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Topic: Yet another n00b looking for a soundcard... (Read 9349 times) previous topic - next topic
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Yet another n00b looking for a soundcard...

I just finished making my way through another thread discussing soundcards, and now I'm all confused about which one to get.  I see references here and there to '6-pack' and 'Audiophile,' but if I throw that into Google to see what that stuff is, I'll come up with b33r and $10,000 tube preamps... please be specific.

What I currently have:

Yamaha YMF-724F (DS1, DS-XG, etc.)
Supports 16bit stereo @ 48kHz (resamples... :insane: though not as bad as MS PCM converter. :mad: )
No digital in or out, though I have the data sheet and know what to do to get digital out...

I'm running Windows XP with Yamaha's ref. drivers = no EAX or A3D like it had on '98.

I'm looking for a card for $100 or below (but more if necessary) that supports these features (higher priority first):

True 96/24 Playback
Works flawlessly with WindowsXP and VIA KT133/686A (= no Creative cards!!)
No S/PDIF resampling PERIOD, Optical In REQUIRED--support for recording digitally up to 96/24.
Low-noise, low-distortion high-quality analog out with no resampling, or with resampling done right.
96/24 analog recording would also be nice, but I doubt that I'll see that on a "consumer" card.
Low latency.

Other stuff that would be nice:
EAX/A3D support.
XG MIDI synthesis (I'm spoiled) in either hardware or software
2+ connections for internal CD-ROMs (S/PDIF preferred, with at least one analog for other things).

Does such a card exist, or am I going to have to build it? 

TIA!
godzilla525

Yet another n00b looking for a soundcard...

Reply #1 –
So far it looks like the Hercules Game Theatre XP. Maybe later on I'll go after a dedicated 96/24 device (DAL CardDeluxe with S/PDIF add-on card) to use in conjunction with the GTXP if they (DAL CD) ever get any cheaper or if I ever get any more money.

That seems to be the only way I'll be able to get everything on that list.
godzilla525

Yet another n00b looking for a soundcard...

Reply #2 –
The only problem I see with the Gametheater XP is that the SPDIF output is locked to 48Khz.  That means all your wonderful music at 44.1Khz is being massaged/mangled (depends on the card) to 48Khz as it's sent to your receiver over the SPDIF interface...

I recently bought a Chaintech TheaterExcel off Ubid for $14 shipped .  It's a C-Media 8738 based soundcard with Optical SPDIF OUT at 48Khz or 44.1Khz.  If you plan on using your PC for DVD it's also good because it passes both Dolby Digital and DTS correctly over the SPDIF.

Yet another n00b looking for a soundcard...

Reply #3 –
Quote
Originally posted by godzilla525
True 96/24 Playback
Works flawlessly with WindowsXP and VIA KT133/686A (= no Creative cards!!)
No S/PDIF resampling PERIOD, Optical In REQUIRED--support for recording digitally up to 96/24.
Low-noise, low-distortion high-quality analog out with no resampling, or with resampling done right.
96/24 analog recording would also be nice, but I doubt that I'll see that on a "consumer" card.
Low latency.


The Terratec EWX 24/96 (www.terratec.de) meets all these requirements, I guess the newer DMX6Fire too, but I don't know much about it. Only drawback I've read of is Terratec's poor driver support, but, I can't talk on my experience as I don't own one.

The M-Audio Audiophile (www.m-audio.com) has better driver support, lacks digital optical in/out, but instead has coaxial digital in/out. About recording digitally a signal, there's no difference in quality on optical or coaxial I/O. Optical (or coaxial) is better only if your equipment has only optical (or coaxial) outputs or inputs.

Both cards are similar in audio quality.

The Hercules cards resample, and have no 24/96 capability.

Yet another n00b looking for a soundcard...

