Is soundcard important if you are using headphones?

[Sirrion]

Right now i have a relatively older "6.1" Hercules GameTHeater XP soundcard with sound bay which was nice a couple years ago when i bought it hehe. But In my new rig I have decided to go strictly with headphones, Im not even going to hook up any speakers of any sort. Now my new mobo, DFI LP Ultra-D will have on-board sound, and I'm debating whats the best choice for me as this rig will be strictly for gaming and strictly headphones.

1)Use on-board sound, plug my headphones into the jack on the mobo.

2)Install my Hercules card and use the Sound Bay to plug my headphones into (Also comes with usb ports, game pad port, etc) and disable on-board sound.

3) Buy a newer Audigy type soundcard and install that, plugging my headphones into the actual soundcard and disabling on-board sound.

I'd rather not waste any money on another soundcard if what i have on either the motherboard or the HErcules card will do just fine and there will be no significant gain if i buy a new soundcard. But if i really am missing something in terms of not buying a new soundcard then I'll consider getting one. What are your thoughts and suggestions? Thanks!

 

[imported_itr]

the new xfi cards really optimize the use of headphones.

 

[thirdlegstump]

You don't need a soundcard if you are using headphones.

 

[YOyoYOhowsDAjello]

This is kind of dependent on the headphones you're going to be using.

 

[ViRGE]

Originally posted by: deathkoba
You don't need a soundcard if you are using headphones.

As a cans user, I disagree. The last time I tried onboard(Asus A7N8X Deluxe 2.0, so nForce 2 SS), I couldn't even use it, the jack was so amplified that I couldn't get my cans to be quiet enough, and the 3D audio wasn't anything to write home about compared to my Audigy(frankly, it was terrible, the SS couldn't do positioning well at all). Now I don't know if that was just an nForce 2 thing or is with all on-board solutions, but I am quite sure on the poor quality of their respective 3D audio capabilities. A good soundcard for gaming means it needs to implement good Head Related Transfer Functions(HRTFs) to give a convincing impression of 3D positioning, and few companies truely invest in that; Aureal did, Creative only did slightly up to the Audigy(and now they're taking it seriously with the X-Fi), and that's really about it, none of the on-board or other discrete makers have gone nearly as far. A gamer with headphones and serious about audio is going to want at least an Audigy, if not an X-Fi.

 

[akugami]

Originally posted by: YOyoYOhowsDAjello
This is kind of dependent on the headphones you're going to be using.

And to expand on that a bit, IMHO, if you're going to be using headphones that cost, say $250+, you don't want onboard sound. If you've got like $50-150 headphones I'd say just go with onboard sound. If you've got headphones that are like $10, you need to go get new headphones.

 

[orangat]

Originally posted by: akugami

Originally posted by: YOyoYOhowsDAjello
This is kind of dependent on the headphones you're going to be using.

And to expand on that a bit, IMHO, if you're going to be using headphones that cost, say $250+, you don't want onboard sound. If you've got like $50-150 headphones I'd say just go with onboard sound. If you've got headphones that are like $10, you need to go get new headphones.

I think you can get some very good headphones for $100-150 to justify getting a soundcard.

Onboard sound solution vary greatly in quality too. Most are poor because of lower quality components plus noise and interference. I've seen a rmaa numbers of recent ECS m/b with the noise floor of a lower end sblive. Some like the old soundstorm is pretty decent and newer hd chipset implementations might be good.

 

[shoRunner]

Originally posted by: deathkoba
You don't need a soundcard if you are using headphones.

HA....then what do you plug your headphones into...you need a sound card if you want sound. maybe your trying to say that you can use the onboard sound card...at least i hope.

 

[sniperruff]

you can especially hear the difference with headphones. i noticed a huge difference from the on-board AC97 audio and a Sb live. in this case, the hercules should do fine. i think m-audio is highly-rated for their sound cards

http://www.m-audio.com/products/en_us/Revolution51-main.html

 

[sniperruff]

Originally posted by: shoRunner

Originally posted by: deathkoba
You don't need a soundcard if you are using headphones.

HA....then what do you plug your headphones into...you need a sound card if you want sound. maybe your trying to say that you can use the onboard sound card...at least i hope.

sound card = PCI sound card. the on-board audio is not a sound card as it's just a chip with no cards involved.

 

[Pr0d1gy]

I have some Logitech HiFi Stereo Headphones and I don't use a sound card, works fine for me. Like they said, if you're spending $100+ you're looking for sound quality & might want to pickup a card.