Soundcard Query

[TheRedanian]

Soundcard Query

Is it true that any external Audio Card is better than Realtek audio no matter how modern or boasted with features.

I have a Creative SoundBlaster X-FI XtremeGamer lying around, which is old but still has driver support; should I use it stead of onboard audio?

 

[Georgie_Porgie]

Is it true that any external Audio Card is better than Realtek audio no matter how modern or boasted with features.

I have a Creative SoundBlaster X-FI XtremeGamer lying around, which is old but still has driver support; should I use it stead of onboard audio?

Internal sound cards are almost always nonsense. Don't know what motherboard you have but I'm almost 100% sure it won't differ from onboard audio better.

I suggest watching this video which explains all this nonsense surrounding internal soundcards.
[media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d1rXcJuEsy0[/media]

 

[501105]

Yeah the whole soundcard thing has basically turned into nothing but a money sink with semi modern motherboards.

 

[TheRedanian]

So you guys are saying that External cards are BS, and Realtek ALC chips are better than them?

 

[501105]

So you guys are saying that External cards are BS, and Realtek ALC chips are better than them?

Not exactly but when you have a good modern mobo the extra cost for a good sound card is not really worth it and hardly any better in general. No insult intended though, I know some are very sensitive when it comes to their soundcard purchase and justification.

 

[TheRedanian]

Not exactly but when you have a good modern mobo the extra cost for a good sound card is not really worth it and hardly any better in general. No insult intended though, I know some are very sensitive when it comes to their soundcard purchase and justification.

Thank you but I am not being sensitive, I just want a reason to keep this card otherwise I will drop it out. The thing I wanted to know is that even though it's aged should it still pack punch required in modern apps, and there's no point comparing Internal software driven audio with standalone ones. They simply do not compare.

 

[501105]

If you have a modern system with a good mobo and thus a decent sound chip, then I see no reason to keep the card (unless it is not actually that old). Sound is a tricky thing though, you may as well pop the card in and out to compare the sound and see what fancies you most.

 

[SkycladGuardian]

Hm, all I can say is, I experienced a notable overall improvement of sound playback on my rig after I switched from onboard to an Auzentech Prelude. Why don't you just plug it in, listen if there's any improvement. If there's none, you can still get rid of it.

 

[GuyNwah]

With onboard sound, I have had more problems due to AD chips than Realtek ones. But I have nothing good to say about Realtek either.

If you have nothing better than CD-quality audio or MP3 to play through computer speakers anyway, onboard sound is as good as any cheap soundcard.

If you have a serious investment in audio material of higher quality, and speakers capable of rendering it, a professional audio card will be only a small but entirely necessary part of your investment.

 

[Garrison72]

With onboard sound, I have had more problems due to AD chips than Realtek ones. But I have nothing good to say about Realtek either.

If you have nothing better than CD-quality audio or MP3 to play through computer speakers anyway, onboard sound is as good as any cheap soundcard.

If you have a serious investment in audio material of higher quality, and speakers capable of rendering it, a professional audio card will be only a small but entirely necessary part of your investment.

When you say higher quality, are you referring to people creating actual music on their PC's? Or will it enhance sound for gaming, even if you have quality headphones? I personally use headphones only.

 

[GuyNwah]

When you say higher quality, are you referring to people creating actual music on their PC's? Or will it enhance sound for gaming, even if you have quality headphones? I personally use headphones only.

If the game has good sound, and you have good headphones (Grado, Sennheiser, etc.), it will improve sound. Same if you have a library of quality music recordings in lossless (FLAC) or high quality format (Ogg Vorbis, CELT/Opus).

Of course, sound perception is so subjective that any two people can hear different results from the same equipment.

 

[SkycladGuardian]

Of course, sound perception is so subjective that any two people can hear different results from the same equipment.

Indeed, my wife still refuses to hear the vast improvements of my new Elac speakers over the old quadrals.

 

[Zanderat]

Sorry but sound quality is as important to me as visual quality. No onboard solution exists today that is as good as even an old X-Fi Xtreme Music.

 

[bors_mistral]

Sorry but sound quality is as important to me as visual quality. No onboard solution exists today that is as good as even an old X-Fi Xtreme Music.

That's not entirely correct. If you use the optical out on your onboard audio (or the HDMI on a recent AMD video card) and connect that to an audio receiver... Then again, you can't really compare most bookshelf speakers to more or less any "PC" speakers. Then again, there are a lot of PC speaker sets that already have optical input, so we don't need to bring a receiver and bookshelf speakers into the equation at all.

Bottom line: if your speakers have optical input, use that and what sound-card you have won't really matter. Unless you want to play an old game that natively supports EAX...

 

[adridu59]

Fairly recent Realtek codec are pretty good contrary to what people might think, but what really matters looking at onboard sound is it's electrical implementation: caps, AMP, isolated PCB, eventual shielding etc.
You can have pretty good sound implementations depending on the motherboard (if you have an OEM PC, then it's most likely not the case), e.g. Gigabyte Z87 boards, Asus ROG, ASRock Z87 marketed as "Purity Sound".

Anything from ALC889/892 is pretty good, after that it all depends from your physical implementation. Recent motherboards tend to use the more recent ALC898 (which has a variant called ALC1500 or ALC900).

Here is an example with an ASRock Z87 Extreme4:

Here you can clearly see isolated PCB, dedicated caps and AMP. This will produce a crisp, good sound. It uses an ALC1500 (ALC900) BTW.

 

[Zanderat]

Technical specs aside, jack of all trades implementations are never as good as a dedicated solution. I believe my ears.

(Speakers are not a limiting factor for me. They are high end, as are my headphones.)