Onboard sound chips vs. sound cards

[Bregor]

I had a quick question about onboard sound and sound cards I was hoping someone could answer.

As you can see from my sig, I am in the process of planning a new computer build. Initially I was planning to just use the onboard sound of the Abit IS7 motherboard because no current sound card has the features I really want.

Recently, however, I read one of the many articles covering the recent HL2 benchmarks. Unfortunately, I have lost the link to the article, but it happened to mention that HL2 and upcoming games would be very CPU intensive. It advised that those wishing to get the best performance out of the game would want to have their sound system entirely hardware accelerated, so that the CPU would not have to handle any of the load.

Unfortunately, I know very little about the details of sound cards, I was hoping that someone could answer the following questions:

1) Does the onboard sound of the IS7 require significant CPU resources to operate? Enough to effect the performance of games?
2) If so, what is the cheapest sound card you can advise that:
a) Does not use up significant CPU cycles.
b) Produces decent sound using headphones.

I know that these questions are little esoteric, but I was hoping that someone here might know the answers to them.

Thanks in advance for any advice!

 

[chocoruacal]

Judging from your post, I think you should stick with the onboard sound and not worry about it. Yes, onboard sound can take more CPU power than a separate card. Will it be a significant difference, enough that you would actually notice a difference in the game? Probably not. Anyone who says they can tell the difference between 80fps and 70fps is deranged. Will it make a difference in Half Life 2? One can't really say right now. Should people be making hardware decisions based on forum gossip and brief demo reviews? No.

 

[BoomAM]

Originally posted by: Bregor
1) Does the onboard sound of the IS7 require significant CPU resources to operate? Enough to effect the performance of games?

Depending on the on-board sound chip, it can reduce performance by upto 5-10%.

2) If so, what is the cheapest sound card you can advise that:
a) Does not use up significant CPU cycles.
b) Produces decent sound using headphones.

A) Hercules Fortissimo 3. Or if you can find one, the SBLive5.1.
B) Hercules for that, excellent Headphone outputs quality. Produces semi 3d sound as well through them.

 

[TheAudit]

They are right. Onboard sound would almost never make any noticeable hits in your performance although it does use up some CPU cycles. It is not something that you should probably concern yourself with.

If you want an inexpensive sound card, I am in the same boat as BoomAm, get the SB Live card. It should be very cheap now.

 

[BoomAM]

For reference, the SB Live5.1 can be had for £25, and the Audigy1, for £40.
In dollers....erm.....£25 is about the same price as mid priced game.

 

[sniperruff]

get a sound card, since they are so cheap now. get a SB Live for $30 and a turtle for $35 at compusa (is it? im not sure anymore)

sound card sound better than on-board in general, not to mention on-board has annoying hiss sound, especially noticable when you plug in headphones

 

[Nebor]

You're looking at mediocre sound quality and a big framerate hit when using EAX. Ditch the onboard, get an Audigy, AUdigy 2, or Audigy 2 ZS.

 

[Bregor]

Thanks for the advice, guys.

 

[magomago]

Originally posted by: chocoruacal
Judging from your post, I think you should stick with the onboard sound and not worry about it. Yes, onboard sound can take more CPU power than a separate card. Will it be a significant difference, enough that you would actually notice a difference in the game? Probably not. Anyone who says they can tell the difference between 80fps and 70fps is deranged. Will it make a difference in Half Life 2? One can't really say right now. Should people be making hardware decisions based on forum gossip and brief demo reviews? No.

Yeah but what if this is the difference between 50/60 or 20fps or 30FPS.

The arguemetns IMOI becomes mute once you get over 85FPS to me...but at lower numbers that extra 5-10fps does make a difference.

I would've had a hell of an easier time playing CS at a consistent 25fps rather than 19...