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[TheFNEffecT]

I have a recon 3d fata1ty that was like 20 bucks at a best buy clearance. It has some neat features like voice manipulation, nice bass response and whatnot.

I primarily use it for my mic and speakers. My Sennheisers go in directly to my onboard sound and have a more pure sound that works well with the open back

 

[Engell]

Anyone using the new Sound BlasterX G5?

I had the soundblaster E5(basically the same) for two days, then I returned it. It removed the noise that my onboard made, but it did a terrible job with the audio, i couldnt make it reproduce the audio correctly, even when all their shitty enhancements was turned off and set to do direct playback. It got easily beaten by my onboard in regards to music reproduction, i even did measurements..

This is just the audio output looped back to line in. The micro IDSD is not in this picture but it looks 100% like the original audio, but damn well should at that price.

 

[Mad1723]

Xonar Essence STX (PCI-E) here paired with a set of AKG K7xx and Corsair SP2500. The onboard sound would not do these puppies justice in any way. Might go DAC at some point, but the fact I can switch my output on the fly with XonarSwitch is pretty awesome

 

[diffusionx]

I remember when I built my first PC, the onboard audio was so bad I had no choice but to get a soundcard. It was shocking, really.

So yea, I am still a soundcard user.

 

[crazepharmacist]

My hyper x cloud 2 headphones have a built in usb sound card. I just know Virtual 7.1 surround sounds much better on it than my Xonar DG, which sounded tinny and full of reverb. I wonder if higher quality sound cards have better virtual surround sound or HyperX did some kind of engineering magic to make it sound so good and realistic

 

[RipperGrim]

I use a Xonar DG sound card with headphones for my PC and it's pretty damn good for the price, a massive step up from onboard sound.

 

[kuroshiki]

Onboard sound has improved dramatically ever since intel introduced HD codec in 04 and microsoft introduced XP.

These days a lot of dedicated soundcard functions also can be emulated without performance hit. My personal favorite is Dell WaveAudio.

In short, there is a lot less reason to spend money on dedicated soundcard compare to 10 years ago.

 

[Woorloog]

I have a Xonar something soundcard, as my mobo's soundcard is busted or something, a lot of static and such.
Didn't feel like taking things apart and returning the mobo as it works fine otherwise.

 

[nkarafo]

I'm still using an Audigy 2 ZS myself. I remember another thread about this here where a lot of people simply ditched sound cards in favor of on-board stuff. I would prefer to have something since there's some issues with static or noise from on-board sound.

I plan on building a new PC sometime by the end of the year and I'm ready to ditch my Audigy 2. I'm no audiophile, but I would like something a little better than on-board audio. I usually use headphones (not super high quality ones), but still use speakers once in a while. What's the simplest solution? I would like to at least match the audio quality I have with my current Audigy 2. Some examples on newegg or something would be great so I can get a feel for pricing.

Why do you feel like you have to ditch the Audigy 2 if you just want an equivalent?

 

[LQX]

Of all my components sounds cards seem to die on me the most or cause issues. I had two Asus Xonars die on me and for years before that I had to resort to using old drivers for my Soundblaster as Creative refused to properly update it. Bought a DAC and don't I think I will ever buy another sound card again especially with how far the audio on some motherboard have come.

 

[_Spr_Drnk]

USB M-Audio Fastrack 8R for my PC, but that's for my audio production needs. For games onboard would do me.

 

[_SAKY_]

Yep, ASUS Xonar DX. Need that surround sound.

 

[_SAKY_]

EDIT: double?

 

[Sanjay]

Why does all this shit cost so much?

 

[BPoole]

I have a Creative Soundblaster Z. I mainly bought it for more audio inputs. I have speakers, headphones for music, and a headset for gaming/Skype.

 

[Kiyoshi]

ASUS Xonar DG with Dolby Headphone, coupled with some decent headphones. Massive improvement over onboard sound.

 

[boybrushdRED]

I'm using Xonar DG for the headphone amp, and I'm a sucker for the virtual surround gimmick.

External DAC seems to be the better option because soundcards are inside the PC, and everything inside the PC has electrical interference which may degrade the sound quality.