Reply #4 –
Yeah, Unless I find some way of upconverting them to 48kHz before I encode them to mp3 (which means re-doing my whole collection yet again.  ).  While reading through some other threads on this forum I saw some software mentioned that will do just that.  Hopefully a Winamp out_wave.dll can be written utilizing this.

The soundcard that I'm using really isn't that bad, but it's the single best-sounding DAC that I've experienced thus far... and it's 4 years old, so hopefully things have gotten better since then in the upsampling department.  It's not perfect, but it's not the MS PCM converter, either... it's somewhere in the middle.

I see that the GTXP explicitly supports 32k, 44.1k, and 48k S/PDIF input.  Judging from Herc's specs, it doesn't look like it resamples the input since they are all stated explicitly, unlike the output which they say is a fixed 48kHz. This is kind of important since I have a CD changer with an optical output, and with copy protection casting an ominous shadow from behind, I'd like to be prepared.

As far as upsampling, I'd have to take a leap of faith, buy it, and run a sine sweep to be able to tell how bad the output will behave. I can't really find too much about it other than what's on gaming sites, and gamers usually don't care about that for the most part.

I'm strictly analog outside the computer right now, so if I need 6-channel, I could just build a few mono amps to take care of that due to the discrete analog outputs on the GTXP rather than spend a ton of money on another reciever/decoder.  The built-in 1/4" headphone and mic jacks are also a plus, along with the USB (I'm fresh out of open ports, but I might need to modify the GTXP for more power).

Also comes with Yamaha S-YXG50, so I don't need to worry about that.

Also through this forum I found the full "M-Audio Audiophile 96/24" mentioned and had a look at their offerings--impressive in both terms of quality and price, but they lack the features/versatility of the GTXP.

I guess to get the best of both worlds, I really have to get the best of both worlds.
godzilla525

Yet another n00b looking for a soundcard...

Reply #5 –
You know what, I've been thinking hard about this for the past couple of days, and I think I'll skip the GTXP, and wait until I accumulate enought for a Terratec DMX 6fire or EWX 24/96 (most likely the latter).  I have a feeling that if I get the GTXP I might not be satisfied with it.  I have looked at Terratec's driver page, and even though they have a bunch of silly bugs listed through the revisions, it appears that they are addressing them with regular updates.

Thanks for your help. 
godzilla525

Yet another n00b looking for a soundcard...

Reply #6 –
Why not the Audiophile?

Yet another n00b looking for a soundcard...

Reply #7 –
I need the Toslink optical input in case CD copy protection becomes more widespread (My CD jukebox has only analog & optical outputs, and the analog is terrible :mad: ).

There's a Toslink adapter for the Audiophile floating around someplace, but that's a separate item that adds more to the total cost, plus I'd have to buy a Toslink cable.  From what I hear, the Terratec actually comes with a 2m Toslink cable.

Fortunately the reorganization of the forum brought some soundcard threads back into view along with links to reviews, which show the Audiophile to better in many regards than the Terratec.

...Still they're all better than an Audigy.
godzilla525

Yet another n00b looking for a soundcard...

Reply #8 –
As I have very recently purchased a Terratec EWX 24/96 to replace my "good old" SB Live I believe I might have something to add to this discussion.

The difference was enormous. Here is a few things that were immediately apparent when I switched sound cards:

1. The sound has much better definition and clarity. It's like a huge wall of pure noise was removed from the sound. The noise involved with Live isn't like an analog hiss; more like a quantization error. Details are much more audible, my jaw dropped as I noticed that in one song, there was a very subtle hi-hat beating around. I had never noticed that hi-hat before. Also the positioning (sense of location) of single instruments is much better, the stereo sound field now actually has some palpativity in it. Also it seems that with Live the music would have been equalized really weirdly.

I believe strongly that this is mostly a resampling issue. It's widely known that poor resampling can destroy music completely. It also causes that Live's frequency response curve is far from straight line. More like a complex 4th-degree equation. The "weird equalization" -issue could be a straight consequence of this. Based on this, I wouldn't recommend a resampling AC97 sound card for anything, even to be used as a frisbee. They are simply evil.

