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Please recommend a sound card

J

Jon55

2[H]4U
Joined
Jul 7, 2008
Messages
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For a long time I've been in the camp of, 'sound cards are not needed and onboard sound is fine' and for simple 2.1 computer speakers it still seems true. But I've been using my new 5.1 system lately (which is an Onkyo HT-R390 receiver + speakers, 2011 model) that I picked up about a week ago, and I'm very happy with it. But now I'm starting to wonder if a sound card will do some good.

So I'm asking if you could recommend a good sound card for me. My primary use is gaming and movies/TV. I'm very much in the dark as far as sound cards go, although I've heard Creative is generally crappy when it comes to drivers.

My specs:
Onkyo HT-R390
i5 760
ASUS P7P55D Pro
XFX 6950 2GB
Windows 7 64-bit
 
Last edited:
Which receiver? (make/model - be specific)
Motherboard?
OS?
GPU?
 
If you're looking for 5.1 and to use it with Movies/TV and with a brand new Yamaha receiver (depending on model) you may as well just use any card that will support DDL.

But to narrow down your needs please answer the above by 450
 
450 said:
Which receiver? (make/model - be specific)
Motherboard?
OS?
GPU?
Click to expand...

My bad, don't know how I managed to leave it out. Original post has been updated.

Rossi~ said:
If you're looking for 5.1 and to use it with Movies/TV and with a brand new Yamaha receiver (depending on model) you may as well just use any card that will support DDL.

But to narrow down your needs please answer the above by 450
Click to expand...

I'm posting this question for a friend setup, and for whatever reason thought it was a Yamaha receiver but it's actually an Onkyo receiver + speakers. I've updated my original post.
 
FYI, You may be stuffed regarding the onboard optical and DDL http://www.viaarena.com/forums/showthread.php?t=43470 so yes i would look at a cheap soundcard that supports DDL. Creative seem to have the cheapest cards for this route i do believe but their drivers are questionable apparently. I wil leave this up to 450, spaceman and the others to answer. I don't have much experience with 5.1 through a soundcard, only passthrough via a graphics card or 2 channels.
 
Creative's drivers weren't crappy they were simply non-existent. They saw their business model disappearing, so rather than adapt they tried to force all their current customers to buy new hardware when moving to vista/win7. Creative audio stuff is alot like OCZ power supplies: you get what you pay for.

If you're looking to run everything digitally to your receiver there is very little advantage in going with any audio card: all you're going to get is some DSP options, most of which are gimmicks, and a *very* minimal reduction in CPU usage (and asking as a software engineering student, wtf is the point in buying 19 core CPU's if you're not going to let any of em do any work?)

I'd suggest you do what Rossi~ is doing, bridge your audio out through your 6950 over HDMI to your Onkyo HT-R390. Its a nice unit.
 
Kind of what I was expecting. Thank you very much for the help guys.
 
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