Should You Buy a Sound Card?

If you like onboard graphics, you'll love onboard sound.

If, however, you actually like to play games and listen to music....then you'll have a discrete graphics card and a discrete sound card. And no shitty "beats by dr dre" headphones, either.
 
Cmdrmonkey said:
If you run digital out to a receiver, it makes no difference what you use as the receiver is doing the audio processing. And even a cheap receiver will sound better than a sound card.
Click to expand...

I would argue against this on so many levels. A proper set up running a quality sound card to an amp will perform much better.
 
I asked one of my professors about this a few semesters ago since he holds a few ADC patents, teaches circuit design at a top university and has worked for TI etc.. He said that it doesn't matter and there are very few differences unless you're willing to spend a LOT of money for very little improvement.

If you use a digital output, it matters even less. Digital means that your amp or receiver are receiving data from your computer that is eventually converted to an analog signal for your speaker. It either gets it or it doesn't.

Here's the best part: most digital audio isn't even native 24/192, it's interpolated to fill in the gaps that compression creates because most audio is compressed for storage efficiency!! Even if it were true 24/192, it'd still be compressed from the actual sound. Most people have crap speakers that can't handle a full frequency range anyways and just judging components by the artificially tweaked impressions that they hear.

Under my professor's guidance, I was able to build an amp for around $50 using TI's LM3886 that beat most amps <$1,500. This was a quantifiable measurement using an oscilloscope.

People will believe whatever BS that they want to though.
 
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I've always been a sound card guy.. In fact when buying a motherboard I've always made a point buy one that did NOT have on-board video or audio. Harder to do with audio these days but my idea always was that there is less circuitry to screw up and I never use the on-board anyway.
Creative cards were always the go-to for me, but like others have said I'm rather chapped with their driver changes. It doesn't keep me from doing what I used to do, but hooking my 10 track mixer from my line out to my line in and drag my condenser mic around is kind of a pain in the ass if I want to add commentary to some live footage.
Added; yes, a digital out to a preamp and amp should produce great results regardless. I don't personally own a crazy system but I still like my old 5.1 Sony receiver with Cerwin Vega speakers.
 
PynkFloydd said:
I asked one of my professors about this a few semesters ago since he holds a few ADC patents, teaches circuit design at a top university and has worked for TI etc.. He said that it doesn't matter and there are very few differences unless you're willing to spend a LOT of money for very little improvement.

If you use a digital output, it matters even less. Digital means that your amp or receiver are receiving data from your computer that is eventually converted to an analog signal for your speaker. It either gets it or it doesn't.

Here's the best part: most digital audio isn't even native 24/192, it's interpolated to fill in the gaps that compression creates because most audio is compressed for storage efficiency!! Even if it were true 24/192, it'd still be compressed from the actual sound. Most people have crap speakers that can't even handle a full frequency range anyways.

Under my professor's guidance, I was able to build an amp for around $50 using TI's LM3886 that beat most amps <$1,500. This was a quantifiable measurement using an oscilloscope.

People will believe whatever BS that they want to though.
Click to expand...
Ah I see, being a professor makes you appreciate good hifi.
When your professor tells you his opinion, it gives you an all encompassing knowledge that surpasses the experience of people who can hear more.

What quantity was it that made your amp better than most amps up to $1500?
 
Nenu said:
Ah I see, being a professor makes you appreciate good hifi.
When your professor tells you his opinion, it gives you an all encompassing knowledge that surpasses the experience of people who can hear more.

What quantity was it that made your amp better than most amps up to $1500?
Click to expand...

Since his patents were likely used in that so-called "HiFi," then yes. :D
"...people that can hear more." Is this a superhuman power or some kind of mutation?
Your second question makes no sense.
 
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Galvin said:
I cant stand people on vent that sound like shit cause they're using onboard sound.
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Not everybody is going to throw down 100 dollars on a quality mixer, pop filter and mic. That's more of a product of that than it is of sound cards. Cheap mics = sound like shit, no pop filter or mixer to cut out the lows and highs, sound more like shit, external noise in the enviorment -> sound even more like shit.

I mean zeesh i could throw down money for a MXL 990 mic and Behringer Xenyx Q1002USB mixer round out my lows and high and sound chill as fuck. costing me around $200 OR i can sound like crap for $5 and just properly use it in a quite environment.

