Sound card Vs Onboard

neilzomg · 30 May 2009 at 00:41

Hello, With todays motherboards onboard sound has increased in quality And with todays processors the need for a dedicated card is decreasing.

So whats the difference between onboard sound and a dedicated sound card?

how much of a performance boost does it give in games?

Is there an increase in sound quality (including surround sound and dolby sound)

Is it worthit for £100 sound cards such as Creative Fatal1ty x-fi sound card?

Share thoughts.

siumatfung · 30 May 2009 at 00:42

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=SC-000-AS

sooooooooooooo much better than onboard sound man

neilzomg · 30 May 2009 at 00:44

All of those high end sound cards are good yeah.. but what about all of the chaper ones? sound blasters for example

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=SC-040-CL&groupid=701&catid=11&subcat=

J.B · 30 May 2009 at 01:02

If you are going to buy a cheap soundcard then there is no point over the on board ones. I have a Creative X-Fi Titanium and there is a noticable difference.

I was torn between the X-Fi and the Xonar, was leaning towards the Xonar but got a good deal on this card second hand.

Audigex · 30 May 2009 at 01:44

Dedicated sound cards do still make a difference if you're an audiophile, for those of us who stick spotify on for half an hour to break the silence there's not much point. :-)

Cannaton · 30 May 2009 at 08:43

The quality of your audio system also makes a big difference. If you're playing through a decent amp / hifi speakers combination you'd probably hear a more noticeable difference than if you're using PC Speakers.

shadowake · 30 May 2009 at 09:56

I run 7.1 Creative Gigaworks speakers on an XFi Fatality Xtreme Gamer in a 2m square room, the sound quality is insane, I have to turn down the bass and trebble if I'm gaming for too long or I feel sick :S

fobose · 30 May 2009 at 10:01

I have the 2.1 Creative Megaworks 250D and absolutley love them, but I mainly use onboard sound!

shadowake · 30 May 2009 at 10:07

If your not sure just use on board, see if it's good enough, if it's not pop in a decent card later

neilzomg · 30 May 2009 at 10:13

I was just wondering

I did order a cheap sound blaster card, but thats because my onboard is either a bad chip, or the drivers overall are bad. My mate has the same pc as me only difference is my psu, gfx card. In games we get random game crashes with looping sound, replaced ethernet and everything, the hardrives are fine so the only thing i could think of was sound.

Im not an audiophile as you say, although i do allot of guitar playing/ music recording for the likes of youtube. Im sure this will easily replace my realtek "HD" beacuse it's giving me a headache, and also my counter-strike source clan while were in a league match :s those crashes when im playing league matches arent doing me any favours.

shadowake · 30 May 2009 at 10:22

Sounds like drivers, I had the same problem when I first built my machine using the drivers on the disk. Downloaded the latest from the web and no problems for nearly 2 years