recommend me a sound card

ergonomics · 20 Jun 2007 at 19:54

hello. i know absolutely nothing about sound cards. im fine with everything else , but ive never once looked into them.

heres the situation. i have come across a marantz cr-601 DAB player (nice piece of kit) and some rather large ex studio mission speakers. its linked to my pc mobo audio. the sound is great from these beasts, but my musician mate says i should buy a soundcard to fully enjoy these.

i game a lot, i dont watch that many films, only have 2 speakers (in front of me) and i do enjoy listenin to loud music.

what do you people think? from both high and low ends of the scale.

thankyou

edit: here is a pic (i really like them as you can guess)

sorry for using photobucket (and the crappy quality)

MofoKilla · 20 Jun 2007 at 23:07

Any of the XFI cards should do the trick.

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=SC-045-CL&groupid=701&catid=11&subcat=

Hen_Dawg · 21 Jun 2007 at 16:58

X-fi for best gaming experience and better than on-board music

M-Audio range or E-MU for best music experience but no gaming support

jbloggs · 21 Jun 2007 at 20:48

Hen_Dawg said:
X-fi for best gaming experience and better than on-board music

M-Audio range or E-MU for best music experience but no gaming support

Indeed so!

MagicBoy · 24 Jun 2007 at 01:15

Mission 731s?

I've got a pair in my computer room with some old but still decent separates...

I'm also looking for a new PCI soundcard. The onboard sucks, and my old SB Live sounds utterly utterly terrible under Vista. Any suggestions?

Hen_Dawg · 24 Jun 2007 at 15:05

Quick suggestions below, these are for music listening, not gaming or surround etc.
M-Audio Audiophile 192
M-Audio 2496
E-MU 0404

mrk · 24 Jun 2007 at 15:53

It would be interesting to see if there are comparative reviews of the M-Audio cards VS X-Fi because if the gaming FPS in new games is only minial amount of difference (say 5fps) then I wills ell my XFI and get an M-Audio card!

Hen_Dawg · 24 Jun 2007 at 21:27

I can't comment on M-Audio but my E-MU 0404 just doesn't work in some games at all. They really aren't built fot it.

FPS improvement with X-Fi is generally 5 or so

Greenlizard0 · 24 Jun 2007 at 21:32

I have a Fata1ty card just because it came with the breakout box/front bay. I just don't want headphone cables trawling to the back of my machine and it's a real pity that Creative only do breakout boxes because my computer is primarily used for music - I think I have only ever played 2 maybe 3 games to completion recently on a PC.

chaparral · 25 Jun 2007 at 00:40

greenlizard0 said:
it's a real pity that Creative only do breakout boxes because my computer is primarily used for music

But you couldn't used any breakout box with a audio output if you wanted a different soundcard..