Take it i'm half death in my left ear so like hell i can tell the difference or care.
 
PynkFloydd said:
Since his patents were likely used in that so-called "HiFi," then yes. :D
"...people that can hear more." Is this a superhuman power or some kind of mutation?
Your second question makes no sense.
Click to expand...

My uncle created many additives used in every drop of gasoline produced while working for Shell, but he couldn't design and manufacture a Ferrari. Since it appears you are a college student it's safe to assume you have never owned or used high end audio equipment, making your argument basically null.

What he was asking is what made your $50 amp (I'm assuming its an Altoid special since that's about the best you can build with $50) equate to a $1500 amp? Did you somehow create a high end tube amp with your $50? Do you know what a tube amp is? I suggest not attacking people that may have more experience cause you are amped up as a student.
 
just get some Bose speakers. They are usb and don't even use your sound card, lol.
 
haste. said:
Since it appears you are a college student it's safe to assume you have never owned or used high end audio equipment, making your argument basically null.

What he was asking is what made your $50 amp (I'm assuming its an Altoid special since that's about the best you can build with $50) equate to a $1500 amp? Did you somehow create a high end tube amp with your $50? Do you know what a tube amp is? I suggest not attacking people that may have more experience cause you are amped up as a student.
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I'm a 33yr old airborne infantry veteran that finally went back to school to get an Ivy League education. Did you check my signature? The Marantz amp I have is an excellent sounding amp with a toroidal transformer and the monitors that I own are some of the best rated monitors ever produced in the world. I've also owned some of the top Cary tube amplifiers (which I personally spoke to Cary's design team and modded) and MANY, many various top-of-the-line components over the years. Would you like more of my resume?

No, not a CMOY headphone amp. If you actually understood audio, you would have known that. I designed the circuit from the spec sheet of the LM3886, as stated. My design used a toroidal transformer based on my own experiences with hifi audio. Amps don't use those until they hit ~$1,500 price range. I also measured outputs with an oscilloscope as to make sure everything was within spec. Specs sheets are available online, explore and make your own judgments if you don't believe me.

...and I suggest that you not make ignorant assumptions and attack people with more experience than yourself. I was simply defending myself against someone who began to belittle my experiences, similar to what you attempted to do.
 
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PynkFloydd said:
Since his patents were likely used in that so-called "HiFi," then yes. :D
"...people that can hear more." Is this a superhuman power or some kind of mutation?
Your second question makes no sense.
Click to expand...

So when I think of something that can be used as a component in a hifi system, I become an audiophile, interesting.

Yes some people can hear more.
People have different levels of eyesight and visual perception too.

You said
Under my professor's guidance, I was able to build an amp for around $50 using TI's LM3886 that beat most amps <$1,500. This was a quantifiable measurement using an oscilloscope.
Click to expand...
What was this quantifiable measurement you did that made your amplifier beat most amps up to the value of $1500 ?
 
Nenu said:
So when I think of something that can be used as a component in a hifi system, I become an audiophile, interesting.

Yes some people can hear more.
People have different levels of eyesight and visual perception too.

You said

What was this quantifiable measurement you did that made your amplifier beat most amps up to the value of $1500 ?
Click to expand...

I don't see any instance of me using the word, "audiophile." I must also be using a subpar screen and cannot see that.

See my previous answer and here is a link to the spec sheet:
http://www.ti.com/product/lm3886

I'm not teaching a class. Find some amps and compare the data yourself. I have finals now and have more important things to concentrate on. I do find it hilarious that the people responding have absolutely no clue to what they're talking about or what "good" even is though...
 
Cmdrmonkey said:
If you run digital out to a receiver, it makes no difference what you use as the receiver is doing the audio processing. And even a cheap receiver will sound better than a sound card.
Click to expand...

I'm sure this is true for bistreaming, since the data stream should be the same and untouched between any devices that bitstream.

However, I wonder if it's still true for soundcards and drivers that implement DDL/DTS encoding. Are these algorithms completely standardized so that they AWLAYS output the same data?

I also wonder if it's true for games that may use hardware acceleration for sound (or did this completely die with windows xp?)
 
