Since we are on this subject, what is CPU utilization? What do they do; run a program that gives out CPU utilization numbers? How is it possible for a program to do that? Won't that program use the CPU? How do we know the program isn't reporting numbers that are caused by itself? Aren't some audio processing functions implemented in software and some in hardware, so wouldn't CPU utilization vary depending on what the audio sub-system was called on to do? Even if every audio processing function is 100% in hardware, don't apps such as games have to put together the appropriate sounds, and wouldn't that take up CPU time, possibly dwarfing the time the Audio Processing Unit expends? And since audio processing uses memory (for the sound data) and the various busses to transfer large, continuous quantities of data, would that not interfere and compete with the access the CPU requires, slowing everything else down, even though the APU might be doing all the audio work? Aren't some audio problems, such as "static", caused by the APU hogging the bus, and not due to CPU utilization at all, but to APU utilization? In that case, why is CPU utilization bad and APU utilization good? Maybe a $200 P4 can do it more efficiently than a $5 APU?
IAC, Anandtech has done CPU utilization tests with on-board audio, and found the numbers very low for sound chips such as the ones often used on VIA chipset mobos, and regardless of the numbers, caused no problems in games. The conclusion was that CPU utilization worries were a thing of the past, at least for games.
I tried out an nForce1 motherboard a while ago, the $65 ASUS AN266-VM, and I thought the sound was solid and clean, about all people would want for game explosions and such, and playing popular tunes on under $200 speakers. But I would not say it had that spooky, hi-fi sound, it you are familiar with expensive audio. Now I just got a DFI NFII LanParty, and it being on the expensive side, and using the CMedia codec that is often considered superior to the Realtek, so that I though it would be good enough for what I have, I am quite disappointed in the sound. Some favorite tunes that have exquisitely beautiful sections are distant, grainy and indistinct, and the bass flabby. Maybe the engineers chopped off the highs to get rid of computer noise or something, or maybe my expectations have changed with all this praising of the nForce sound everywhere. This sound is no competiton for the $40 Santa Cruz. But the nForce does behave better than the Santa Cruz in the game I tried. In comparison, the Santa Cruz has messed up the sound effects by randomly playing them normal and barely audible, or cutting off the end, although I have not yet tried it in this mobo. Some people have warned that the sound of motherboards is not the same just because the sound chip is the same. For one thing, computer engineering is not like sound engineering.
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