 

[Samaritan]

I still use a dedicated sound card simply because my headset situation requires Dolby over TOSLink/Optical Audio for 5.1/7.1 and my integrated sound card just doesn't provide that.

 

[Inkwell]

Why do you feel like you have to ditch the Audigy 2 if you just want an equivalent?

Honestly, I just want something newer. I've had a few issues here and there, and it would be nice not having to worry about using custom drivers like I'm using now.

 

[justsomeguy]

I got a soundcard (Sound Blaster Z) for my most recent build a couple years ago because I only realized after the fact that my board didn't have the sound options that I wanted and there was no way to change that through software.

Installed it and got the options I wanted. The only problem is that now when running games, a buzz can be heard coming through the speakers. It's really annoying. I assume it's an interference problem from being so close to the GPU.

I don't really know what to do about that, though. :/

Make sure you have muted line in, microphone, etc. I had buzzing and muting line in got rid of it.

 

[Edvardelis]

ASUS Xonar DG with Dolby Headphone, coupled with some decent headphones. Massive improvement over onboard sound.

I had planned on going this route, but got a good deal on a Logitech G930.

 

[SirMossyBloke]

Not at all.

HDMI out to my 7.1 receiver through my video card gives me fantastic audio.

 

[AppleSeason]

I've been using my Audigy 4 Pro for like forever. Originally I bought it for the Dolby decoding and hooking the consoles to the computer so that I could use the 5.1 speakers with them, although it became a pain when I upgraded to vista / 7 and drivers sucked.

It saw life again when I changed to a new motherboard that did not have Dolby / DTS encoding and I could do it with the audigy. This is vital when you are hooking a PC to a Home Cinema amp.

Right now it is a bit abandoned, since I downgraded to stereo and I don't need 5.1 encoding, but I still use it from time to time to plug my guitar through the sound card's external dock.

PS: I bought it for 40€ on eBay. I still feel guilty about paying so little for something that costed around 300€.

 

[MadSexual]

I'm actually using two...

I got a ASUS Xonar DGX somewhat recently to try out the virtual surround with the nice headphones I already had. I've actually been pretty impressed. It's a nice feature to add for very little cost and it seems like a lot better quality than surround headphones. Surprisingly, it's even cut down on the ear fatigue I usually get from cans.

I also have an external sound processor, a Presonus Firestudio Mobile, for my studio audio work. It also drives my monitors for desktop stereo gaming.

 

[Gaogaogao]

only if onboard is broken or really bad

onboard sound seems to be getting way better on the good motherboards

 

[xrnzaaas]

I had an Audigy 4 in my previous PC (switched to a new one about a month ago). For the first time I don't have a separate audio card now.

 

[Zepp Twofist]

I recently replaced my Audigy 2 with a Asus Xonar U5. It was an upgrade in every single way, and I was surprised at how big the difference was. At this point I suspect my onboard would be better than the Audigy even.

 

[Rinさとり]

No since motherboards got HD audio i have not owned a single sound card. But back in the day i had them all

 

[marlowesghost]

External DAC seems to be the way to go

I use the sound blaster omni to drive my sennheiser headphones and my 5.1 setup. Im a big fan of the device, plus I can plug it into my laptop when I'm on the road.

 

[Lombax]

No, I use an external DAC - Schiit Modi 2

My Schiit stack is as follows:


Vali->headphones
Sys->speakers
Modi 2
PC->Wyrd

I'm Fulla Schiit at the office.

Also yeah external DAC is the way to go these days.

 

[Alex]

I got mine to drive headphones better, it was a pretty large increase in quality.

 

[Prophet Steve]

I have one, mostly for my microphone which had a lot of noise with my onboard audio. Entirely done with a cheap soundcard. I haven't really tried the differences with my headphone.

 

[Akronis]

I'm Fulla Schiit at the office.

Also yeah external DAC is the way to go these days.

My man.

 

[Mad Season]

for those that use the soundblaster z, do you crank the surround all the way up (all the way to the right)? if not, where is your sweet spot?

 

[Parsnip]

I use one, but this external dac business sounds interesting. Any good primers on that stuff out there that you guys would recommend?

 

[Älg]

Buying an expensive DAC is probably a waste of money if that's all it is. You're better off just buying a good amp, but most people probably don't even need that.

