Need sound card with rock-solid, current drivers and headphone support...?

[Brian48]

Originally posted by: jakobkraft

Originally posted by: Algere
Your 7506's are low impedence so it doesn't take much to drive 'em. Having a dedicated headphone jack while not as effective as an actual amp, do drive headphones better than a line-out connection.

EDIT: Justification to buy a Audigy 2 ZS = Lower CPU utilization for sound processing in games ergo better performance in games as a whole.

Got the Audigy 2 ZS, am loving this card, although, as someone pointed out, I can't connect the headphones at the same time as speakers since it doesn't have a dedicated headphone jack but Radio Shack, of all places, had a little box that enables you to have both speakers and headphones connected and easily switch between the two with no loss in signal strength.

But with music I actually have to squint since the sound is so strong and clear, even though I'm using the same old headphones, this card rocks!
Thanks all for the info

Good choice actually, considering your primary use. I had the Chaintech AV710 for a short time as well as the slightly better quality MD Entertainer 7.1 (another Envy24HT-S based card) and I thought both cards absolutely SUCKED in games and was barely on par with my old Santa Cruz when it came to music (analog) playback. The ONLY thing it has over the A2 is digital 2.1 music playback.

I looked into these cards because I needed something with optical out and I've yet to come across a consumer-level card that can match my Fortissimo III for overall use in gaming AS WELL AS music and movies.

 

[Algere]

Originally posted by: Brian48

Originally posted by: jakobkraft

Originally posted by: Algere
Your 7506's are low impedence so it doesn't take much to drive 'em. Having a dedicated headphone jack while not as effective as an actual amp, do drive headphones better than a line-out connection.

EDIT: Justification to buy a Audigy 2 ZS = Lower CPU utilization for sound processing in games ergo better performance in games as a whole.

Got the Audigy 2 ZS, am loving this card, although, as someone pointed out, I can't connect the headphones at the same time as speakers since it doesn't have a dedicated headphone jack but Radio Shack, of all places, had a little box that enables you to have both speakers and headphones connected and easily switch between the two with no loss in signal strength.

But with music I actually have to squint since the sound is so strong and clear, even though I'm using the same old headphones, this card rocks!
Thanks all for the info

Good choice actually, considering your primary use. I had the Chaintech AV710 for a short time as well as the slightly better quality MD Entertainer 7.1 (another Envy24HT-S based card) and I thought both cards absolutely SUCKED in games and was barely on par with my old Santa Cruz when it came to music (analog) playback. The ONLY thing it has over the A2 is digital 2.1 music playback.

I looked into these cards because I needed something with optical out and I've yet to come across a consumer-level card that can match my Fortissimo III for overall use in gaming AS WELL AS music and movies.

When you had the AV-710 were your speakers/headphones connected to the alt. out analog line-out connector (next to digital out) and set to high-resolution mode in the driver settings?

 

[Brian48]

For analog playback, I remember doing that for the MD because I knew for certain that it had the Wolfson DACs. Don't remember for certain with Chaintech, but both cards were identical so I probably did. I used it primarily with the optical output, but on occasion hooked up my Klipsch 4.1 to it. I was very disappointed in this regard that the optical out didn't really didn't sound any better than my Fortissimo III.

 

[Algere]

For the optical out what DAC/receiver were you using?

Maybe the quality of your DAC was limiting the sound quality the Chaintech (or Fortissimo III) is able to output therefore sounding the same between the 2 sound cards.