comment, you would have seen that I own 1200 CDs (and not one godeforesaken iTunes track) which roughly equates to 12000 tracks of music (at say an average of 10 tracks per CD.
Therefore my point was that an iTunes user who has paid for and downloaded 12000+ tracks from there can then talk to me at an equivalent level about supporting the music industry on the basis he/she is getting a bit closer to the money I myself have spent on legal music.
Like I said in another post, do not equate someone who hates DRM and iTunes to someone who does not pay for and enjoy music. If anything, because I have the patience to sit down and thoroughly enjoy an album or two from start to finish, rather than mess about with playlists and compilations, it probably makes me a better listener of music.
Gentoo Linux - another day, another USE flag.
02 - A lot of music fans are happy to go and hunt down CDs at the cheapest prices possible which ultimately means it costs less for a CD than it does buying the tracks individually on iTunes. Get used to it.
03 - A lot of music fans prefer to buy their music on CD (even vinyl) to get what they believe is the best reproduction of that music on their hifi equipment rather than paying for lossy downloads. Get used to it.
04 - A lot of music fans find CDs excellent value for money. This is because they are discerning people who may break the law occasionally by downloading an album from BitTorrent or Usenet but ultimately buy the album if it is good. This means they never buy a bad CD meaning they are very pleased with CDs as a product and are more likely to go buy even more of them. Get used to it.
05 - Not all albums have only one or two good tracks on them. If you consider this justification for buying music track-by-track then knock yourselves out. However, by diligent selection, it is entirely possible to find wholly excellent albums that will keep you listening from start to finish. Get used to it.
06 - A lot of music fans are not politicians. If Sony, EMI or one of the big record companies release a good album, they will go buy it and enjoy it. They will possibly also go check out the product of small independent labels. If they are kept satisfied by good music and enough of it, they really don't care who marketed it. Get used to it.
07 - A lot of music fans feel they get more for their money by getting a plastic case, disk and some sleevenotes to read on the toilet rather than downloading it. Get used to it.
08 - A lot of music fans do own iPods and non-proprietary players in order to play the music they themselves have ripped from their own collections as a matter of portability and convenience and never once go anywhere near iTunes. Get used to it.
09 - A lot of CD-buying music fans hate music thieves because the former end up subsidising the latter by virtue of what they buy. Get used to it.
10 - By virtue of being a CD-buying music fan, it is perfectly possible to be an honest user of music whilst hating DRM and DRM-peddlars like Apple and iTunes. Get used to it.
Gentoo Linux - another day, another USE flag.
Hrm, not sure. ALSA scares me. I kinda' like pulseAudio because I haven't tried to set it up yet. Swap your cables at the sound card. Plug the rear in to the front and the front to the rear. :)
If I mod you up, it doesn't necessarily mean I agree with what you've said, sorry.
You'll not be able to find the minimum gauge wire you'll need (probably 16, maybe 14) for under $100. I just ran a 9.1 surround setup in my studio apartment; for a approx. 15' x 10' corner, it took me around 200 feet of wire or so and each spool of 16 AWG was somewhere around $40-$45 retail from WallyWorld and RadioShack. If you value your equipment, you'll use at least an 18 AWG for any run over, say, 20 feet.
If I mod you up, it doesn't necessarily mean I agree with what you've said, sorry.
I'm amazed no one has mentioned this, but when Intel defined the HD Audio specification in 2004 (used in most new computers sold today) it included an ability called Jack Retasking. This allows any jack to function as anything, including a second or third stereo output, or even additional microphones. The problem is hardware manufacturers still don't implement the entire specification, even though the specification is part of Vista's new audio architecture called UAA (also to be included in XP SP3).
IMHO, fully implementing HD Audio would be the greatest audio enhancement for multimedia and home theater PCs since their conception.