Sound card market right now

Zixinus · September 9th, 2009, 03:01 AM

I have a SoundBlaster Audigy SE.

After updating to Vista (because I've got a new DX10 card and by golly, I might as well take maximum advantage of it), I noticed that it may be compatible with Vista, but it sure as hell isn't designed for it.

This is due to how Vista handles DirectSound (or so I heard from poking around the Creative (the company, not the kind of) forums) and that no driver update can fix this. The card of course still works, but I want this problem out of the way.

So I'm thinking of putting aside some money for an upgrade to solve this problem.

Only problem is that it seems I'd need to put aside a lot.

The lowest bidder for an 7.1 sound card (why not get better if I bother to upgrade?) is a Asus Xonar DX ( http://www.pcx.hu/?action=termekOldal&azonosito=21055 ).

Does anyone have any experience for this card? Is it worths is money, does it give sufficient future-proofing that I don't have to bother about sound cards in the foreseenable future?

If not, what other card should I look for? SoundBlaster X-fi series? Any reccomendations?

**Regeneration** · September 9th, 2009, 03:13 AM

Sound card is a mixed bag situation and its mostly personal taste. Some people claim that X produces better sound quality then Y, while others claim otherwise. For example, I prefer onboard AD1988B over X-Fi XtremeMusic. But generally, the Xonars are really good (chipset).

blindartist · September 9th, 2009, 08:43 PM

My personal opinion is that their all over priced, i wouldnt pay the asking price for a decent sound card, their trying to market them like video cards but theres fuck all on a sound card, nothing justifing the prce tag on most of them at any rate.

Onboard audio is ok for stereo but it generally falls apart when you try to go surround because they tend to have really low sample rate's when you go higher then 2 channels, but for stereo you wont notice any difference between onboard and sound card.

Only other downside to onboard is it uses a little more cpu then a sound card but with today's cpu's it doesnt really matter.

Personally I just use my old audigy 4, ill buy a new one some day when i come accross a decent one at a reasonable price (<50$, which is all any sound card is worth)

SpectatorX · September 9th, 2009, 09:12 PM

Few days ago i changed my soundcard from onboard one to creative soundblaster x-fi titanium pci-e. IMO card is very good, its sound is pure, added software have a lot of possibilities to set audio with your like. ALchemy brings back hardware acceleration for sound for old games. Software by default gives you three profiles called "modes": game, entertainment and audio creation. Really interesting thing is entertainment mode, with this mode you can hear stereo audio as multichannel (5.1, 7.1 etc) just by turning this mode on. Game mode is as it's nammed, good for games :-) But for people who like set sound as good as it's possible audio creation mode is perfect, this mode brings you so much options to set that i still haven't tried all of them yet :-)

This sound card get special certificate: "Certified by SpectatorX" ;-) Really, i'm impressed with possibilities of this sound card i really reccomend it.

Zixinus · September 9th, 2009, 11:06 PM

Wait, did I read that right? There are sound cards that need a pci-express?

SpectatorX · September 9th, 2009, 11:39 PM

Yes, few models are pci-e cards. They can be putted into x1, x4, x8 and x16 pci-e slots.
For sure my titanium is one of them, probably all higher x-fi serie models are pci-e, All xonars except d2x are pci-e cards, d2x is standard pci.

BTW, just sound cards... i had once for few days x-fi gamer i beliked this card becouse of sound in games and movies but music with this card wasn't enough good for me, now i'm fully happy with my titanium.

Zixinus · September 9th, 2009, 11:56 PM

What about a D1 Xonar cards?

I've also noticed lagging and noise tearing in my Crysis games. Here's hoping that's only because my anti-virus picked a good time to scan. :/

dzap · September 10th, 2009, 01:54 PM

Im happy for u spectatorx that u chose x-fi titanium

on the thread I can say that it is the only option for gamer. Since any other brand can be good for movies/music but mostly doesnt support eax4 and 5. Which are most common standarts for gaming. X-fi titanium gives same music/movies quality as well as games.

Terrak · November 12th, 2009, 11:21 PM

I Have an XFI sound card, but because i have all the slots used on my current rig i have to make do with onboard sound. With this day and age of Multi GPU the sound card is running out of room on the Mobo and with sound on most Mobos being pretty good onboard sound is a good option. Sure im no Audiophile but for me its good enough.

If i were you crossfire your 4850HD, and make do with onboard sound unless you have to get the best Audio Quality.

Sazabizc · November 13th, 2009, 02:16 AM

Sounds like the Asus Xonar DX has Some minor sound issues and
No DTS features.

http://www.hardwarecanucks.com/forum...rd-review.html

But some say its petty good.
http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/200...ss-soundcard/1