A8N5X - Fron Audio Ports

Hi all.
I am installing a A8N5X. I can't seem to figure out the pin diagrams for
the front audio. My front audio has headphones and a mic, and I have the end
of those cables and went to hook it up. However, the line of pins that the
documentation makes reference to, on mine it has two blue "dips/caps"
covering some pins. Is it suppose to be like that? If so, then I can only
see how to hook up the mic, not the headset jack. I hope that makes some
sense.

One more question. I am pretty sure this board does not have onboard
firewire. If I overlooked it, can you let me know?

Thanks in advance.

 

The jumper plugs on the FP_AUDIO header, maintain the continuity
of the audio signal that goes to the green (lime) connector on
the back of the computer. If you aren't using front panel audio,
the two jumper plugs must stay in place, if you want the green
line_out connector on the back of the computer to work.

There are a few different wire combinations available on computer
cases. There are non-Intel compliant setups and ones that are
Intel compliant.

Perhaps the worst setup consists of the following, L_EAR, R_EAR,
GND_EAR, MIC, MIC_PWR, MIC_GND. The problem with this setup, is
there are two ground wires. The FP_AUDIO header only has one
AGND pin on it, and unless the GND_EAR and the MIC_GND are joined
at the computer case, you may have a problem finding room for
the second ground wire. In a situation like that, all you can do
is connect one of the computer case GND wires to AGND, and hope
the grounds are common at the front panel audio.

To be Intel compatible, there should be two wires per channel
on the headphone jack. One is the signal from the AC97 codec,
and one is a return line that goes to the green lineout on the
back of the computer. The two wires take the place of one
jumper plug. When your headphones are removed from the headphone
jack, the two wires are connected together at the jack, and that
allows the lineout signal to reach the green jack on the back.
When the headphones are inserted, the connection between the two
wires per each channel is broken, and the insertion of the
headphones "mutes" the rear output. That is why there is all this
crazy jumper plug jazz - it is to allow a "muting" feature to be
enabled on the front audio headphone jack.

Now, down to the fun. First we wire up a cheap five wire front
audio. The assumption here, is there are no return lines from the
headphone jack, and there is only one GND wire coming from the
computer case. When you remove the two jumpers, and connect
R_EAR and L_EAR, the green lineout on the back of the computer
will stop working, because there is no path for the signal to
get to BLINE_OUT_R and BLINE_OUT_L

                    FP_AUDIO (non-Intel front panel)

MIC <------> MIC2    AGND <------> MIC GROUND
MICBIAS  <------>MICPWR    +5VA
R_EAR <---> Line out_R    BLINE_OUT_R
                    NC
L_EAR <---> Line out_L   BLINE_OUT_L

If, instead, we had a seven wire front panel audio, that would
be "Intel compatible", and the mute function for the rear lineout
would work. Again, the two jumpers are removed, and the seven
wires put in place. The rear lineout jack works whenever
the front headphones are unplugged.

                    FP_AUDIO (Intel front panel)

MIC <------> MIC2    AGND <------> MIC GROUND
MICBIAS  <------>MICPWR    +5VA
R_EAR <---> Line out_R    BLINE_OUT_R <---> R_EAR_RETURN
                    NC
L_EAR <---> Line out_L   BLINE_OUT_L <---> L_EAR_RETURN

So, all you have to do, is read the names on the wires that
come with your computer case, and try and line them up with
the goofy names I made up. If you'd said what the names on
the wires were, this would have been a lot easier.

The orientation of FP_AUDIO on your motherboard, is a 180 degree
rotation of the above diagram. Since I copied this from a previous
posting, I didn't waste time rotating the diagram.

Paul

 

Thanks so much for the information! I will give it a shot now.