The difference to me between onboard sound and a sound card is night and day. Onboard sound just sounds dull and lifeless next to a sound card period. I see a lot of enthusiast pictures of mega buck PCs with triple SLI but have no sound card and I can't help but shake my head at these dudes. Sound is just as important to me as graphics. I have both a kick ass vid card (no SLI for me, one 23" monitor is plenty for me) and a kick ass sound card. I'm very happy to have the best of both worlds. My ears are as happy as my eyes.
 
Mike89 said:
The difference to me between onboard sound and a sound card is night and day. Onboard sound just sounds dull and lifeless next to a sound card period. I see a lot of enthusiast pictures of mega buck PCs with triple SLI but have no sound card and I can't help but shake my head at these dudes. Sound is just as important to me as graphics. I have both a kick ass vid card (no SLI for me, one 23" monitor is plenty for me) and a kick ass sound card. I'm very happy to have the best of both worlds. My ears are as happy as my eyes.
Click to expand...

do you have the same opinion for digital output?
 
PynkFloydd said:
I don't see any instance of me using the word, "audiophile." I must also be using a subpar screen and cannot see that.

See my previous answer and here is a link to the spec sheet:
http://www.ti.com/product/lm3886

I'm not teaching a class. Find some amps and compare the data yourself. I have finals now and have more important things to concentrate on. I do find it hilarious that the people responding have absolutely no clue to what they're talking about or what "good" even is though...
Click to expand...

You inferred that your professors advice was paramount and that your beliefs about hifi are true for everyone.
You dont seem to know very much and I dont think you have heard much hifi equipment either, otherwise you would have some anecdotes worth sharing.
If I'm wrong can you share with us why you made the design choices for your amp, what equipment you have compared it to and how they differed?

You stated that you have made a quantifiable measurement that shows your amp is better than most amps up to $1500.
Can you qualify this? Then it will have some meaning, so far it has no useful context.
 
I know Creative has had more than a couple driver issues through the years but everyone acts like they've had ONE solid driver release ever and all others were total crap. I can personally attest this is not true. I think some of you were doing it wrong.
 
serpretetsky said:
I'm sure this is true for bistreaming, since the data stream should be the same and untouched between any devices that bitstream.

However, I wonder if it's still true for soundcards and drivers that implement DDL/DTS encoding. Are these algorithms completely standardized so that they AWLAYS output the same data?

I also wonder if it's true for games that may use hardware acceleration for sound (or did this completely die with windows xp?)
Click to expand...
DDL and DTS encoding schemes are used to fit 5.1 down optical or coax SPDIF.
SPDIF was designed for stereo and doesnt have the bandwidth for CD quality 5.1.
DDL and DTS are compression schemes for SPDIF.
If using HDMI for example, there is no need for a compression scheme, the audio signal can be sent uncompressed.
 
Nenu said:
DDL and DTS encoding schemes are used to fit 5.1 down optical or coax SPDIF.
SPDIF was designed for stereo and doesnt have the bandwidth for CD quality 5.1.
DDL and DTS are compression schemes for SPDIF.
If using HDMI for example, there is no need for a compression scheme, the audio signal can be sent uncompressed.
Click to expand...
Yes i agree with all of that. That doesn't answer either of my questions, but it does bring another question:

Do all games these days support passing uncompressed 7.1 LPCM audio to the soundcard?

I am still curious if DDL and DTS will produce the same output regardless of driver or soundcard.

I am also wondering if any audio hardware acceleration is utilized in games that would produce different audio.
 
Nenu said:
You inferred that your professors advice was paramount and that your beliefs about hifi are true for everyone.
You dont seem to know very much and I dont think you have heard much hifi equipment either, otherwise you would have some anecdotes worth sharing.
If I'm wrong can you share with us why you made the design choices for your amp, what equipment you have compared it to and how they differed?

You stated that you have made a quantifiable measurement that shows your amp is better than most amps up to $1500.
Can you qualify this? Then it will have some meaning, so far it has no useful context.
Click to expand...


See my reply to Haste. I've owned and auditioned reference quality equipment. My sig contains what I currently own, aside from the AKG headphones and HeadRoom headphone amp that I currently have. I measured against my Marantz and had a readout from my Cary amp that was sent in for repotting. Considering that both of these were >$3k, I think they were fine to measure against.