The only reason there is to buy a dedicated DAC is if you get a lot of noise from your on board one.

 

[Diablohead]

I had a soundcard in one of my early year 2000 pc's even though the onboard was probably good enough, I bought the card for £21 after a work discount... most likely because i wanted to buy something and it looked good at the time.

I think it did some cool things to midi music files, was a soundblaster.

 

[super-famicom]

I use one, but this external dac business sounds interesting. Any good primers on that stuff out there that you guys would recommend?

https://www.reddit.com/r/headphones/comments/15wunp/guide_dacs_and_amps/

Look into Fiio or Schiit products. Good entry level and up stuff from both companies.

I personally use a slightly upgraded version of : this, which you can read about here

 

[KHlover]

Xonar DGX. On-Board sound can't handle my DT 990 Pro.

 

[Parsnip]

https://www.reddit.com/r/headphones/comments/15wunp/guide_dacs_and_amps/

Look into Fiio or Schiit products. Good entry level and up stuff from both companies.

I personally use a slightly upgraded version of : this, which you can read about here

Thanks!

 

[Hypron]

Why does all this shit cost so much?

You can take a look at the O2 amplifer, it's an open source design so there's a bill of materials available that shows you exactly what all the components cost.

 

[Confusion Illusion]

I retired my Sound blaster xtreme gamer card a couple months ago after 8 years of use. The driver started to randomly stop working and I had reinstall it each time to get back sound. I got fed up with it and just switched my on board sound. I'm done with sound cards.

 

[Phinor]

I've used dedicated sound cards for a long time with one specific memory being Aureal Vortex 2 card that was pretty much literally a cheat in Counter-strike. Very popular cards in Finland back in the day.

These days I couldn't live without my X-FI. I need that optical in port to get sound out of consoles and optical in is a very rare feature on onboard cards. Some motherboards have those, but it's cheaper to buy a separate X-FI card at that point. All my consoles are plugged into the same monitor(s) my computer is plugged into so HDMI sound is completely out of the question due to sound quality, and if I plug my consoles directly into my speakers, I can't have PC sound on at the same time as console sound so that's not an option either. Plenty of console games I want to listen to podcast, watch a movie, follow a stream while playing so I need sound out of both consoles and PC at the same time.

SVM is also pretty useful for watching specific movies. Onboard sound cards have similar features (sound volume normalization) but all the ones I've tried just suck compared to what the Creative solution offers.

I dread the day my soundcard breaks. I'll just have to try and find another one with similar feature set which is getting harder and harder.

 

[roadrunn3r]

I have a RME 400 which I also use for gaming + two HS80 monitors. Works quite well, never had a problem with it.

 

[LucidMomentum]

I have an Aune T1 external USB DAC and Amp combo. I use an Amprex Orange Globe tube with it as well. Absolutely love it, but a Fiio external DAC and Amp combo will suit most people better as you can find ones that you can take with you when you travel.

 

[eternalthree]

Been using this for a long time, but recently built an itx skylake machine, and now i'm using onboard sound. next build will be matx again. i like sound cards.

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B000IBV8SE/?tag=neogaf0e-20

wish i had the headphones that go with it, but i hear they're super flimsy.

 

[leng jai]

Purely for gaming onboard sound is fine. Personally I use a comfy couch setup so it's HDMI straight from the video card to my receiver.

If you're using your PC for serious music listening then I would definitely invest in a DAC. I wouldn't spend too much though, definitely no more than a few hundred. Diminishing returns hits fast when it comes to DACs. Money is better spent elsewhere like amps/headphones/speakers if you want better sound.

 

[Polioliolio]

I have xonar or xifi or something. It was supposed to be a choice above the rest, but this fucking thing snaps, crackles and pops. I was blaming the speakers, but it's the damn sound card. Internet search reveals a lot of people have had these issues and there are no real solutions. It hasn't been bad since windows 10 update and reinstall, but it still does it at the end of sudden noises, like adjusting the sound volume slider.. ding!-crack

 

[Mattenth]

I've had the problem of most audio cards resulting in too low max volume.

 

[gabbo]

I've been looking into getting a SBZ, since this is my first build without a dedicated card, and I can hear the difference in quality, but my free spending money limits the ability to buy one