Internal sound card vs External USB DAC

[Kueller]

So I impulse bought one of those microcenter G3258+mobo deals for $100 without really thinking about it. It's turning out to be a storage/HTPC box and I want better audio than the MSI Z97 PC Mate mobo provides (it's noisy, speakers hiss when nothing's playing).

So internal discrete sound card, or HifimeDIY Sabre U2 asynchronous DAC?

If internal, what's the best bang for my buck?

 

[Bluesun311]

I don't know what bang for your buck means anymore maybe. I bought an Asus Essence STX and I don't need to look further so it was an excellent way to go. But my needs are 99% music and 1% gaming.

There are definitely cheaper good options but I don't think external makes much improvement in the signal clarity area, at least on the z87/97 Hero.

Couple weird things about DACs. Use them! Play around with the settings... 24bit-44.8Khz isn't necessarily the right way to go for the Essence and I think 32bit/96Khz are definitely not useful for playback--I've noticed the STX has different drivers for Win7 and Win8 and the sound is different/better on 8... it likes 44.8Khz and the noise floor is empty like deep space. Windows 7 with the same internal DAC 44.8Khz sounds buggy to me and likes 44.1... which isn't as good, but maybe I'm crazy. I've certainly not tested this with an A/B switch so I'm not sure at all.

I wouldn't necessarily recommend the Essence, but it works great for me. Best sounding stereo system I've ever had in my home is the Essence, Win8 and the litttle Blue Sky eXo 2.1. But I'm new to home stereo as I always lived in apartments previously I'll get something bigger if we move to a bigger house.

 

[Bluesun311]

But if I was going to get an external DAC... which I could imagine to save space in the case I would get one of these JDS Labs ODACs. I like how they offer an RCA out version. They are tiny. But the one with the headphones amp in it its $280

I'd probably recommend the FiiO E17 Alpen Portable Headphone Amplifier USB DAC for reasonable money with amp built in but I have no personal experience with it, I'm just echoing some best external DAC pages I saw.