The basic problem of audio is overcoming loss along the circuit (from its origin) to maintain purity of signal. That's basically it. There are others, but there's no point in further confusing you. Most DSPs or tuning just try to cover up the use of poor materials. To most people, this is what makes something sound "better." Speakers are designed this way, amps are designed this way and just about every other audio component is designed this way.

The basic design of any amp must overcome many problems. The very first thing that an amp must do is to take in 'dirty' power in the form of alternating current. Any design must attempt to 'clean' and stabilize that. This is a really dumbed down way of explaining things. Read the [H] review of PSUs and you'll get a sense of the issue as applied to PCs. PC PSUs just aren't designed for audio use and why it's better to rely on data aka digital because algorithms are able to ignore errors, unless clock cycles are unable to be distinguished. I'm not getting a degree in engineering, so I can't explain the exact way a motherboard approaches this problem because I haven't done any design work on motherboards. Anyways, I opted for a toroidal transformer because I feel that they have better efficiency, resulting in less harmonics. They're also more expensive and only used in high-end equipment, which was also the most expensive part in my simple design. The capacitor and resistor choices basically act to stabilize the signal and I was able to source high quality materials for cheap and why there's a huge disparity in price with mass-manufactured units or ones that require more craftsmanship because they are handmade, like the Cary that I owned. This is also another place where most companies skimp and markup prices to increase profit margins. The particular circuit was designed according to the mathematical formula and guidelines that can be found in the spec sheet. I didn't get too fancy and it's really just a negative feedback loop. What made this amp better? Linearity, efficiency, signal-to-noise, etc.. Obviously you didn't understand any of that or didn't even look, so I won't bother to explain in-depth because it's just a waste of my time, which I don't have an excess of.
 
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serpretetsky said:
Yes i agree with all of that. That doesn't answer either of my questions, but it does bring another question:

Do all games these days support passing uncompressed 7.1 LPCM audio to the soundcard?

I am still curious if DDL and DTS will produce the same output regardless of driver or soundcard.

I am also wondering if any audio hardware acceleration is utilized in games that would produce different audio.
Click to expand...

Games will support standard bitrates ordinarily CD (16bit 44KHz) but they can use anything they wish.
Data may be compressed losslessly (ie FLAC) or lossy (ie MP3) or left uncompressed.
I dont think many (if any) games will use the full bandwidth of LPCM.

Any compressed data is uncompressed by the time it reaches the soundcard.
DDL and DTS encoded data will produce the same stream of data on every decoder.

You may be able to get more effects in games that use OpenAL if you have a Creative card that supports EAX by using the Alchemy application.
Other than that there is no more hardware audio support at the moment.
 
Nenu said:
Games will support standard bitrates ordinarily CD (16bit 44KHz) but they can use anything they wish.
Data may be compressed losslessly (ie FLAC) or lossy (ie MP3) or left uncompressed.
I dont think many (if any) games will use the full bandwidth of LPCM.

Any compressed data is uncompressed by the time it reaches the soundcard.
DDL and DTS encoded data will produce the same stream of data on every decoder.

You may be able to get more effects in games that use OpenAL if you have a Creative card that supports EAX by using the Alchemy application.
Other than that there is no more hardware audio support at the moment.
Click to expand...
Thx!
 
Galvin said:
I cant stand people on vent that sound like shit cause they're using onboard sound.
Click to expand...
Especially when it's the connection or the mic itself and not the onboard sound at all that causes it. You don't even know at all. :rolleyes:
 
PynkFloydd said:
See my reply to Haste. I've owned and auditioned reference quality equipment. My sig contains what I currently own, aside from the AKG headphones and HeadRoom headphone amp that I currently have. I measured against my Marantz and had a readout from my Cary amp that was sent in for repotting. Considering that both of these were >$3k, I think they were fine to measure against.

The basic problem of audio is overcoming loss along the circuit (from its origin) to maintain purity of signal. That's basically it. There are others, but there's no point in further confusing you. Most DSPs or tuning just try to cover up the use of poor materials. To most people, this is what makes something sound "better." Speakers are designed this way, amps are designed this way and just about every other audio component is designed this way.

