Canterwood owners- how's the onboard sound?

[pelikan]

The Soundstorm on my nforce2 is pretty good, not great, but acceptable through my high-quality headphones. I'm switching to a Canterwood and the most important feature for me, after overclocking, is sound. It looks like the Canterwood board makers all use different sound. How's yours?

 

[akers]

My Chaintech 9CJS Zenith has absolutely great sound. It uses the Envy 24 chip. I hooked it up to a set of Klipsch 5.1 speakers and I promise you, it WORKS. A lot of reviews actually rate the Envy 24 better at music and DVD play than the Audigy 2.

It also overclocks pretty well. Right now I am running at 1004 Mhz fsb which puts my 2.6C at 3.26Ghz. I ran it up to a little over 3.3Ghz but chickened out. 3.26 is fast enough for me. Temps are also vey reasonable. Right now it is at 39 Celsius using a Vantec AeroFlow, room temp is 81 farenheit.

If music or DVD are important the Handigator remote control is a nice little extra. If you do digital photography or digital video then the CBox is also a handy asset.

Overall I am very satisfied the the Zenith. It is well worth the exta cost when you add in the all features that no one else gives you. I understand there is also a $50 rebate right now which makes it a steal in my book.

 

[OC-Freak]

Well for the most part they are great, especially those based on the via envy chiset.

I can only find one negative thing... The lack of EAX support, which you need a creative card for as it's their tech. EAX DO make a difference in many games....

Else their good or great, depending on which chipset they are based on.........

chaintech and albatron uses the great via envy chiset if I'm not wrong....

 

[sman789]

ic7 gets a bit crackley a few times

 

[pelikan]

Crackly sound! Oh no. I'm most interested in the IC7. I didn't want to hear that. Anyone else have crackly sound with the IC7?

 

[sman789]

http://forum.abit-usa.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=11811

 

[pelikan]

Originally posted by: sman789
http://forum.abit-usa.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=11811

Thanks.

 

[NicColt]

>can only find one negative thing... The lack of EAX support

The Asus A7V600, P4C800, P4P800 and the Intel D865GBF uses SoundMAX which has EAX, A3D and Virtual Theater which is the equivalent of Dolby Digital. So if games/DVD's and onboard sound is important then consider one of these or one that has SoundMAX.

About SoundMAX from Analog Devices
SoundMAX Digital Audio Systems from Analog Devices are premium-performance PC audio solutions that exceed the functionality of sound cards. Offering outstanding audio quality and state-of-the-art technologies for playback of music CDs, MP3/WMA files, DVD movie soundtracks, MIDI music, Internet audio and enhanced game audio, SoundMAX delivers the ultimate audio experience on today?s PCs for business professionals, audio enthusiasts, musicians and gamers.

SoundMAX offers a flexible feature set, giving PC OEMs, motherboard manufacturers, and integrators the opportunity to customize the functionality of their audio solution. Residing on the PC?s motherboard, the SoundMAX-class of audio CODECs are available in both 2- and 6-channel configurations and offer variable sample rate conversion (SRC), professional quality 103-dB output with 94-dB SNR, software-configurable speaker EQ, and analog enumeration capability. Integrated into the PC?s audio subsystem, the SoundMAX feature set includes a state-of-the-art DLS2 MIDI synthesizer with the popular Yamaha DLSbyXG sound set, the award-winning Sensaura 5.1 Virtual Theater? surround sound, and support for all major game audio technologies, including Microsoft DirectX? 8.0, Microsoft DirectSound 3D?, A3D, MacroFX, ZoomFX, MultiDrive 5.1, A3D, EAX and SoundMAX SPX?