2. Stereo separation is much better. More precisely, there actually exists some stereo sound field now. The instruments have a firm location in the sound field. With live they seemed to be travelling around randomly.

This leads me to the assumption that my Live's output jack must have been broken,  minijacks aren't exactly very reliable. Even Live can't suck that bad at stereo imaging.

So, should a newbie be recommended to buy a Terratec or an Audiophile? The difference of these cards is a slightly different model of Envy24 DSP chip, or precisely, the chip Audiophile is using is "better specified." The audible difference is even more subtle. I don't think very many people are physically capable of hearing the difference between these two cards. Not to mention the external equipmentry required.

On the other hand, difference between a SoundBlaster and any real audio card is huge and surely noticable with even very modest equipment. From a regular user point of view, any real audio card represents a quantum leap in audio quality compared to SoundBlasters, even the "shitty" Terratec. In my country Audiophile had a price tag of 340 €, whereas Terratec had 190 €. I won't shock you with the price tag of Echo Mia. Geez, how can I live with the fact that I have a crappy Terratec instead of the Almighty Audiophile? I must cry myself to sleep every night. Well, in fact I seem to be enjoying listening to music pretty damn much. I'm currently re-listening my entire collection since the songs sound so much different than before.

Buying a bit more expensive quality product also pays off in nice details. Here are few:

* No lousy minijacks here. Golden RCA connectors for analog I/O.

* Abundant and actually working analog & digital I/O in general. Sure, EWX is only a stereo card, but one can easily route i.e. DVD audio directly to an external Dolby Digital receiver via SPDIF. I trust standalones more anyway.

* The package had RCA cable, optical cable, SPDIF cable and a CD-Audio cable. I can't even remember when I got any extras bundled with a sound card.

* Terratec's core driver takes about 200 kilobytes of space. No more 30 MB LiveWares.

* Terratec's control panel application is much better than Live's. Every channel has 0-latency VU meter. Buffer sizes are customizable. Sampling rate can be selected, etc...

* I can actually create music with this card. I can use my MIDI keyboard + Propellerheads Reason in ASIO mode with 7ms latency in Win2k. Latencies <10ms are genreally agreed to be adequate for realtime playing.

* I can tick "Bit Depth: 24" at Cakewalk, Reason, MAD plugin and so forth.

I'm sure you get the idea .

Yet another n00b looking for a soundcard...

Reply #9 –
niktheblak,

What advantages does the Terratec EWX 24/96 have over the Sound Blaster Audigy MP3+, feature-wise ?

It's certainly more expensive.

Yet another n00b looking for a soundcard...

Reply #10 –
Quote
Originally posted by niktheblak

1. The sound has much better definition and clarity. 
(...)
I believe strongly that this is mostly a resampling issue.


I don't think so. I ran a blind test between resampling processes at r3mix.net (now down, it seems, but I've got a backup, if you're interested).
The resampling processes were

Lame --dm-preset insane --resample 48
SoundForge 4.5 quality 1 + antialias
SoundForge 4.5 quality 4
CoolEdit pro 1.1 quality 999 in 32 bits + 48 kHz noise shaped dither
SSRC with ATH dither
Capture of the SB live SPDIF out with a Marian Marc 2

My results :
I blindly recognized the bad SoundForge (q=1) two times in a row.
It seems to me that the SoundForge q=4 is the best, but I didn't test it blindly, I'm not sure.
Other ones sounded the same to me.
(Setup : Marian Marc 2 optical out to an external Sony DTC 55ES, AKG K400 headphones)

Yet another n00b looking for a soundcard...

Reply #11 –
Yes, I already saw the price tag for the Echo Mia. :insane:

(I'd love to be able to uncheck 'Dither' and select 24-bit from both in_mad and in_vorbis...)

