Soundcards

[Elle T]

Anyone know a soundcard with decent DVD & sound input/output.
Need one that can plug into sterio system.

[Glycerine]

optical outs for the sterio?? or RCA??

[Elle T]

As in full sterio plugs

[whetu]

elle t, ANY soundcard can hook up to a stereo that has RCA inputs...

what we need to know is this:

* what you want to hook it up to
* the medium you are going to use to do it: RCA, Toslink, SPDIF?
* perhaps a little background information such as what you intend to apply it to... is it a low power system that goes in your lounge and hooks up to your tv, or have you dragged a stereo over to your computer?

basically the cards you want to look at are the Philips Acoustic Edge, TurtleBeach SantaCruz, Hercules GameTheaterXP and last and least the CreativeLabs Audigy.

[Elle T]

well if this helps the Philips one didn't have the plugs needed.

Not for me of course but a friend whos building a machine & wants to hook it up to a $6000 sterio because he makes his own tracks.

[Ragnor]

first:
>> stereo .. with a 'e'


now hmm you really need more infomation.

but in any case he will probably have an amp in there... soundcards don't provide enough power own there own for anything serious.

Wouldn't most decent amps would have SPDIF in & out meaning you could use TEH Acoustic Edge

;)

[whetu]

Originally posted by Elle T
Anyone know a soundcard with decent DVD & sound input/output.
yeah sure.. i'm using one.. its called the PHILIPS ACOUSTIC EDGE. other options that are suitable, I have listed above in my previous post. Decent DVD and sound i/o instantly means DIGITAL CONNECTIVITY. so for that you will need either of the following, or both:
*TOSLINK (optical)
*SPDIF (coaxial)

Need one that can plug into sterio system.
as i said before.. ANY SOUNDCARD can plug into a stereo system. Go to the warehouse. Go to their A/V section and ask for a 3.5mm to 2x RCA Y Cable. Buy the cable, take it home, and see if you can figure it out. (no really.. it takes quite a bit of brain power)
<--Find the invisible sarcasm spots and win a prize //-->
until we get more info, we cant be much more helpful to you....
"Not for me of course but a friend whos building a machine & wants to hook it up to a $6000 sterio because he makes his own tracks."
That means jack (pun?) Is he a professional muso or just a guy with a computer and an audio loop proggy?

If he's a pro, then you're asking in the wrong place, and he should know all by himself. If he's an amateur, then I suggest either the GTXP ORRRRRRRRR if you hang on.. I might be able to sort out something that goes by the name of Guillemot....

Get the info.. then we can help you out a LOT better

[shag]

I'll recomend the gametheater xp

I gots one and it roxors .:cool:

Dolby digital / dts 6.1 with rca's for every channel for basic amps and the usual optical / coaxial outs for a dolby amp. It also has usb and midi connections.

And it matches the blue trim on my HQ08 case nicely :p

Who knows Whetu, maybe he's got himself a $6000 AIWA. In which case maybe he should just stick with the onboard sound on his mobo if he has it :D U do sound a little tense by the way. Would u like it if we brought foward our weekly massage session?

I could come around tonight if U like so we can work out that pent up tension ;) I'll just sneak in the back way so Tojja doesen't get upset about being left out :)

[Gh0s7 L3mUr]

Go teh GameTheatreXP :D

[whetu]

Originally posted by shag
U do sound a little tense by the way.
just a little...
Would u like it if we brought foward our weekly massage session? no that wont be neccessary... just a little edgy thats all... might be just withdrawl from the painkillers...

[KingJackal]

I too have a Gametheatre XP, and haven't regretted the purchase once. It's VERY I/O rich. The actual card only has line-in and the rack cable output. BUT, the rack has all of the following:

Front:
http://www.hardavenue.com/reviews/bigface_gtxp.jpg

Back:
http://www.hardavenue.com/reviews/bigback_gtxp.jpg

...that do ya? :D

[Elle T]

thanx guys :)
KJ damn you now i'll have to change my sig

Thats exactly what hes wants (the back has the ports)

One thing tho the rack doesn't sit in case does it?
Needs to be portible.

