Terratec Aureon sound cards ?

[Soubriquet]

Are they better than Audigy2zs ?

Currently I am exercised about my audio upgrade options because I have SoundStorm APU (Epox 8RDA+) running Logitech Z5500 via SPDIF and the only way forwards from here is downhill.

By which I mean, if I want to move to 64bit I have to contend with systems that have ALC800/850 chips or a Creative Audigy2ZS PCI card and I have read these cannot encode Dolby Digital for 4.1 speakers let alone 5.1. So I am concerned about how to play my MP3 music in future and that I will lose quality. Having run the Z5500s on analogue output previously before hotwiring an SPDIF solution I know the sound suffers if you dont give them the best quality input.

So without actually being able to hear any of the options I am trying to decide what to buy from the seat behind my keyboard here. I would be glad of any advice on how to get top audio for PC besides any experiences with the Aureon range.

 

[ribbon13]

Use foobar for playing music. It's DSP section is very useful. It's like the official player for the hydrogenaudio forums, where all the audiophiles hang out.

Only card I would reccomend is a M-Audio Rev 7.1 It's Enny24 based with 24bit 192Khz DACs
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=29-121-101&depa=0


http://foobar2000.com/

 

[Soubriquet]

Thx ribbon, very interesting.

Having trouble with that player btw missing out the rear left speaker feed to the nVidia nMixer control panel for some reason !? May need to get special version.

some time later...Nup that doesnt use rear left either.

 

[ribbon13]

http://www.m-audio.com/products/en_us/Revolution71-focus.html
http://www.m-audio.com/images/en/callouts/big/couts_revo71_cc779.jpg

More details if your are interested.

 

[Soubriquet]

thx , there seems to have been a hiccup with UK supplies of this card but I have found some resellers over here with google np.

I am not assuming dolby 5.1 means it will play CDAudio from CDRom or WMA via WindowsMediaPlayer as 4.1 or 5.1. Though presumably it will play DVD sound track. It would need to upmix or clone the additional channels from stereo data as I understand it and I will have to check with the manufacturer, since their Audiophile range specifies 2 channel out for SPDIF/PCM which has me feeling a bit cautious. Soundstorm I think manages to clone the channels for front/rear and has a woofer crossover frequency to provide 4.1 channel SPDIF output from a stereo source.

http://www.m-audio.com/products/en_gb/Audiophile192-focus.html

 

[ribbon13]

I reccomended Foobar's DSP for a reason.... 4/5.1 from stereo is one reason. If you want SoundStorms real time Dolby Digital encoding in a new system, join the crowd..... R.I.P SoundStorm. Nothing out there can replace it.

 

[Soubriquet]

OK sorry I havent got to grips with foobar yet I still am stuck with 2.1

I would have thought it was the sort of thing anandtech bring up in a "state of the art" review on soundcards, were they to do one, hint hint

Edit - OK I have it now (my bad) found 4.1 and I see why people would like this player, very adjustable, so adjustable it boggled me there for a bit. mmm nice.