Macintosh 5200/6200 Series: Stereo Input? (7/95)

Is it true that the Macintosh 5200 and 6200 series computers do not support stereo input? I have been unable to record a stereo system beep and have heard that the stereo input is converted to mono by the logic board.

The IC chip that controls sound input on the Macintosh 5200 and 6200 series computers has one input buffer and two output buffers. Because there is only one input buffer, there is only mono sound input. Output is always stereo.

You can, however, record CD stereo sound using MoviePlayer and QuickTime. With QuickTime, the sound data is read directly from the disk. The data is then converted to a QuickTime sound format. The data is not played back through the sound circuitry; it is read from the disk. Since the sound file is not played, sound does not go through the sound IC chip which would limit input to mono sound.

Additionally, CD discs play in stereo because sound is routed from the CD player to the sound output jack and bypasses the sound chip.  


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Published Date: Feb 19, 2012