Winxp And Sq2500

2003-07-04 03:09:33

Hello everybody.

I'd like to ask for some advice regarding my sound card in winXP, to which I'm moving (upgrade, which causes some non-sound related confusion too...but I guess this forum isn't for general hardware; or maybe? Would you help in other areas?)
From what I know drivers for Vortex SQ2500 are included in winXP. But here is the first problem: I've heard that there are drivers bundled and other, from windows update, that are in some fundamental things different.
Which one you suggest?

And are there any things I can do to make audio playback...better in XP with this card?

Or is it not worth the hassle and it is better to move to some other card (unfortunatelly my budget is rather tight, so Phylips Rhytmic Edge or SBLive and the like are only options - btw, are these cards better regarding sound quality etc. than mine?)

And finally, could you tell me is it good to use software resampling in foobar (great player, Peter; and main reson I've found this place at the end of last year) with my card?
I can't probably hear the difference anyway, but it's comfortable to me to know that everything is set up in the best way possible (especially that right now I don't have rather time for testing or messing with different configurations)

Thanks for any help.

Winxp And Sq2500

Reply #1 – 2003-07-04 04:14:39

I'm not an Aureal expert, but I can guess!

For one, I'd say if you want the highest quality sound card for cheap, go for a Hercules Fortissimo III, or an Audigy1 OEM over a Live or a Rhythmic Edge. Otherwise dont bother.  The Live op-amps are either worse than the older SB cards, or something else is going on - I had a Live and trashed it after I hooked up headphones.

Upsampling shouldnt hurt anything
I'd guess there are ideal settings somewhere in the foobar2k forum 

Winxp And Sq2500

Reply #2 – 2003-07-05 15:02:48

Thanks for help (but is it possible there aren't any Aureal experts here?  :P)

Unfortunatelly two soundcards you've mentioned are (and will be for some time) out of my price range.
But is here anybody who can comment on Rhytmic?
Or perhaps on some lower priced Terratec cards that I've just found here: 128 i PCI, 512 i PCI Digital, Aureon 5.1 Fun, DMX XFire 1024 and SiXPack 5.1?

Right now I'm certain only of one thing, I guess - that my card will be better than integrated audio on some cheap board.

Winxp And Sq2500

Reply #3 – 2003-07-05 15:39:13

The Aureal drivers bundled with xp work pretty good. There are some bugs, but they do work. And if you add the vortex control panel from the 2k drivers with a patch to make them compatible (updated au30dal.dll file) you can get the EQ, midi controls and quad mode working too. To be honest though, I'd go for a newer card that is supported.

I will also add that the updated drivers available from windows update are not recommended, because they disable hardware acceleration features.