I found the Audiophile 2496 here for $180.  For converting Toslink <--> Coaxial I'd have to use a Fostex COP-1 for $50 or a Midiman CO2 for $60.  Plus I'd have to go to a store locally and pick up a Toslink cable for around $20.

That brings the total up to $250-260 USD plus shipping.  I could get the Terratec DMX 6fire2496 for that much!

...Or I could just buy the Terratec EWX24/96 at the same place for $170 USD plus shipping, and not have to bother with purchasing a separate external convertor or Toslink cable. 

Hopefully the drivers for the Terratec have improved since the time those reviews were written...
godzilla525

Yet another n00b looking for a soundcard...

Reply #12 –
Quote
Originally posted by niktheblak

I believe strongly that this is mostly a resampling issue. It's widely known that poor resampling can destroy music completely. It also causes that Live's frequency response curve is far from straight line. More like a complex 4th-degree equation. The "weird equalization" -issue could be a straight consequence of this. Based on this, I wouldn't recommend a resampling AC97 sound card for anything, even to be used as a frisbee. They are simply evil.


Not to say there aren't a lot of sucky things about the Live and Audigy..  the main thing they have going for themselves is their low cost..  But...

Is this the picture you've seen before?  This is for an Audigy,  but possibly the same "result" shows up with the Live cards..  I know I've seen it in a review or two that uses this test software..  It's actually a ghost.. a feedback corrupted situation when using Right Mark Audio analyzer and the stock settings for the Audigy..  See first entry in their news..  never happens in "real life".
http://audio.rightmark.org/news.html

Quote
* I can actually create music with this card. I can use my MIDI keyboard + Propellerheads Reason in ASIO mode with 7ms latency in Win2k. Latencies <10ms are genreally agreed to be adequate for realtime playing.


Well, to give Creative the little credit that they're due..  since I've got my system up on XP,  and using the "real" (2K and XP) WDM drivers..  I've been running Cubase and Virtual Sampler,  and other soft synths... at 5-7ms as well,  with ASIO. 

Yes, there are annoyances..  like you apparently only get 48Khz in ASIO and I think in S/PDIF.. 

Perhaps it will sound better this way, since the card is 48Khz internally, and has to resample for 44.1Khz.  Yes.. AC97 isn't extremely good..  that's why the Kx project guys (hacking up their own set of drivers for Live/Audigy) actually switch the front and back outputs..  the rear channel dosen't use the AC97 codec,  and has better specs therby..

But anyway.. one of the "real" musician cards will be better..  with loss of some features like gaming sound support, (perhaps not with the Terratec) or lack of digital or MIDI capabilites,  depending on which..

Actually,  another option,  with no guarentees,  you could leave the Live or whatever in there,  and use the 24/96 card as a second soundcard.  Many have got this working successfully... game on one, music on the other,  get the best of both worlds..

Yet another n00b looking for a soundcard...

Reply #13 –
ack..  almost forgot.

Read about one,  the Hoontech DSP24 Value..  supposedly the cheapest full 24/96 card..
listed in the Brit mag Computer music at 116 UKP.  Catch is,  if you have it as the sole card,  and need MIDI ports,  Optical in and outs.. you have to buy a pricey second card, costs 50UKP,  and pushes its cheap price to more than the Terratec EWX 24/96..

Another option to look into..

Yet another n00b looking for a soundcard...

Reply #14 –
I'm taking the Terratec (EWX24/96) plunge...

If I have any problems with games, I'll just leave the Yamaha DS-XG (AC97) in.
godzilla525

Yet another n00b looking for a soundcard...

Reply #15 –
Quote
Originally posted by JonPike
Read about one,  the Hoontech DSP24 Value..  supposedly the cheapest full 24/96 card..

well, there's always the Terratec 6fire without the external connection box thingy..
A riddle is a short sword attached to the next 2000 years.

Yet another n00b looking for a soundcard...

