Onboard Sound vs Discrete Add-in Cards - Revisit
- Thread starter bfar
- Start date
I've gone from onboard, to a xonar ds to a creative x-fi in the last couple of months.
On XP i spent a lot on an audigy 2zs, which was useless on vista, and returned to onboard.
Whilst you can have 7.1 onboard sound it doesn't offer a lot in terms of functionality, the cheapest entry level card (£40) will be a huge improvement in terms of versatility and sound quality.
An even better card (£70) will offer even greater functionality (upmix from stereo to pseudo-surround, full eax in games, crystalizer on x-fi cards) and better FPS.
if you are a perfectionist (or just picky) you wouldn't want to step down from a sound card to onboard.
On XP i spent a lot on an audigy 2zs, which was useless on vista, and returned to onboard.
Whilst you can have 7.1 onboard sound it doesn't offer a lot in terms of functionality, the cheapest entry level card (£40) will be a huge improvement in terms of versatility and sound quality.
An even better card (£70) will offer even greater functionality (upmix from stereo to pseudo-surround, full eax in games, crystalizer on x-fi cards) and better FPS.
if you are a perfectionist (or just picky) you wouldn't want to step down from a sound card to onboard.
Soldato
- Joined
- 2 Nov 2007
- Posts
- 4,184
Onboard sound has hardly progressed at all. Still terrible quality and picks up so much interference. Fine if you just use digital, but not for analogue.
Associate
- Joined
- 21 May 2009
- Posts
- 245
The 889's specs are surprisingly good, slightly above those of the current Xfi (but not the Xonars). Though with onboard electronic noise and EMI is always going to be very high even though the chip iteself may be good.
Whilst I tend to agree with add in sound cards and have always used them in games, I have found there are problems with the latest drivers for Windows 7 (X64) see my link....
http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showthread.php?t=18054158
http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showthread.php?t=18054158
Realteks ALC889A is superb because it now comes with Dolby Home Theatre which sounds amazing on both games & hidef movies with no game sound stuttering even on analog.
But overall I still prefer my Asus Xonar D2X as that has Dolby Digital Live encoding as well as many other features which just make games & movies sound very lifelike.
If you get a decent high end motherboard with the newist onboard Realtek then unless your willing to spend another £150+ on a decent soundcard it will be more than good enough for most users.
But overall I still prefer my Asus Xonar D2X as that has Dolby Digital Live encoding as well as many other features which just make games & movies sound very lifelike.
If you get a decent high end motherboard with the newist onboard Realtek then unless your willing to spend another £150+ on a decent soundcard it will be more than good enough for most users.
Soldato
onboard is fine if you use the digital connection.