High Definition Audio on AMD Boards

[jmelt5056]

In the article that reviews new DFI Crossfire board, Anandtech's staff claim that it is the first board for AMD CPUs that has HD audio capabilities. It features the Realtek ALC882 codec. Realtek has another HD codec, the Realtek ALC880, which has been available on several AMD boards. In another article reviewing the Geforce 6100/6150, Anandtech claims that neither feature HD audio. Asus has a board featuring the the Geforce 6150 chipset that features HD audio ( in it's manual it advertises this as an feature). Also, Gigabyte has two motherboards which also claim to have HD audio. Both feature the Geforce 6100/6150 chipset and both claim to have HD audio in their manuals. So which is it? Are these true implementations of HD audio or what?

 

[forumposter32]

The brand names I would trust the most are: Abit, Asus, DFI, MSI.
Look at their web sites and you might find it.

 

[Cerb]

Either they are or they aren't. The DFI RDX200 does have it.

The GA-K8N51GMF-9 appears to have it, but GB hardly seems to be marketting it. Seems like they'd play it for marketting value.

If in question, Google the audio Codec. ALC880, FI.

 

[obeseotron]

And you plan to listen to what exactly that supports "HD Audio"? DVD audio? doubtful as nothing is available on it. As near as I can tell "HD Audio" seems to mean 8 channels, 96KHz, 24 bit sound, a format for which no content exists. Even in the hypothetical situation where content for "HD Audio" existed you would need very good ears and a very expensive speaker system to take advantage of it, so expensive that the cost of a sound card would be a joke.

 

[BOLt]

the msi neo4 platinum/sli nF4 board has a soundblaster audio codec built in. does that count?

 

[BOLt]

 

[BOLt]

 

[Operandi]

Originally posted by: obeseotron
And you plan to listen to what exactly that supports "HD Audio"? DVD audio? doubtful as nothing is available on it. As near as I can tell "HD Audio" seems to mean 8 channels, 96KHz, 24 bit sound, a format for which no content exists. Even in the hypothetical situation where content for "HD Audio" existed you would need very good ears and a very expensive speaker system to take advantage of it, so expensive that the cost of a sound card would be a joke.

It's more then just improved speifcations and specifications, HD capable codecs have much improved sound quality then your typical AC97 codec.

Both of these Aopen AMD 939 boards make use of ALC880 HD codec.

 

[jmelt5056]

Originally posted by: obeseotron
And you plan to listen to what exactly that supports "HD Audio"? DVD audio? doubtful as nothing is available on it. As near as I can tell "HD Audio" seems to mean 8 channels, 96KHz, 24 bit sound, a format for which no content exists. Even in the hypothetical situation where content for "HD Audio" existed you would need very good ears and a very expensive speaker system to take advantage of it, so expensive that the cost of a sound card would be a joke.

From what I hear the sound quality is very noticable. I looking into building a Media Center PC. The sound quality from HD audio would work well with a 7.1 stereo system. And as far as the lack of media content now, why would you spend several hundred or a $1000+ on a high end MCE PC and not try to future proof it somewhat if you could in at least one area if you could? Embedded HD audio would save around $100+ over buying a Sound Blaster Audigy/X-FI card which support EAX HD audio.


The lack of quality sound, among other things, has always been one of the draw backs to using your PC as part of an entertainment center. HD audio closes that gap. Now all they need is digital cable tuners that off the same features that digital set top boxes offer. Cable card isn't good enough, at least not now.

These links give detail into implementations of HD audio and what it's use is for:

http://www.realtek.com.tw/products/products1-2.aspx?modelid=2004058
http://www.intel.com/design/chipsets/hdaudio.htm

 

[jmelt5056]

Originally posted by: Operandi

Originally posted by: obeseotron
And you plan to listen to what exactly that supports "HD Audio"? DVD audio? doubtful as nothing is available on it. As near as I can tell "HD Audio" seems to mean 8 channels, 96KHz, 24 bit sound, a format for which no content exists. Even in the hypothetical situation where content for "HD Audio" existed you would need very good ears and a very expensive speaker system to take advantage of it, so expensive that the cost of a sound card would be a joke.

It's more then just improved speifcations and specifications, HD capable codecs have much improved sound quality then your typical AC97 codec.

Both of these Aopen AMD 939 boards make use of ALC880 HD codec.