The basic design of any amp must overcome many problems. The very first thing that an amp must do is to take in 'dirty' power in the form of alternating current. Any design must attempt to 'clean' and stabilize that. This is a really dumbed down way of explaining things. Read the [H] review of PSUs and you'll get a sense of the issue as applied to PCs. PC PSUs just aren't designed for audio use and why it's better to rely on data aka digital because algorithms are able to ignore errors, unless clock cycles are unable to be distinguished. I'm not getting a degree in engineering, so I can't explain the exact way a motherboard approaches this problem because I haven't done any design work on motherboards. Anyways, I opted for a toroidal transformer because I feel that they have better efficiency, resulting in less harmonics. They're also more expensive and only used in high-end equipment, which was also the most expensive part in my simple design. The capacitor and resistor choices basically act to stabilize the signal and I was able to source high quality materials for cheap and why there's a huge disparity in price with mass-manufactured units or ones that require more craftsmanship because they are handmade, like the Cary that I owned. This is also another place where most companies skimp and markup prices to increase profit margins. The particular circuit was designed according to the mathematical formula and guidelines that can be found in the spec sheet. I didn't get too fancy and it's really just a negative feedback loop. What made this amp better? Linearity, efficiency, signal-to-noise, etc.. Obviously you didn't understand any of that or didn't even look, so I won't bother to explain in-depth because it's just a waste of my time, which I don't have an excess of.
Click to expand...

Not a bad AV amp, it was well accepted.
My Onkyo 875 AV amp is a little clearer/punchier than the 8002.
But it was easily bested by my current setup, Minimax Tube DAC plus (stereo) / Oppo 105 (5.1) with Emotiva XPA 2 and XPA 3 amps.
Bass extends deeper, a huge increase in clarity/detail and an incredibly open 3D soundstage in stereo, something that was largely missing from the AV amp.
(the amp stages were compared with the same external DAC)
I was saddened how much difference there was as I hoped the Onkyo would hold its head up, so I gave it to my father.

You said you werent giving a tutorial, I'm up to speed thankyou.

Can you point out which parts of the [H] reviews on power supplies are relevant to this discussion? (skip the simple stuff)
Toroids are used on lower end hifi as well as high end, the quality and power handling vary substantially.


You should be able to answer some easy questions.
Which toroid did you use, there is quite a broad range and how many VA did you settle on?
Which harmonics did you find were reduced by the use of a toroid?

Are you running class A or a hybrid?
What damping factor did you achieve?
Can you describe the impulse response?
At what THD did you finally rate your RMS power output and what RMS did you achieve?

You say I dont know what "Linearity, efficiency, signal-to-noise, etc.." are, yet you own up to using a basic circuit and put different capacitors on it to set up a feedback loop. There wasnt really any design, more part selection.
You barely had need to consider them yourself.

fyi:
Linearity is an expression of variation (or lack of) in the rate of change.
Efficiency is the rate of loss expressed as power out / power in.
Signal to noise is a ratio of background noise to signal strength.

None of these define sound quality, they are basic parameters that can be used many times throughout a design.
Did you choose the LM3886 on any other criteria?
 
Cmdrmonkey said:
How do you figure? A $200 Onkyo will poop all over any sound card on the market. You also don't have to deal with Creative's horrible drivers when you use a receiver.
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Depends on the DAC used on the receiver and sound card.

I have an Auzen X-Fi Prelude 7.1 which has a well regarded AK4396 DAC chip. I had it plugged it into the analog mult-ch inputs of my Onkyo 805 which meant that the soundcard was processing the signal and my receiver was just amplifying the sound. Then i plugged it digitally into my Onkyo 805 which had a Burr Brown dac. When the receiver now processing the sound, it made big difference in soundstage, though not so much in frequency response. The other big improvement was there was much less background noise emanating from the computer as the result of the receiver handling the signal. Granted, the Onkyo at the time was a 900 dollar receiver, compared to the 150 dollar Auzentech. However, if i had gone a step down and spent a few hundred dollars less on a midrange Onkyo 705 receiver, it wouldve came with a lower quality Cirrus logic DAC.
 
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Galvin said:
I cant stand people on vent that sound like shit cause they're using onboard sound.
Click to expand...

