Sound Card Advice

[SuperBeast]

Hi I really need some help on the new system I am building. It is mainly regarding my sound card choice and my current speakers. These are my Speakers I got them for a really good price for my laptop and I want to use them on my PC. Problem to me is that they only have a headphone jack and I'm not sure how well that will work with this Sound Card

The card has Line In/Out, Subwoofer and Rear ports but nothing for headphones, so if somebody could tell me if my current speakers will be fine or if I need to upgrade. Thanks

 

[ultimatebob]

Didn't the speakers come with an audio cable for the sound card? It usually has 1/8" jacks on both ends, and is colored green on both ends.

 

[SuperBeast]

Nope, these particular speakers only came with a headphone jack to plug in, and a cable to hook up the main speakers to the subwoofer.

 

[schneiderguy]

I wouldnt reccomend getting the xtreme audio. It's basically a rebadged SB Live!. It doesnt have the X-fi DSP so it has to do everything on the CPU. At that price range a Audigy 2 would be better... for a bit more you can get a "real" x-fi xtreme gamer

 

[fuentefan]

http://forums.anandtech.com/me...ht_key=y&keyword1=x-fi

 

[Modelworks]

I have to laugh at creatives "Restore the details and vibrance that your music lost during MP3 compression "

Thats the biggest load of crap I've ever heard.
You can't put back what was lost in compression, thats why people use flac.

Not a fan of creative obviously.
I do a lot of high end audio listening, BB opamps, etc.

Recommend th chaintech av-710 for 30.00 shipped at newegg .
Since your only using 2 speakers you can run the card at 192khz output through the very good wolfson dac on the card .

 

[Ghouler]

its obviously marketing lingo about one of the features. It does not make X-Fi a bad choice. I have one, and I admit to using crystallizer (betterizer) sometimes. Have to re-rip all my CDs into FLAC one day, but for the moment this little cheat with X-Fi
does the trick My X-Fi works in Vista, finally, too. One thing worth keeping in mind is that full EAX works on Vista only with X-Fi or Audigy. Can ignore this info if you do not play games though.

 

[AnitaPeterson]

Superbeast, are you Canadian?

If so, look at these threads in RedFlagDeals (a Canadian Hot Deals forum):

http://www.redflagdeals.com/fo...howthread.php?t=459651
http://www.redflagdeals.com/fo...howthread.php?t=466043

DO NOT buy the Extreme Audio... it's a crappy card. It's the Xtreme Music you should be looking at!

 

[AllGamer]

"Restore the details and vibrance that your music lost during MP3 compression"

is not exactly crap, you'll have to try it to hear it, to then believe it.

if you listen the same MP3, in the same computer first vs another sound card, then with X-Fi

and you'll hear the HUGE difference between the two.

if you don't.... then your ears are below quality, and it doesn't really matter what you hear nor what sound card you use. LOL

 

[Ika]

Originally posted by: AllGamer
"Restore the details and vibrance that your music lost during MP3 compression"

is not exactly crap, you'll have to try it to hear it, to then believe it.

if you listen the same MP3, in the same computer first vs another sound card, then with X-Fi

and you'll hear the HUGE difference between the two.

if you don't.... then your ears are below quality, and it doesn't really matter what you hear nor what sound card you use. LOL

Yes, you'll hear a HUGE difference... but that "difference" is not what was originally intended. When you compress music, you basically throw data away. Creative claims that it can make an MP3 sound better than CD quality... but how? Does it fish in the garbage can for this lost data? The point here is, it is impossible to make a compressed MP3 to sound like an uncompressed file. All Creative does is add some EQ to it and "fake it". To some, it may sound better, but to others, like me and Modelworks, it doesn't.

I second Modelworks' recommendation for an AV-710, seeing as I have one and it's great. However, it does sound a lot better with an external amp... but then again, all sound cards do, don't they?