Best Audio Card?

[CHarrington]

I just bought some Sennheiser headphones and I'm looking to purchase a new audio card to compliment the Sennheiser's sound quality.

What's the best card out there, and how does it compare to the Turtle Beach card I hear so much about?

Thanks in advance .

 

[HardWarrior]

I went from soundstorm to an Audigy 2 ZS and have been very pleased with it. There are probably studio cards that sound better, but the probably cost a lot more too. :music:

 

[TheMasterofallFPSs]

As far as consumer level PC audio cards go, there is the Soundblaster or there is nothing. Audigy 2 ZS is the way to go.

 

[konakona]

if you play games all day and do nothing else, maybe audigy. otherwise your choices are as follows:

chaintech AV-710 (and YES, it does destory audigy for 2channel music if you know enough to set it up right ) $24shipped from newegg
m-audio revo $100ish used
EMU-1212 $199 from various retailers

i am not sure about the EMU card, but anything Envy24 based is better for movies as well, provided it has a good DAC and circuitry.

what kinda phones do you have? what matters more than the sound card is an amp. if it is anything higher than HD-580 you MUST have an amp to get a proper sound out of it. actually i am getting myself a piccolo DAC by AOS. a good place to do your research is www.head-fi.org

...and if you got all the $$$ in the world get Lynx2 and Bel Canto DAC to go with it

 

[chadomaly]

Just bought an Audigy2 zs platinum pro this weekend, really happy with it. basically using it as a receiver for all my stuff (tv, dvd, computer) through the gigaworks speakers. sounds great and is an alternative to an expensive HIFI home theater setup.

 

[konakona]

huge YMMV if you have the infamous HD-650!

if you somehow decide you must have audigy then make sure you use the kx drivers, many report this helps improve the inferior sound limited by the hardware.

Turtle Beach is better than audigy, but falls short of the three afformentioned cards.

here is a link, go read the amp and the source sections if you will

 

[dowxp]

Revolution 7.1 or Audiophile 2496 if you want to go hardcore and don't play games.

 

[konakona]

damn you and your 650... cant afford it >.< what cable are you using on it?
2496 has better digital out, revo has better analog... but the EMU1212 is simply better.

 

[dowxp]

standard cable. cannot justify another $100 for a cable. another difference is that 2496 doesn't really support the new gaming codecs (EAX2,3) and only has stereo IO with RCA connectors. (i've had both. it was annoying)

 

[konakona]

make your DIY cables! i had a local cable retailer to do the mod for $30ish... top notch Gepco stuff, coudlnt be happier there is a spare canare quadstar stuff lying around in my room but they are missing the original pin connectors

 

[SickBeast]

I listened to my buddie's Grado headphones hooked up to an M-Audio soundcard and they sounded MUCH nicer than anything I've heard come out of my SB Live soundcard. I would say go for the M-Audio card, it's about the same price as the Audigy2 and has much better music reproduction IMO.

 

[wetcat007]

nForce 2 board with a MCP-T southbridge lol

 

[Nebor]

Get the Audigy 2 ZS. For simple setup, good sound quality, built in DD and DTS decoding, and EAX 4. it's also the only card to support DVD-Audio playback. Other cards can't even handle 24bit\192khz sound!

I found this interesting:

if you somehow decide you must have audigy then make sure you use the kx drivers, many report this helps improve the inferior sound limited by the hardware.

How would drivers help improve inferior sound that's limited by the hardware? If it's limited by the hardware, you'd need to solder on some more capacitors or something.

The Audigy 2 ZS is a great consumer card, the top selling in it's segment. And most importantly, Creative knows what the customer wants, and works hard to provide it through their outstanding products, and their international technical support infrastructure.

 

[Brian48]

I tried the kx drivers on my SBLive. It's did improve the audio quality for music playback and I was very happy with it for awhile,...........until I started up a few games. Of the few games I tried, they sounded absolutely horrible. You can also kiss EAX goodbye with it as well.

If all you do is listen to music, use the kx drivers. Otherwise, stick to the Creative ones.