I can't stand vent. Its probably more mic related than sound card for that issue.


I think a sound card is a great addition, especially with the price of the Asus Xonar DSX.
 
For most people, they have a <$50.00 set of speakers, usually 2.1. They rarely benefit from a discrete sound card. If you go with something better for your speakers, you usually care more about the sound. At that point, a discrete sound card makes a lot more sense. A pair of Logitech or Creative speakers that you picked up from Walmart really aren't high end. So, for most people, they don't NEED a sound card. They need an audio output.

Now, for those hardcore gamers or those with better systems, yes, you definitely would hear a huge improvement over onboard audio (you can with cheap speakers, but the speaker still is a huge limiting factor there).
 
If your not an audiophile or hardcore gamer then there is no need. I'd rather spend that money on something else that will actually benefit my system more. No sense in getting an expensive sound card for $30 speakers or what's output from your TV. Discrete cards are becoming a small niche product but are still very valuable to those who want/need them.
 
My speakers sound better then onboard with a sound card a Sound blaster recon better bass louder picks up more

But my headphone sound better with my onboard Realtek asus sound by far....
 
My onboard sounds great to me. Got sick of the incompatibility back in the day. Optical out to my Logitech z5500's. Maybe it doesn't sound as good as a high end sound card. I'd be hard pressed to spend more money on my system to try, then not notice the difference. Maybe I'm getting old... heh.
 
After asking for some help on the same thing in the computer audio forum, I just send the sound via HDMI to my reciver. For 320kbps mp3's and some gaming, it's perfect.
 
Nenu said:
Not a bad AV amp, it was well accepted.
My Onkyo 875 AV amp is a little clearer/punchier than the 8002.
But it was easily bested by my current setup, Minimax Tube DAC plus (stereo) / Oppo 105 (5.1) with Emotiva XPA 2 and XPA 3 amps.
Bass extends deeper, a huge increase in clarity/detail and an incredibly open 3D soundstage in stereo, something that was largely missing from the AV amp.
(the amp stages were compared with the same external DAC)
I was saddened how much difference there was as I hoped the Onkyo would hold its head up, so I gave it to my father.

You said you werent giving a tutorial, I'm up to speed thankyou.

Can you point out which parts of the [H] reviews on power supplies are relevant to this discussion? (skip the simple stuff)
Toroids are used on lower end hifi as well as high end, the quality and power handling vary substantially.


You should be able to answer some easy questions.
Which toroid did you use, there is quite a broad range and how many VA did you settle on?
Which harmonics did you find were reduced by the use of a toroid?

Are you running class A or a hybrid?
What damping factor did you achieve?
Can you describe the impulse response?
At what THD did you finally rate your RMS power output and what RMS did you achieve?

You say I dont know what "Linearity, efficiency, signal-to-noise, etc.." are, yet you own up to using a basic circuit and put different capacitors on it to set up a feedback loop. There wasnt really any design, more part selection.
You barely had need to consider them yourself.

fyi:
Linearity is an expression of variation (or lack of) in the rate of change.
Efficiency is the rate of loss expressed as power out / power in.
Signal to noise is a ratio of background noise to signal strength.

None of these define sound quality, they are basic parameters that can be used many times throughout a design.
Did you choose the LM3886 on any other criteria?
Click to expand...

I concede. I now understand that electrical signals running into speakers can only be measured by the amount of fairy dust that's been sprinkled onto the equipment and what the Magnolia salesman at Best Buy told me were good metrics to go by.

Thank you for making me realize that I'm wasting my time getting an education. I'm heading to the registrar's office now to withdraw.
 
Sadly the audiophile world is filled with bullshit and misinformation from people trying to sell you $1000 cables and other crap that doesn't stand up to solid electrical analysis and double blind testing. You certainly don't need the sound card for the processing power these days, it should easily be handled by the CPU. Get one if you want to run analog out from your computer, otherwise spend the cash on the external device and try to make sure you're using HDMI in one of the better quality modes.
 
I'm going out on a limb to say, anyone under 40 years old doesn't even know what Hi Fi is.

As soon as Sony got involved, the move to compact convenience crushed any interest in "golden eared" quality and technical excellence. "Hi Fi" ended.

