Bother with sound card?

[Agent24]

Re: Bother with sound card?

SO TRUE. It's a frickin' disaster lol...

Disaster for my disk space certainly!

At least FLAC does have some compression though, but it's pretty sad how there is practically no support of it on any head unit.

[Phaihn]

Re: Bother with sound card?

I got a Creative Sound Blaster Audigy 2 ZS [B800] Sound Card) sound card for my computer back in 07 and am still using it today..
I also got some cheap sound cards I am selling for $25...

[999999999]

Re: Bother with sound card?

With no audio playing, turn up the volume and see if you can hear static or other noise while moving mouse around. Next, put the CPU under load like running Prime95's torture test, volume still on high, moving mouse around.

Next, load the video card like with ATITool, it's 3D view and "scan for artifacts", again with volume up and moving mouse. Pay special attention to the moment you stop and start these tests, if the power level change when that happens causes a noise *blip*.

These are the situations where onboard audio tends to be a problem, they have less power rail noise isolation than (most, even cheap...) sound cards.

Overall, the Sound Blaster Live! is probably the better of the two but you may not be able to hear the difference, especially through an amp instead of driving (a load) headphones, but if you're a gamer then the SB Live! may support more /better sound effects.

The two primary reasons not to use it would be if you need it more in a different system, or you have other PCI cards competing for the limited bandwidth available on PCI. Keep in mind you can install the card and have both it and the integral functional, switching between which is the primary to do the sound tests.

Also there is the issue of crystal accuracy. Certain types of video capture require the audio crystal to be close to sync with another system clock, otherwise you end up with audio sync issues. If video capture is needed you might check whether it keeps sync with your preferred setup using the audio card.

As for other audio specs of specific chipsets and codecs... it is doubtful that either the SB Live! or the integrated audio uses an especially high resolution DAC so it is doubtful the paper spec differences between them would in itself cause audible difference. So many people compare these things assuming an "all else equal" situation when even if all else were equal which is rarely the case, the other factors like power rail noise usually swamp the spec of the IC used assuming it isn't really, really bad.

Better adapter cable is unlikely to matter assuming the one you use is average quality, coax cable construction, although use of a headphone out jack can eventually cause the weak spring contacts in it to make poor contact and a noisy or capacitive connection. A way around that while still using analog would be to mount a couple RCA jacks on a case slot backplate and wire the sound card output to those. Of course there are other equal or better audio connectors you could use but the RCA jack size, simplicity using a straight cable, and easy availability make them "good enough" while avoiding the weak headphone jack connection.