Xonar DX + Sennheiser 595.

[Unknown-One]

So, I just ordered an Asus Xonar DX and a set of Sennheiser HD 595's to go with it. I'm coming from an Audigy 2 which I've only ever used with speakers, so this is a pretty big upgrade for me

This is my first foray into anything even approaching high-end audio, and I'm understandably a bit clueless. It took quite a bit of reading (and some nice sales) just to come to this sound card and these headphones. Figured I'd ask if I've made some kind of gigantic mistake while I still have time to cancel my order (the hardware will be here in a couple days).

Now...onto the questions.
I know the 595's are easy to drive, and the Xonar has a decent built-in amp, so would I be correct in assuming that a dedicated headphone amp would be a bit overkill?
Is there any special configuration or EQ I'll need to do on the Xonar for headphones?
I've heard good things about Dolby Headphone, and I can't wait to try it out. Anyone here have any experience with it?
How is the Xonar at switching between speakers and headphone configurations? Not too many knobs and levers I hope?

 

[Valaire]

I have both of those so let me chime in:

1. Will you get a better sound using an amp? Maybe/likely. Is it significantly better given the low resitsance of the headphones? Probably not.

2. Matter of taste. I personally like using Dolby Headphone with my set to listen to music and to game. With dolby headphone off, the music is not projected outside your head and it causes me listener fatigue.

3. It's a bit of a pain for me to switch. I wish someone would develop a small app for it. I use an audio switch for my headphones and speakers. When I switch from my headphones to speakers, for example, I do the following: (1) flip the switch; (2) lower Windows volume from 85% to around 15%; and (3) change drop down to 8 channel (if gaming/movie) or leave at 2 channel (for music), and enable Dolby Headphone.

You can also use the presets which aren't bad. For gaming though, I tend to do it differently than their 'gaming' preset. I enable Dolby Headphone, but also enable 7.1 virtual speaker shifter.

 

[Unknown-One]

HD 595's showed up today, still waiting on the Xonar. They already sound excellent with my Audigy 2, which makes me wonder what kind of improvement I'll see from using a Xonar instead...

Oh, is there a burn-in period on these headphones that I should be aware of, or are they ready to go out-of-the-box? I've heard that a couple of other models need to be broken in for a couple of days before they reach their final sound, not sure if that applies to the 595's here.

 

[Valaire]

I burned them in anyway to avoid that variable. And the Xonar is a great soundcard at a great value. Buy with confidence.

 

[Unknown-One]

The Xonar has turned out to be one big headache, actually...

Immediately after installing the card, my boot time went into the stratosphere. Windows took at least ten times longer to start up, and when it did, a lot of services had failed to start (icons missing from the system tray). I managed to start everything manually and install Asus's drivers. Aug, they're horrible. The audio control panel in Creative's drivers is FAR less bloated than this monstrosity Asus has come up with.

I rebooted my system to see if the startup issue was a one-time thing... it wasn't. Startup is compleatly FUBAR with this card installed. Removing the Xonar immediately returns bootup to normal, so it's the new card causing the problem for sure.

Is this a known issue? Bad card? Known fixes? I'm pretty close to just returning it...

 

[Valaire]

I'm sorry you are having trouble. I've never had a problem like what you are describing and I have reinstalled the software on my Xonar several times and moved it between 2 motherboards.

Perhaps it is a bad card? Can you try it in another computer to eliminate your computer as a culprit of some kind?

The software isn't bloated in the sense that there is much being loaded. The control panel is ugly, yes, but it's fairly lightweight and is the ONLY thing that should have been installed beyond the driver itself.