Anyways i'll throw up my choices for this dudes Audio/DVD System.
If you can recommend better shout out,
So IMHO:

AMD Althon XP1900 $320 - StylesPC
256Mb Samsung PC2700 DDR333 $140 - Tastech
Asus A7V333 With 6 Channel Audio $330 - Tastech
GLOBALWIN YCC 8860 Aluminium Case & 400w Power Supply $245 - DragonPC
80Gb Maxtor D740X-FDB IDE Hard Drive (2Mb, 7200rpm, ATA133, Fluid Dynamic Bearings) $312 - Tastech
Asus E616 16x DVD-ROM drive/48x CD-ROM drive $160 - Tastech
Asus 4012 IDE CD Re-Writer, 40w/12rw/48r with Nero 5.5 $225 - Tastech
Sony 1.44 Floppy Drive $30 - Tastech
56k/v.90 DLink PCI Internal Modem (Conexant) $80 - Tastech
Gigabyte AP64-D Radeon 8500LE, TV Out, 64MB DDR $410 - Tastech
Hercules Games Theater XP Sound Card $376.88 - Dragon
17" Philips 107T Flat Screen Monitor, On Site Warranty, 0.24mm $434 - DragonPC
MS Optical WheelMouse (OEM) $45 -Tastech
Microsoft Internet Keyboard (OEM) $45 -Tastech
Thermaltake Volcano 7 PLUS, Copper with Variable fan speed $55 - StylesPC
__________________
Total: $3207.88 inc

[KingJackal]

What I would change:

Buy the lot from Tastech
He seems to be your main choice. So buy the lot from him, he'd probably give you at LEAST $200 off for a bulk purchase - the same would go with Dragon or Styles.
;)

CPU & Cooler
Even a Duron 1GHz is overkill for DVD playback. I'd get the slowest Athlon XP you could get, and the quietest heat-sink you could get - probably a Zalman CNPS6000-Cu from Dragon or Styles ( silent ). It's $95 - but the silence will be worth it. After all, it's a waste of money to go all out on a DVD/Audio system that's so loud you can hardly hear the speakers :rolleyes: ;)

This would complement well with the Radeon 8500 - which has DVD hardware acceleration. In other words, you DON'T NEED the CPU grunt for DVD work :).

...and I take it you'll be using TV-out? Cos even my 19" is frustratingly small for watching DVD's.... :(

[Elle T]

Ok an XP1800 & Zalman would be better then,
Anything lower than a XP1800 i feel won't be future proof.

The reason for the different stores is that they don't all have the same stock which means subsituting good parts for lesser ones.
Plus i'm going by costs as well. (Notice Chch only too)

And yes he'll be using TV out :)

[KingJackal]

Originally posted by Elle T
Ok an XP1800 & Zalman would be better then,
Anything lower than a XP1800 i feel won't be future proof.

The reason for the different stores is that they don't all have the same stock which means subsituting good parts for lesser ones.
Plus i'm going by costs as well. (Notice Chch only too)

And yes he'll be using TV out :)

...OK....

1700+ isn't future proof, but 1800+ is? What are you smoking?

Seriously though - do you HONESTLY think it is possible to future-proof any piece of computer componentry? And even in the future, Duron 1G's will still be overkill for DVD....
:confused:

And yes, I know you're trying to get the best deal - but if you spread your purchases out, you WON'T GET BULK DISCOUNTS. Seriously, you could be looking at $200 - $300 - MORE off retail price if you buy the lot from one of them, and if you give them a couple of weeks warning, trust me - they'll move heaven to get it for you :D.

[utopian201]

this is kinda un related, but would onboard sound from a motherboard be better than an old ISA AWE64?

and am i right in thinking that having a proper soundcard instead of onboard will mean better quality?

[Humantuckshop]

Originally posted by utopian201
this is kinda un related, but would onboard sound from a motherboard be better than an old ISA AWE64?

and am i right in thinking that having a proper soundcard instead of onboard will mean better quality?



Well, that depends on how old the motherboard is, and what onboard sound chip it has.

Any modern 4 or 6 channel soundcard will give better quality than onboard. Not to mention onboard sound solutions use up a helluva lot more CPU cycles than any soundcard.

[whetu]

depends on the onboard audio that is used... its a misconception a lot of people have to get rid of.... ever since nforce, "onboard == crap" is no longer anywhere near valid... i gave one of my flatmates this lecture yesterday... cept it took me quite a while to get it into his head

[Humantuckshop]

I already said it depends on the onboard audio, whetu. Geez, some people are so slow............. :rolleyes:
:p

There were mere seconds in it......... A forum record?
;)

[whetu]

hehe i gave you your chance...

JINX!

NYAH NYAH DE NYAH NYAH :p

[SecretSquirrel]

Elle T - why is he buying the ASUS board with onboard 6 channel out, AND a GameTheatre XP?

Why not go for a less bloated motherboard, which is cheaper by about $50 or so, and get the soundcard/unit as well?

Seems like a waste. Also, is 256 mb RAM enough for the mixmaster music wikka wikka wikka plans he has?

I'd say no. But then again, who knows, eh? Who knows.



Also also, ask Styles and Tastech to each give you a quote, and go with the best offer...you'll be surprised at the end $$

[Elle T]

SS because it appears as if no ones selling the Asus A7V333 pure yet in NZ.
Asus don't crap out and lasts along while, better to pay for the quality.
(It was Asus or Abit but he doesn't need the proformance of an abit so going for most trouble free board)

256mb to start off with is fine, i'm not going to put a gig of Ram in when its going to cost heaps more & he might not even need it.
So 256mb to start and if it isn't enough i'll put more in.