 

[konakona]

nebor, i am starting to suspect if you work for creative with your last comment about creative. probably bose and dell know what the customer wants, cuz they stuff sells so well to care-free mass. damn right it is a hardware issue; whacky resampling algorithm that couldnt be alleviated by software is what if it aint hardware limitation. care to elaborate?

people actually do replace some caps and opamps to improve sound. thats a good point you brought up there

i am sure your gigaworks are SOOOO great with that DD/DTS. while at it please name some of your favorite DVD-A titles pls?

Brian48: well, the guy didnt say he plays games so..

 

[Nebor]

Actually my gigaworks are not the best for movies. They lack any real power at all. They can't immerse you in a movie. Big dissappointment there. But that's just MM speakers.

They're pretty good for DVD-audio, I have 5 Bethoven DVD-As and a Shania Twain. Classical is really neat on DVD-A.

My question before was, how can KX drivers improve sound that is limited by poor hardware? It can't. Fortunately neither the Audigy's drivers or hardware need improvement, and the Audigy 3 should be shipping out to the reviewers in the next 3-4 months.

 

[konakona]

to each his own. i couldnt be happier with my hd-580/cd3000 combo.
whole 6 dvd-a's? wow. now thats a good reason to go out and grab an audigy. newsflash : DVD-A is losing it to SVCD, which itself suffers from lack of titles.

no, kx drivers dont solve hardware problems. what i am saying is audigy can never be as good as the 3 cards i have mentioned - a clear hardware limitation. yet gettin kx drivers may close the gap somewhat.
maybe they dont need any improvement cuz they are targeting different market segment, if thats what you meant. audigy is an ok all around product, i dont intend to put it down as a worthless POS - just trying to enlighten folks it aint all that and in terms of pure music reproduction it gets beaten by much cheaper alternatives, truth to be told. now, i am not sure which Sennheiser CHarrington has, but as long as its its one of upper class models, it will stomp all over your gigaworks in music for sure. a 'subtle' difference you may not notice with your multimedia speakers can be readily recognized by us headphone users


well i sure hope they get their acts straight and dont rush out another product that leaves nothing but dissapointment.

 

[Nebor]

My Gigaworks occasionally step aside for the use of my HD600s, RS85s, and Bose Triports.

 

[Nebor]

And I still flat out refuse to believe that that $20 Chaintech card offers better analog out quality than an Audigy 2. Please provide a link.

 

[Algere]

Consumer Level Soundcards

M-Audio Revolution 7.1(VIA Envy 24HT) = Best at music

Creative Labs Audigy 2 ZS = Best all around package.

 

[Nebor]

So can the Revo bypass kmixer for the analog outputs? Analog ASIO?

 

[Schadenfroh]

Originally posted by: Nebor
And I still flat out refuse to believe that that $20 Chaintech card offers better analog out quality than an Audigy 2. Please provide a link.

the DACs alone on the audigy 2 zs cost 8 bucks for creative to buy from cirrus logic

 

[konakona]

do you have an amp to go with your phones tho? you sure thats not your audigy holding you back? maybe time for an upgradage! i am no big fan of triports btw.

so you havnt seen an AV-710 in action have you? did you know some actually successfully flash this card to function as prodigy 7.1 (i doubt you would argue audigy betters this one) it is not just the chaintech card; in fact, any envy24 card coupled with decent DAC and circuitry can eat audigy for lunch. dont assume it would do poorly just cuz its cheaper than audigy. hell, my dsp24 is untouchable by audigy. ok you can keep wondering. here are some links took me some time cuz the search function is down at head-fi and the AV-710 craze is an old news there..

Link1
Link2
Link3
Link4

a direct comparison is hard to find as audigy is generally frowned upon by audiophiles, most of them dont consider it as a valid candidate for music listening

 

[Algere]

Originally posted by: Nebor
So can the Revo bypass kmixer for the analog outputs? Analog ASIO?

Dunno what kmixer is but the Revo has ASIO in their latest drivers.

i.e. WinAmp with the ASIO plugin outputs sound to my analog only speakers.

 

[konakona]

you dont have to have ASIO to bypass kmixer, altho that is one of the ways to do it. another option would be kernel streaming.

i personally use otachan's ASIO plugin, convolver, SSRC resampler and advanced limiter. crossfeed is only used selectively.