Given two setups, a mic amp speaker playing a sound ... vs ... a 24/192 recording of that sound, played through the same amp and speaker, and you can tell the difference ... you're a better man than I. Arguing over the last .01% THD is kind of silly.

I used to work for a high end speaker company in the 70's. Starting on the assembly line after school, to engineering as a college coop. 99% of the industry died off by 85'. Whether it was the shift to mobility or cheap prices, or the classical/Jazz crowd dying off, the vast majority of consumers stopped giving a shit. If it sounded good, that was enough, the "specs" and science were irrelevant.

Meantime, yeah the nForce II sound circuit and software was really excellent. NVidia screwed the pooch not staying with it and really perfecting the design ... I think high end niche products would have been profitable to this day.

I find it much more annoying that most HDMI/SPDIF outputs are limited in software to placate the Blu Ray overlords and not allow full 5.1/7.1 raw audio, instead shipping lower quality levels for fear the precious audio content might end up recorded somehow in it's full glory by those heinous content copiers... er, I mean customers. We will sell you full fidelity, we just own't let you actually listen to it...

YOU CAN'T HANDLE THE SOUND!!

I have that NForce II Asus M3N78PRO board still, as the basis for my home theater since it was the last one to get away with allowing full 5.1 through HDMI unmolested. Such a shame they stopped supporting the driver software, so it will be stuck in time till obsolete.
 
xX326Xx said:
My onboard sounds great to me. Got sick of the incompatibility back in the day. Optical out to my Logitech z5500's. Maybe it doesn't sound as good as a high end sound card. I'd be hard pressed to spend more money on my system to try, then not notice the difference. Maybe I'm getting old... heh.
Click to expand...

If you have optical out on your motherboard, then it came with decent onboard sound. Even Realtek has the ability to do DDL and DTS, given that you have that specific chip. Even though it's a software feature that can probably be done with any Realtek hardware. But once the sound from your PC leaves as digital, then it's all about the speakers and receiver.

Once you have a decent receiver and speakers, then there's no need to ever replace them. A lot of people will tell you that a lot of older hardware does a better job with sound then modern hardware, as they got cheaper with the quality of the components. As for the PC, the only concern about digital output is how much of a load it puts on the CPU. Pretty much every sound card today uses software to do DDL or DTS output, and compresses the hell out of it in the process.

If your sound card is PCI, or PCI-E with chip that converts PCI to PCI-E (cause a lot of PCI-E cards are really PCI), then it compresses the digital data by a significant amount. Even some of the Creative sound cards do this, and audio quality is lost. That's why sometimes it's best to use the DAC on your soundcard over the digital output. There's also the issues with latency delays as well, since again the DDL/DTS data is so huge that the bandwidth it sucks out of your PC can cause delays.

This is why I still think the best sound ever came from Nvidia's original MCP-T SoundStorm. Due mainly that it never used PCI, but hypertransport for data. Unlike modern day PCI-E 1X port which is only 250 GB/s, the original SoundStorm had 800 GB/s bandwidth.
 
How do you figure you need high bandwidth for audio? Lets assume 32 bit (4 Bytes) at 192KHz and 8 channels. 4 * 192 * 8 = 6144 KB/s or about 6 MB/s. Not exactly high bandwidth and that is high quality RAW.
 
TroubleMagnet said:
How do you figure you need high bandwidth for audio? Lets assume 32 bit (4 Bytes) at 192KHz and 8 channels. 4 * 192 * 8 = 6144 KB/s or about 6 MB/s. Not exactly high bandwidth and that is high quality RAW.
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Don't remember where I read it, but that was the explanation as to why SoundStorm was the best. Remember most sound cards already had bandwidth issues in the past with PCI, so something like DDL or DTS pushed it over the edge. Especially Creative sound cards, which had issues with sound cutting out specifically for this reason. That's also the reason why most PCI sound cards do DTS but not DDL, due to bandwidth. Modern day DDL and DTS are heavily compressed and may sound worse then using a DAC. Just depends on the sound card.

Also what you're describing is pass through from like a DVD or Blu-Ray disc, straight to receiver. I'd imagine to do something like Dolby Digital Live or DTS would require more bandwidth with the sound card itself.
 
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