Yeah i'll just waiting to hear back from him & i'll then i'll start hammering the shops :)

[Westy]

i was also looking at getting either the Creative Inspire 5.1 Digital 5700's, or the Cambridge Soundworks DT3500's, if you could have either one of these, which would you choose (and which soundcard to pair up with them)

was looking at getting an audigy DE, but if i go forking out for some nice speakers in the near future i want a soundcard thats going to make them function the best.

[Ragnor]

hmm you probably won't get many (any) recommendations for Creative round here...

/just wait for a whetu or disco stu rant about creative...

In the mean time lets review for those that don't know:

Creative's driver support sucks.. they make drivers once every blue moon and they make them as hard as possible to obtain / download / install. You usually can't install new Audigy drivers without having to insert the orginal cd.. cause creative are bastards. The most current Sound Blaster live drivers available for download are dated like august 2001... gah..!

Do a google search and you will find that the Audigy is invloved in many hardware conflicts... especially with via chipsets.. yes via and creative can still be a nightmare to get going.. or be bliss.

In 6 months time creative will have forgotten about you and your card.. when a new OS comes out you'll be stuffed for drivers till they can be arsed making you some (months later in WinXP's case).. or you'll be having sound problems in a game you'll be stuffed...

They really do have a history of crap support for their exisiting cards as soon as something new comes out...

Creative's speaker range is pretty sad too... granted they are a good entry point and fine for the average joe (tho for the lack of quality you get they are overpriced). The main thing is with most of the models the satelites are like 5 or 6w of plastic crapness.

If you aren't too bothered about good quality sound. and you just want something to do the job now.. creative are alright.. but you really should investigate the (superior) offerings from competitors.

Here's a few things to get your searching started..

Sound cards:
Philips Acoustic Edge
Santa Cruz Turtle Beach
Hercules Game Thearter XP

Now good quality speakers.. that depends on how much you want to spend, how acute your appreciation of sound is.. and how much you want to spend.. did I mention how much you want to spend? .. cause you can get good quality speakers for 200, 300, 400 ---> 2000

[utopian201]

so what speakers would u recommend for about 2-300?

hehe this site has swayed me so my nxt comp's sound will b powered by philips, not creative....!@#!!

[Gh0s7 L3mUr]

Originally posted by utopian201
so what speakers would u recommend for about 2-300?

hehe this site has swayed me so my nxt comp's sound will b powered by philips, not creative....!@#!!


You've just made whetu a very happy man. :p

Get the best stereo speakers you can afford. Ask any audiophile here and they'll tell you unless you have $1000+ to spend don't even worry about looking at comp speakers but rather go for real speakers with real sound. :D

[H2gO]

http://www.pcsound.philips.com/images/mms206_image.jpg

$180.00 & within budget

Not the most from a set but performance cost a little more - know whay I mean

http://www.klipsch.com/images/products/icon51.jpg

[Ragnor]

Soundcard....

/waits for the Hercules Gametheatre fanboys to turn up and start pimping that card...

Seriously all the options (non crapative ..ahem.. creative) are good... each is slightly better at different things.. make sure you read some reviews..!

Philips AE has the sp/dif in and out, the qsound alogorithms for environmental sound

Hercules Gametheatre has that cool box thing with craploads of output and input options etc..

etc...

There is a growing number of happy Philips Acoustic Edge and Hercules Gametheatre owners here... The santa cruz card is highly rated by overseas sites but it's harder to buy in NZ...

Now if you are going to get the Philips you'll want to bookmark these sites:

Official site: www.pcsound.philips.com
Latest beta drivers/update: www.3dss.com/drivers/AcousticEdge/
Win2k/XP WMD latest beta drivers: www.3dss.com/drivers/AcousticEdge/WDMbeta.html

[Ragnor]

Speakers...

Here's the crunch.. if you buy the best soundcard in the world it won't mean jack if you're playing through crap speakers. That's why pc speakers made by genius, kts etc are just now worthwhile. Creative speakers are a stop above that level but still bow down to a stereo system... which bows down to logitech or klipsch PC speakers...

Ideally what you want is a good balance between the two, you want them match in terms of sound quality.. but that's just not possible on a budget.

What are do you mostly use your computer/soundcard for? ..
Do you watch alot of DVD's on your computer, or mostly gaming... or are you a hard out mp3 listener...?

[KingJackal]

Originally posted by Ragnor
/waits for the Hercules Gametheatre fanboys to turn up and start pimping that card...
Hi!! :D

Seriously all the options (non crapative ..ahem.. creative) are good... each is slightly better at different things.. make sure you read some reviews..!

