What's a decent soundcard these days?

darael

darael

darael

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Once upon a time Creative were regarded as decent soundcards. I bought my Creative X-Fi XtremeMusic at this time, but now I'm am very sick of the drivers for the ageing soundcard.

I only have PCI slots free, but I could free up a PCI Express slot up by removing my USB 3.0 card.

I heard that Asus soundcards were good. But I can't really make out which is the best card for me from their website. I'd really like one that matches or betters the quality of the X-Fi, rather than a downgrade.

My budget is £50, but this could be expanded within reason.
 
Ive got an asus xonar essence STX which I bought coming from an X fi Titanium that I had and its incredible.

Its more than double your £50 budget but with the right speaker setup its worth every penny. The asus cards are way better than the creative ones IMO.

You can get xonar cards starting at £20 I think so theres a card for every budget
 
Personally, I wouldn't buy a PCI sound card now.. On the next gen motherboards PCI is getting rarer and rarer.

I actually think that when Creative released the XFI Xtreme Music, it was too good. The cards themselves are indestructible, they just have really terrible drivers. Did Creative did this on purpose to force people to 'upgrade' to newer cards..?

Finally ditched mine for a Xonar DX. Asus aren't known for their awesome driver releases either, but in my experience, they're the better of the two.
 
darael said:
Ouch I never intended spending so close to £100 on a soundcard. What's special about it compared to the £50 model?
Click to expand...

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=SC-005-AS&groupid=701&catid=11&subcat=

You can read the bumf on it here. Way over your budget I know so why not check out this one?

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=SC-002-AS&groupid=701&catid=11&subcat=

You should post this in the sound section. Guys in there will be able to tell you exactly what everything means :)
 
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im going to say the same as cammy and bledd,got rid of my creative card a year or so ago and went to asus.

so glad i did,ive got a asus xonar d2 with a set of z5500,cant see me changing either or a very long time.
 
Budget you need for the card would depend a lot on what will be connected to it. No point spending small fortune on the soundcard if your headset/speakers are cheap.

Decent creative drivers can be had if you look (Daniel_K or PAX drivers)
 
Ultimately depends on what the speakers/headphones are. Unless you have £100+ headphones or some impressive speakers, I'd go for a DX. The cheaper Xonar's DGX and DSX may be step down from the X-Fi you have, so I wouldn't go for either of those.

As other have said, PCIe would be the better choice really, as PCI will be phased out at some point.
 
Well the soundcard will be connected to mid-range, avergae, amplified sound system with 5.1 sound. I'm not looking for studio quality, but I don't want to regret buying a rubbish soundcard either!
 
Buy the cheaper one and check it out, return if it doesn't perform better than the creative.

I can't speak to the quality of the dg myself, reviews seem v good, I've owned the d2 and stx, both very good.
 
Both me and my friend have asus xonar d1 cards and have both had to take them out of our system as we get really bad buzzing on them with microphones when playing games with our friends. Tried switching mine to different pci ports but it doesnt help, its almost like it gets interference from within the case but we both have the same issue with different cases and components.

I am just using the onboard sound now and dont have the problems when using mumble etc.
 
They all sound the same to me as long as they work. I've had an X-Fi but currently use my Audigy 2ZS, upgrading isn't going to offer better sound unless you are a complete audiophile.

Creative drivers are useless, I will never buy a Creative sound card again because of this. Fortunately you can download the custom "PAX" Audigy or X-Fi drivers for free and they work really well.

http://www.hardwareheaven.com/pax-drivers/

I would be getting an Asus card if my Audigy died.
 
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I always find it amazing how companies get a bad name. Sure, yeah creative drivers used to suck, but for the last couple of years they have been pretty good. On the other hand Asus sound card drivers really do suck at the moment. To swear that you would never buy a product from creative again for bad drivers is a bit extreme especially since, as you said, there are PAX drivers that work perfectly.

Asus sound cards have needed help too, they have the unified drivers which are much better and way more stable.

To the OP, when you say you are connecting to a 5.1 sound system, will you be connecting using analog cables or digital (coaxial or optical) ?

At your budget, well, if you are using headphones a lot get the Xonar DG. If you will be using the speakers most then really depends on use. IF mainly gaming I would seriously consider getting the REcon 3D. If doing a mix of music, gaming and movies then you can't go wrong with the D1 or DX, they are the same card just one is for PCI and one if for PCI-Express.

Just one thing, if you are connecting to the 5.1 sound system using optical or coaxial only then there is no point in getting a sound card, just stick with the onboard audio.
 
Melmac,

If i'm brutally honest, i hate asus, I wish the card was made by any other company than them, unfortunately they currently do the best range of sound cards.

Obviously quite a few people think the drivers suck and go with the unified ones, I personally have never had a problem with them across several different motherboards/cases this goes for the d2 and stx, cant say the same for my previous creative cards.

anyway, as it's been said, let us know what you will be connecting it too and you will prob get some more suggestions... but as i said, if not sure, buy one and test it yourself - everyone has different tastes
 
Llamadal, cant argue with you about the hardware. Asus have a better range of cards out there at the moment. All I was saying is that you should buy the best hardware because generally speaking both companies have driver problems but there are 3rd party drivers out there for both. And lately creative have much improved drivers.

And I think creative will have as strong a line up of cards as Asus by Christmas. The new line of cards look very good. The ZXR, ZX and Z have the same headphone amp that is the the asus st and stx. The DAC is the same as the one in the Titanium HD. They have also have sound core3d cpu onboard. It seems Music gets routed through the DAC while gaming audio goes through the core3d processor. Not sure how this works in practice :-)
 
Im still using my XFI Xtreme Music and I have no probs in win7, but Im using about 2yr old drivers. But I refuse to change these as the drivers still work perfectly in all games. Like they say "If its not broke, dont fix it"

image2sz.jpg
 
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My advice is buy a second hand xonar dx or dsx etc from the members market there's always soundcards going in there.I would definitely say a lot of people have swapped to asus xonars myself included a long time ago.I wouldn't call it a massive upgrade from an xfi xtreme music but dolby headphone can be good and of course as poorly updated as they are anything beats creative drivers cant say I have ever had any issues in years of using xonar no crashes no game issues i can think of at all.
 
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