Finally! On board audio has finally hit audiophile levels!

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Heres a few Asrock motherboards that have it to...look at the X79 Champion...looks like it has the Recon3D housing thing too!
 
I guess that's assuming you consider the Recon3D to be audiophile level itself.
 
That weak an amp seems almost pointless no? Most <80ohm hp won't need it and most everything else tends to make a bigger jump (250/300 or 600 in some cases). The Recon3D wasn't particularly well received outside of gaming either.

It'll be interesting to see how this compares to current on board solutions in practice, on paper it sounds like an improvement but I definitely wouldn't call it audiophile grade... Not when their old X-fi is still a better product in that regard.
 
I know its not actually audiophile quality stuff, but I'd go as far to say that its better than anything else on board has gotten.

Prove me wrong?
 
Send me $180 for the mobo and I'll get right on that... :D

Edit: I'm not trying to bash it, just saying, a couple manufacturer's specs and a Recon3D chip doesn't automatically make it the best on board solution ever.
 
Got any links to the specs for that chip? I seem to be drawing a blank both from Creative's site and Gigabyte's site.
 
Should be much better than normal onboard audio, but it won't have OPAMPs even close to those of a stand alone sound card.
 
Dan_D said:
Should be much better than normal onboard audio, but it won't have OPAMPs even close to those of a stand alone sound card.
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Again, I know, just saying:

Actual 4-core Creative audio chip > anything Realtek

Of course theres no way its going to be as good as a separate sound card...amount of components on a sound card vs. a motherboard is more than enough proof of that! :p
 
Have you seen Recon 3D tho? There's not a lot of components on that either, and it isn't because Creative magically shrank down and integrated the design of a DAC as they'd like you to believe.
 
It is a step in the right direction, but as many have stated, it is far from audiophile level.

With Windows Vista and later most sound processing has moved to software, and the most important "features" for a generic user/gamer sound card is to hold the correct signal levels and have a good software stack.

Creative have shown this with the Recon3D, as the new parts are more software than hardware.
Asus have shown this change in features as well, as they advertise Realtek chips as high end due to having a design with a good ground layout and Creative software.

Feel free to correct me, as this is my own personal opinions :)
 
runs2far said:
It is a step in the right direction, but as many have stated, it is far from audiophile level.

With Windows Vista and later most sound processing has moved to software, and the most important "features" for a generic user/gamer sound card is to hold the correct signal levels and have a good software stack.

Creative have shown this with the Recon3D, as the new parts are more software than hardware.
Asus have shown this change in features as well, as they advertise Realtek chips as high end due to having a design with a good ground layout and Creative software.

Feel free to correct me, as this is my own personal opinions :)
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Nope. You are pretty much right on the money.
 
Kind of an underwhelming board otherwise IMHO. At least it is a physical audio chip...unlike Asus Maximus that have a "Supreme X-Fi" sticker pasted over a Realtek ALC audio chip (yes, that is literally what they do).
 
Skripka said:
Kind of an underwhelming board otherwise IMHO. At least it is a physical audio chip...unlike Asus Maximus that have a "Supreme X-Fi" sticker pasted over a Realtek ALC audio chip (yes, that is literally what they do).
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Yes it is. My ASUS Rampage III Black Edition is a great example of that. Though it does include a Thunderbolt / Xonar card with it. That has two replaceable / upgradable OPAMPs and is actually a fairly nice solution.
 
Dan_D said:
Yes it is. My ASUS Rampage III Black Edition is a great example of that. Though it does include a Thunderbolt / Xonar card with it. That has two replaceable / upgradable OPAMPs and is actually a fairly nice solution.
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I thought it hilarious with my Maximus Gene IV that they go to the effort of the shiny sticker...then in the motherboard manual the geography layout diagrams plainly label the chip for what it is.
 
Skripka said:
I thought it hilarious with my Maximus Gene IV that they go to the effort of the shiny sticker...then in the motherboard manual the geography layout diagrams plainly label the chip for what it is.
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Well they license the Creative EAX support and name. Its purely software driven, but they get to use the name. That's probably how Creative makes a lot of their money these days. We know they aren't surviving purely on sound card sales as they once did.
 
wonderfield said:
How do you define "audiophile-level"?
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I would start at ASUS ST or STX for sound cards. I would only ever use onboard for optical transport which bypasses the DAC on a mobo.

Creative hasn't made anything I consider "audiophile" grade in a long time. As I said this is a personal opinion.
 
I'm not sure what that means. What qualities of the ST/STX cards push them into audiophile territory, as you define it, and what keeps the Creative cards from reaching that plateau? Intermodulation distortion? Crosstalk? Total harmonic distortion?
 
The Titanium HD is pretty much on par with the STX SQ-wise, no headphone amp tho.
 
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wonderfield said:
I'm not sure what that means. What qualities of the ST/STX cards push them into audiophile territory, as you define it, and what keeps the Creative cards from reaching that plateau? Intermodulation distortion? Crosstalk? Total harmonic distortion?
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With Creative its more lacking driver options , a decent headphone amp , EMI buzz all of which I've experienced with many Creative cards.

My last Creative card was an X-Fi Forte which was an utter piece of shit. Now to be fair it only had the Creative chip and it wasn't directly a Creative product but the drivers were also incredibly shitty and throughout the life of the card I had constant popping sounds , buzzing and this card was used in two generations of computers with entirely different components. Finally it died after one of the caps blew.

My experiences mold my judgement when it comes to Creative products being "audiophile" grade or not. As it stands right now I do not consider them as such. I consider them more gaming tuned products that have a dash of "audiophile" like qualities.
 
In my experience, the biggest weakness of onboard sound chips is the very audible interference that they pick up due to their integration with the motherboard.

None of my unshielded PCI sound cards have had that problem, even the Creative ones.
 
With a double blind test, I doubt people could tell the difference between a properly configured Creative card and an STX.
 
Creative & Audiophile in the same sentence... Now that's just fucking hilarious
 
I moved to external USB soundcards and haven't looked back since. No more crackle/pop, better (physical) controls and no interference from the system operating. Only thing better is a Firewire/Thunderbolt soundcard :)
 
Asus Xonar STX/ST have intregrated headphone amplifier, which I think is useless on a high end soundcard, most of the people that buy those Soundcard uses external headphone amps for their HP i guess, so is a useless plus of $.


Which is the better soundcard without headphone amp? just dac shit...
 
450 said:
With a double blind test, I doubt people could tell the difference between a properly configured Creative card and an STX.
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Depends on the headphones. With something hard to drive, like Q701s or 250 ohm+ headphones I think you'd be able to tell for sure.
 
Forceman said:
Depends on the headphones. With something hard to drive, like Q701s or 250 ohm+ headphones I think you'd be able to tell for sure.
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The lack of a headphone amp would be glaringly obvious so a blind test wouldn't even be required.
 
Trmntr said:
Asus Xonar STX/ST have intregrated headphone amplifier, which I think is useless on a high end soundcard, most of the people that buy those Soundcard uses external headphone amps for their HP i guess, so is a useless plus of $.


Which is the better soundcard without headphone amp? just dac shit...
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The Titanium HD can often be found much cheaper than the STX and it has no amp, but the STX can actually switch between speakers and headphones without unplugging cables which is genuinely useful and it's still the best Xonar... Not like the amp hurts anything if you're using an external one, and it's not particularly expensive at $150. The Ti HD has been as low as $70 during random Best Buy clearances tho.

The STX amp is far from useless but the Ti HD can be a genuinely good deal if you already have an amp and want some CMSS3D or whatever.
 
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