Philips AE has the sp/dif in and out, the qsound alogorithms for environmental sound

Hercules Gametheatre has that cool box thing with craploads of output and input options etc..

That's exactly it. ElleT decided on the GTXP - due to the sheer number of outputs, some of which he needed.

If you DON'T need all those outputs, then the Philips cards are a better move - they're cheaper ;). Of course, if you really want that 1337-looking rack, well, it'll be a GTXP again, but otherwise.... :D

The Turtle Beach cards ( Santa Cruz - see their site (http://www.tbeach.com/site/) ) are also another good option - though they are ( as Ragnor eluded ) very hard to track down here in NZ. If you've got a mate in the states though they could be an option....

Speakers/Sound Card
I've seen people spend $700-$800 on a top of the line retail Creative sound card ( a card with reasonable output quality and a lot of options ), and then $400 on some Creative speakers. It's criminal.

You really should be spending a similar amount on your speakers to your sound card if you want to match quality and performance levels. ESPECIALLY if you're wanting to go surround ( 4.1, 5.1 or 6.1 speakers setups ).

Luckily, you've done the right thing and decided to do some research first - so if stick with a couple of weeks of reading, you're likely to get a mint setup :). Decide on roughly whereabouts your budget lies first ( $400 card+speakers? $800 total? $4000 total? - and yes, it would be easy to spend that on speakers alone.... *drools* ), and also what you're a fanb0y of ( DVD, gaming, mp3's, audio creation ;) ).

To give you an idea, I've spent around $250 on my sound-card ( second-hand ) and around $700 on speakers ( headphones, surround setup, AND stereo homebuilts ). If I was buying new, I'd be spending more like $340/$600, and that's because I game, play a lot of DVDs, and listen to mp3's ( though no audio creation ).

[utopian201]

mainly gaming and mp3

probably up to $400 total? (speakers + soundcard)

as u can tell from my budget, im not looking for component stereo quality sound, otherwise i would get a proper system for that

.....so if thats the case, should i just settle for onboard sound?
har har

and i think if i was gonna get a card, the AE would b it, since i dont think i need as many connections as the gtxp

[Solid Snake]

AE chews up more CPU cycles than SBLive!, depending on your processor it may or may not make a difference.

[utopian201]

i think they r about the same, the MUSE xl II or Fortissmo or sometihng uses more than the rest, but i didnt take much notice of it since im not getting it

yeh, ppl said the Audigy, even though its a real hassle to install the drivers (since u need the orginal cd), has best sound quality

but Acoustic Edge is best for games since its got QMSS which is some surround sound thing or something

anything heinously wrong w/ AE and creative sb310 speakers?.....
or if i think i might want to watch dvds, creative 5300 speakers?

like Ragnor said, creative r better than genius etc and cheaper than proper sound systems

[whetu]

Originally posted by Solid Snake
AE chews up more CPU cycles than SBLive!, depending on your processor it may or may not make a difference.

only if youre a moron and use the 1.19wdm's that come on the cd.... with the 1.57 final release the cpu util is on par and in some cases lower than with the live. with the 1.8x beta's it is apparently lower (i dont know first hand, but the biggest AE whore I know of does, so I'll trust what he says)

oh thats right... suckers with lives dont get to appreciate the value of regular driver releases (and thus improvements) *chuckles*

[Ragnor]

Originally posted by Solid Snake
AE chews up more CPU cycles than SBLive!, depending on your processor it may or may not make a difference.

..and I read the world is flat too!

Seriously just like any hardware it's all about the drivers.

The 1.86 and now 1.87 WDM drivers are getting to be very good. Philips has been cranking out these beta drivers about once every two months consistanly. The 1.87's came out this month..

You can see the changes and continual improvement they have been making here:
http://www.3dss.com/drivers/AcousticEdge/WDMbeta.html

When was the last driver update for the Sblive... oh november 2001.. brillant..!

In all the recent reviews I've seen comparing sound cards.. they've all been very close in cpu usuage... only 1-8 fps difference in popular games (with the exception of the muse which is generally a decent amount slower).

Also I'd say a upto a 15fps loss in game is well worth taking cause damn qsound rocks! I've been experimenting with it recently.. even makes a 2.none speaker setup sound better... not too mention good headphone and 4.1...

I imagine Sensura thang that the gametheatre can do is pretty damn good too...KJ..?

[whetu]

sensaura is generally regarded to be stronger than qsound when it comes to headphones. From what I can tell, qsound gets the upper hand at speaker solutions tho... but again it all comes down to the listener's preference... personally I cant fault the headphone handling on my AE.. I can easily locate enemies and deal to them effectively *shrugs*

[Solid Snake]

Sigh, once again (cr*ppy) reviewers let me down again ... :( dang. Make me look like a fool since I've just bought an OEM SBLive! ... drat! Dang it. Crud ... *expletive deleted*