Reply #16 –
After digging around on the Web, I found evidence that strongly suggests the M-Audio Audiophile 24/96 is better than the Terratec EWX from a technical standpoint... I can't find the link to the relevant pages though.

BTW, the Hoontech came in a distant third & didn't measure up anywhere near the Terratec or M-Audio.

Yet another n00b looking for a soundcard...

Reply #17 –
I already read twice that the Audiophile 24/96 and the Terratec 6Fire allegedly have slightly different chipsets. According to my information, this is not true. For all i know, they both utilize the DSP "ICEnsemble Envy24 ICE1712" and the converter-chip "AKM AK4524VF".

Yet another n00b looking for a soundcard...

Reply #18 –
Quote
Originally posted by CiTay
I already read twice that the Audiophile 24/96 and the Terratec 6Fire allegedly have slightly different chipsets. According to my information, this is not true. For all i know, they both utilize the DSP "ICEnsemble Envy24 ICE1712" and the converter-chip "AKM AK4524VF".

Well, if you were referring to my post, I meant specifically the Terratec EWX 24/96, not the 6fire (which wasn't compared in the review I found).

Cheers...

Yet another n00b looking for a soundcard...

Reply #19 –
Sorry for such a late reply, but I have a job.

@plazz

Unfortunately AFAIK Audigy isn't that different from Live. Sure, it supports 24-bit I/O interface, but you gain absolutely nothing using it since Audigy's internal processing resolution is 16 bits. For comparison, Terratec's and Audiophile's internal resolution is 36 bit...

For EWX's features, you might want to check this:

http://www.terratec.com/products/ewx2496/ewx2496_details.htm

@JonPike

Yep, that's the picture I saw. Good to know it was false, not even Creative can manufacture so inferior product. But I still think that with my Live, the music seems to be weirdly equalized .

@Pio2001

Did you think that SoundBlaster's resampling might be slightly worse than LAME's .

@godzilla525

Good idea leaving an AC97 card for enmergengies. There's an AC97 chip integrated to my motherboard, so I'm pretty much out of the woods when it comes to compatibility.

Althought I haven't had any game audio problems with the Terratec yet. Problems might occur when a game uses multiple sampling rates (like 44kHz and 22kHz) simultaneously. DirectSound has to be used for resampling both to 48kHz by software and that's SLOOOW. Better use your AC97 legacy card for those kind of games.

Edit:

Hmm. If one's system has an AC97, which is used for resampling? DirectSound's software routines or the card's hardware? Is it dependant on the "Resampling quality settings" in control panel? Or is "DirectSound output" software resampling and "waveout" hardware? Pio2001?

PS. Edit:

I would love to do a soundcard ABX. I would need a program that would output exactly the same sample through random sound card, in blind ABX style of course. I don't know does such programs exits, and I sure as hell haven't got time to program it myself (pretty easy with VC++) .

Yet another n00b looking for a soundcard...

Reply #20 –
In my experiences, the YMF-724F DSP in my Yamaha card did the resampling.  When I was running Windows 98 (with VxD drivers), the hardware resampling was clearly evident with a sine sweep, but not as bad as Microsoft's PCM convertor.

Now that I'm running Windows XP (WDM), The card's resampling sounds the same as it did before, but when I used the convertor in Winamp's DiskWriter plugin (I don't know if it's different or not from MS PCM) to convert from 44.1k to 48k, There was no noticeable loss in quality whatsoever.

I have always had the sample rate conversion quality sliders all the way up in the control panel.  That really killed things in '98 when running games through an ISA ESS1869 (=not AC97, but still a P.O.S.)...

About games, the current XP driver for my card only provides basic support, and probably forces DirectSound to do everything in software anyway.  So I probably won't be seeing any kind of performance hit (or a boost...) with the Terratec.  XP had its own drivers for the Yamaha card, but they did not support using the Hardware XG synthesis at all.  That is simply stupid. (Yamaha's ref. drivers are better)  In any case, going from 98 to XP and using WDM drivers resulted in a loss of my AUX and VIDEO internal connections... hey, I USED THOSE! :mad:  Probably all part of the AC97 initiative...

