Good sound card?

P

pclov3r

Limp Gawd
Joined
Feb 14, 2010
Messages
441
Whats a good sound card for around 100$ I was looking at some Asus cards but unsure.

I'm sick of Creatives crappy drivers.
 
Asus Xonar series.
The DG is decent and cheap. I went all out and got the Essnce STX though to support 600 Ohm headphones ;-)
 
If you can wait a few weeks I would suggested the ODAC (http://nwavguy.blogspot.com/) which is essentially a VERY high quality USB soundcard will come out for right around $100. The performance of this is supposed to be along the lines of the very finest audio equipment- 24 bit encoding, 192khz sample rate, completely flat, noiseless response with insanely low noise. If it does what it's supposed to do- and this guy's record suggests that it will exceed his goal specs- you could hardly do better at any price. I have one of his headphones amplifiers (which is also less than $100 when I bought it) and it's completely amazing. The ODAC will also be driverless (none required, works with any OS/any version), portable and super efficient.
 
guisar said:
If you can wait a few weeks I would suggested the ODAC (http://nwavguy.blogspot.com/) which is essentially a VERY high quality USB soundcard will come out for right around $100. The performance of this is supposed to be along the lines of the very finest audio equipment- 24 bit encoding, 192khz sample rate, completely flat, noiseless response with insanely low noise. If it does what it's supposed to do- and this guy's record suggests that it will exceed his goal specs- you could hardly do better at any price. I have one of his headphones amplifiers (which is also less than $100 when I bought it) and it's completely amazing. The ODAC will also be driverless (none required, works with any OS/any version), portable and super efficient.
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Well he (Nwavguy) said at best it will be mid-may. And, if the OP doesn't plan on listening to FLAC all the time nor plan on using headphones, the ODAC won't make any sense for him.

To the OP: What exactly are you looking for? Are you going to be using speakers? Headphones?

Cheers,
 
Benjus said:
Well he (Nwavguy) said at best it will be mid-may. And, if the OP doesn't plan on listening to FLAC all the time nor plan on using headphones, the ODAC won't make any sense for him.

To the OP: What exactly are you looking for? Are you going to be using speakers? Headphones?

Cheers,
Click to expand...

Actually, It would. I enjoy FLAC and use a pair of ATH-M50 headphones.
 
Nwavguy kinda lives in his own world. While he makes good points here and there he is quite egotistical about other things.

I would wait for a general census before buying anything new from him.

ASUS DG if you want cheap but quality sound.
 
belmicah said:
Asus Xonar series.
The DG is decent and cheap. I went all out and got the Essnce STX though to support 600 Ohm headphones ;-)
Click to expand...

Do you actually have a set of headphones with over 50ohms of resistance? I'm starting to think anything above 200 is crazy. Even studio monitors I have seem never have anything near 600.
 
OFaceSIG said:
Do you actually have a set of headphones with over 50ohms of resistance? I'm starting to think anything above 200 is crazy. Even studio monitors I have seem never have anything near 600.
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There are many which have over 50 Ohm input Impedence.

May I refer you to essentially the ENTIRE Beyerdynamic DT line. All three models come in 80/250/600 ohm varieties as well as 32ohm, but even those aren't very sensitive and some claim they take more power than the 80s.

Also, check out Planar Magnetic headphones. Many have an input impedance of greater than 50 ohms (Notable Exceptions: HiFiMan HE-500/400).

Cheers,
 
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