It's interesting that both of those Aopen boards on newegg say that they use Realtek ALC880 codec. Yet, if you look in their manuals it says that they use one of the AC 97 codecs. Wonder if it is newegg or Aopen misrepresenting product.

 

[A5]

If you're putting the system into a HT setup, anything with a digital out would be fine (unless you plan on gaming with your HT, then you probably need a Creative card to get full 3D).

 

[jmelt5056]

Originally posted by: A5
If you're putting the system into a HT setup, anything with a digital out would be fine (unless you plan on gaming with your HT, then you probably need a Creative card to get full 3D).

So if i'm understanding you correctly, using the SPDIF out would bypass the need for the for the PC to need to decode the audio signal and allow the stereo receiver to do the job? Does the codec effect the quality of the SPDIF signal?

 

[Pariah]

Embedded HD audio would save around $100+ over buying a Sound Blaster Audigy/X-FI card which support EAX HD audio.

Those are two completely unrelated items. So called onboard HD audio is in no way a replacement for what an Audigy/X-Fi can do. The only widely available high fidelity audio sources currently available are SACD, which cannot be played on a PC, and likely never will be able to, and DVD-A which Creative sound cards can play right now, and nothing else in the PC market can. So you can actually use the higher fidelity capabilities of a Sound Blaster, while you can't for the onboard. Also there are no non-Creative sound cards that support any version of EAX beyond 2.0, which is ancient and inferior to what Creative is currently using (EAX HD 5.0, I think). Using high fidelity DAC's for EAX 2.0 is like making a video card that displays 64bit color but is only certified up to DirectX 3.0. What the hell is the point? Not to mention Creative's cards have significantly lower CPU utilization in gaming compared to the competition despite using much more advanced EAX versions.

And simply put, all onboard audio no matter what it is called, is vastly inferior compared to the X-Fi when it comes to the most basic of sound card functions, producing clean and accurate audio.

There really is no such thing as HD audio, unlike HD video which has a set of industry standards. Current onboard audio labeled as HD, though better than the garbage that was AC97 is still no competition at all for a quality standalone sound card from the likes of Creative, Turtle Beach, M-Audio, and Terratec among others, in the sound quality department. Don't let the marketing for dummies trick you into thinking onboard "HD" audio is anything more than a budget solution for the masses who couldn't tell the difference between a real audio file and the original CD if you told them which was which before playing them.

 

[jmelt5056]

So if i'm going to use the pc as a HT does it really matter what type of sound codec or sound card I'm going to use if I use SPDIF out to a stereo receiver? What about in games? From what i've seen only the high end Sound Blaster Audigy/X-Fi cards only have SPDIF out via the I/O Drive. Would that be the only way to get advanced game audio output to a stereo? You could use the mini jack to RCA adapters to connect to the stereo's audio in connections also couldn't you?

 

[Googer]

Originally posted by: Cerb
Either they are or they aren't. The DFI RDX200 does have it.

The GA-K8N51GMF-9 appears to have it, but GB hardly seems to be marketting it. Seems like they'd play it for marketting value.

If in question, Google the audio Codec. ALC880, FI.

If in question, Google the audio Codec. ALC880, FI.

 

[YOyoYOhowsDAjello]

Originally posted by: jmelt5056
So if i'm going to use the pc as a HT does it really matter what type of sound codec or sound card I'm going to use if I use SPDIF out to a stereo receiver? What about in games? From what i've seen only the high end Sound Blaster Audigy/X-Fi cards only have SPDIF out via the I/O Drive. Would that be the only way to get advanced game audio output to a stereo? You could use the mini jack to RCA adapters to connect to the stereo's audio in connections also couldn't you?

Anything with digital out should do a good job for sending sound to your receiver.

A Chaintech AV-710 would be a good card for passing stereo for games and music while passing a DD stream from movies and other DD encoded sources for your receiver.

Creative cards are a bad idea for digital out. You wont benefit from their gaming effects in digital mode.

The solutions that will give you surround sound from games are cards that can encode DD in real time. These include Nvidia soundstorm, the X-Mystique, Montego, and a couple Intel HD offerings.

If your receiver has 5.1 channel direct input, you can get whatever card you want and just hook it up via analog though.

 

[jmelt5056]

Thanks for all of the input. Learned a lot I didn't know.