Interestingly enough, my Yamaha card sounds best when I have the Output set for ~0dB, not with the volume slider all the way up.  For a proper ABX comparison between soundcards, the levels of both need to be matched.  This can be really tricky considering the crappy mixer in AC97 codecs (Mine's made by Texas Instruments--I don't know how good it is) can't even balance channels by closer than 0.2 db sometimes and is either above or below 0dB and can't be set spot-on (that's probably splitting hairs, though...)
godzilla525

Yet another n00b looking for a soundcard...

Reply #21 –
True 96/24 Playback
Works flawlessly with WindowsXP and VIA KT133/686A (= no Creative cards!!)
No S/PDIF resampling PERIOD, Optical In REQUIRED--support for recording digitally up to 96/24.
Low-noise, low-distortion high-quality analog out with no resampling, or with resampling done right.
96/24 analog recording would also be nice, but I doubt that I'll see that on a "consumer" card.
Low latency.

What about the Edirol (=Roland) UA-5? I couldn't find much info on the internet about it, but bought it from a local store: sounds great (although still not as good as my NAD cd-player), and has a bucket-load of features. Downside's the price: UK£230 i paid.

Major features:

-winXP compatible
-24/96 playback and recording.
-optical, coaxial and analog ins and outs (as well as guitar pre-amp)
-resampling to 44.1, 48 and 96
-external USB therefore no computer hiss and hum (and excellent for my laptop)

but this says it better.

specifications here

independent review here

good luck, and keep saving  tonderai

[span style='font-size:9']edit: more links[/span]

Yet another n00b looking for a soundcard...

Reply #22 –
Well, I got my Terratec and I've been enjoying it way too much the past few days.  I expected to have more trouble with it than what it gave me--just a pitch problem with RealPlayer.

It syncs with my CD changer's optical connection perfectly.

I haven't seen too many problems with games, but I did have to reduce the DMA buffer size from 10ms to 7ms to stop the sound from skipping in Unreal Tournament.

No BSODs or other hardware conflicts to speak of (WinXP Pro/KT133/686A)

I did some tweaking with the Mixer and RightMark Audio Anayzer 3.4 (16-bit @ 44.1kHz), and I was able to get a PERFECTLY flat response curve, THD of 0.0006% (ouch!  ), and an IMD+noise of 0.005%.  This is with the settings for +4dBu (my stereo seems to like that better) and all mixer controls set for -1.5dB.  Analog In gain was set at 0dB for tests, then set to whatever I need later to get my input levels matched with other devices.  Rated as "Excellent" all across the board and overall.

I must stress that I did not use the test levels of 0 and -6dB that RightMark desires, as that got me a 6+% IMD level (WTH???)  I played with the mixer until I found levels (somewhat lower) that got me the best balance between distortion and SNR (which is -99.4dB, during the tests I managed to see it drop to -107dB--better than specs!)
godzilla525

Yet another n00b looking for a soundcard...

Reply #23 –
Quote
Originally posted by godzilla525
I did have to reduce the DMA buffer size from 10ms to 7ms to stop the sound from skipping in Unreal Tournament.


I've got a Marian Marc 2 soundcard. Skipping in American MC Gee's Alice, sound stops after 0.5 seconds in Unreal Tournament, with the digital output (there's no mixer). The solution to play these games was to set the analog output as default device in the control panel, for the games to use it, and then set the digital out source to "analog out" instead of "application program".
I didn't mess with the DMA buffer size.

Yet another n00b looking for a soundcard...

Reply #24 –
How about the ST Audio MK II ?
Anyone know anything about this one?
I'm interested in that since it has balanced XLR out, which I intend for active speakers.
So far I've only read that this is one awesome card, I intend to use it for listening only.
any ideas? links? opinions?