Help me with sound card shopping

[enihsg]

Hello, I'm thinking of buying a sound card (sub $100) for gaming and listening to music. Unfortunately, I don't know much about sounds cards or what makes one sound card better than another. My other hardware, if it matters:
e6400, gigabyte DS3, patriot pc6400 2gb, hiper 580w, x1800xt, seagate 320gb, vista x64

All I know is that I want 7.1 channel surround. Other stuff like sample rate, SNR, chipset and whatnot confuse me. It would be nice if someone could explain what some sound terminology to me rather than just dictate what I should buy.

Also, I use headphones only. The ones I have are some $20 logitech headphones, not high-end or anything. Will I lose quality from these? Do I need better headphones to go with a good sound card?

 

[trOver]

Because you have vista, a creative card may not be the right choice atm. Others will have some reccondmendations

 

[ethebubbeth]

Originally posted by: enihsg
...

All I know is that I want 7.1 channel surround.

...

Also, I use headphones only.

Is there any particular reason why you are looking for 7.1 audio when you will be using only headphones (2.0 stereo)?

 

[enihsg]

Other family members use this computer and it does have speakers hooked up. It's just that I personally stick to headphones and was wondering if I should get better ones. By the way what's wrong with using creative cards on vista?

 

[cmdrdredd]

Originally posted by: trOver
Because you have vista, a creative card may not be the right choice atm. Others will have some reccondmendations

Depends...if you want EAX at all creative is the only choice. It does work in Vista through software.

 

[cmdrdredd]

Originally posted by: enihsg
Other family members use this computer and it does have speakers hooked up. It's just that I personally stick to headphones and was wondering if I should get better ones. By the way what's wrong with using creative cards on vista?

Creative's Vista drivers have issues with other drivers (some webcams for instance)

 

[Deceitkin]

Vista removed HAL(Hardware Abstraction Layer), thus no DirectSound 3D which results in X-Fis doing most their work through software instead of hardware, causing a decrease in sound quality, unless OpenAL is used. Xtreme Music should be around that price range, and it's still worth it imho, I don't have any issues with X-Fi and Vista x64 so far, besides having to use the ALchemy Project for some non-OpenAL games.

 

[enihsg]

Dang. I got a couple questions then. I see that vista has taken stuff away, so has it added new features too? If so, can sound cards made in the XP era use these features? Are there any made-for-vista sound cards coming out?

 

[JSt0rm]

why not use the optical output on the mobo to the digital converters or reciever of your choice. Thats how i would roll with consumer grade audio stuff.

 

[Ghouler]

Originally posted by: enihsg

Dang. I got a couple questions then. I see that vista has taken stuff away, so has it added new features too? If so, can sound cards made in the XP era use these features? Are there any made-for-vista sound cards coming out?

Yar, you have e.g. calibration feature. But if you get a sound card like Audigy or X-Fi and use XP you will have calibration applet called THX console. If you have receiver, then calibration feature should be there. M$ sold, allegedly, 40 million of Vista copies so it can't be THAT bad, I am still on XP though... In audio dept Vista failed to impress me really.

It's new OS so there were issues with various hardware items but they get sorted out, stepwise.E.g. Creative have ironed out new driver and announced they will have yet another one soon: http://forums.creative.com/creativelabs...essage?board.id=Vista&message.id=16284
Creative is quite a safe buy overall, I have been using their cards for years and they keep improving drivers and release updates.

As for Vista and hardware acceleration I know there this workaround called ALchemy, can google this. That's if you want to have hardware accelerated audio in games under Vista.

 

[Puffnstuff]

x-fi + vista = sound hell

Trust me I'm there along with a ton of other folks. Follow that link to the creative forum and hear our cries. I refuse to buy another creative card because of this mess. Creative has failed to deliver a functional driver/software package that works like the xp console did. I'm running the youpax modded software so I can use my card in vista.

 

[Ghouler]

Some folks do not get that Vista is simply a completely different OS. There is no support for hardware acceleration for Direct X games for instance. So there is vendor specific fix called ALchemy for this. There is e.g. no 6.1 configuration under Vista - only 5.1. or 7.1. And so on.
I guess it is matter of time and there will be fully functional X-Fi software for Vista - within Vista's own limitations anyway. Driver on its own was much improved already. If youppax modded software works then I am sure Creative can release full Vista version of their software. The question is just when.