If you do not care about the price, get the ASUS Xonar Essence STX - you will find no better card on this planet.

Edit: It has been a while since I thought about upgrading my sound
system. When I wrote the first response to this thread I had not
remembered all of my reasoning from back then. I took the time to
search around and verified that today everything is the same as it was.

My recommendation:

For unbalanced I/O: HT Omega Claro Halo. Link to HT Omega web page for Claro Halo.
For balanced I/O: M-Audio Delta Audiophile 192.Link to M-Audio web page for Audiophile 192.

The Xonar E STX was my first alternative to the M-Audio Audiophile 192 that I bought and had to return. Neither of those two cards have good, stable drivers, but the M-Audio ones had just a few less complaints. What put me off of the ASUS card was the number of owners that were having serious problems with the drivers and, for some, the card itself. The vast majority, maybe even all of them said that ASUS was unresponsive to their complaints and requests for help.

Just keep in mind that the Xonar E STX and the Claro Halo do not allow balanced I/O. That is not a problem in most cases as most of us use line-level I/O.

I got thinking about this and remembered that the card I would prefer to buy is not the ASUS, but the HT Omega Claro Halo. It has features and specifications that are comparable to the ASUS, if not better. When comparing the two cards against each other, on the basis of features and specs, it really comes down to personal choice. When comparing the two on the basis of the drivers, the Claro Halo is the hands down winner. Period. Good solid drivers. The ASUS drivers are known to be very flakey. On the basis of quality, again the Claro Halo is the winner. The ASUS is known for suddenly letting out a very loud high-pitched scream through the headphone outputs. Some users claim that it was loud enough to damage their headphones and possibly their hearing.

If you read reviews on-line about the Xonar E STX, you may see a bunch of complaining about drivers that are lousy. The new ones may work better, but from the reviews that I saw today, I doubt it. There are no complaints that I could find about the Claro Halo drivers.

Another card that is recommended by the pros is the M-Audio Delta Audiophile 192. Despite what the M-Audio web site "Specifications" tab says, it does NOT support unbalanced I/O. I had an Audiophile 192 and the lack of unbalanced support is why I sent it back. If you do have the capacity for balanced I/O, it is a superb card, though. If you do have the option of balanced I/O, keep in mind that neither the Claro Halo or the ASUS Xonar E STX support balanced I/O, so in that case I'd recommend the M-Audio card.

The Claro Halo has an add-on card that gives you full analog 7.1 output if you want it. The add-on card sells for around $60 USD.

Both the Claro Halo and the Xonar will cost you around $200 USD. The other cards the pros recommend are so ludicrously expensive that they don't warrant mention by or to us mere mortals.

Do a search for balanced vs. unbalanced audio and you will get some useful information. The majority of people have unbalanced systems. Unbalanced signals have a single conductor and balanced have two conductors under the shielding.
The reason for two conductors is to help prevent noise pickup along the length of the conductor. If you don't understand the distinction you likely don't need to worry about it.
Lots of information can be googled if you want to learn more.

Quoted from "pegleg"

Thanks alot,Scott love dogs,and shoggy.I will look into these cards.what do u mean by unbalanced I/0 scott love dogs?The speakers i have now are logitech z623 but i just ordered the corsair sp2500,for them cards u are talking about scott love dogs would i have to get rca plug speakers or do they make connectots for the speakers that i have to hook to them cards? Merry chrismas to all and a happy new year

You can just use a cable that comes with the Corsair speakers. The Corsairs come with a cable that is RCA on one end, and the standard (for computer audio) 3.5mm plug on the other. Just plug it in and you are set.

Balanced cables have XLR plugs, just like mircophones. Photo of a balanced cable here (click). The main advantage of the balanced cable is that they have both positive and negative signal separated from each other and then twisted around each other. That way any electrical noise that gets picked up by the cable will exist in both the positive line, and the negative line. Thus, the noise will cancel itself out completely when it arrives at whatever the cable is attached to. They are typically used on VERY high end systems. For example, click here, this $30,000.00 (yes, $30,000.00) McIntosh power amplifier. BTW it is only one channed, if you want stereo or 5.1 or 7.1 you have to buy 2, or 6, or 8 of them. Believe it or not, people actually do buy that many sometimes.

Just thought I'd add to what Scott and others have said. There are actually balanced lines that are implemented with typical phone jacks. They look like typical stereo head-phone jacks. I say stereo because any balanced connection must have 3 wires, and stereo headphone plugs do - you can see the metal plug is divided into 3 sections. This is known as a TRS (Tip Ring Sleeve) plug and you'll see balanced systems that support both that and the XLR mentioned above. For example, I have several audio interfaces (TASCAM US-1800 is one of them - I used to have an M-Audio like what Scott mentioned - I agree they're good) that have multiple inputs and outputs, some of which are balanced. Some of those are TRS, and some of them are the XLR type that Scott mentioned. Also, while not cheap, one there are loads of audio interfaces that have balanced I/O that can be had for several hundred dollars. These are targeted at the home recording crowd. But, as everyone has said, balanced is overkill for most applications - I think balanced is only needed if you're doing long wire runs or have a lot of interference.

That aside, if what you want to do is listen to music and/or play games (which is my impression, forgive me if I'm wrong), then you don't need a lot of input capability. I don't have personal experience with the Asus mentioned above, but have heard it's good. I've used Soundblaster products in the past and always found them good, too. In fact, I currently have a SoundBlaster Recon3D PCIe card. I got it specifically for one feature, and it's something I didn't see in a lot of other sound cards out there: Dolby Digital Live encoding. I'll explain this briefly in case you're curious.

Dolby Digital Live comes into play if you're outputting via digital signal to an A/V receiver. You need it to encode surround sound that isn't in the Dolby format (most video games output surround sound that is NOT in Dolby Digital format) into the Dolby format so that the A/V receiver can play it as 5.1. This is only needed if you plan on using the digital outputs of a sound card, and it sounds like you're going direct to speakers via analog lines. I mention this in case you plan on adding some sort of outboard amp capable of decoding dolby digital (like an A/V receiver) in the future. If you want to know more, hit me back and I'll explain in greater detail. Or google "What is Dolby Digital LIve"

Sure PegLeg, I'm the same way: I want things to sound great too! Okay, here's the deal with the Dolby Digital Live; forgive me if I cover stuff you already know.

So, video games on PCs output digital sound to whatever sound hardware is on your PC. The sound card then translates the digital to analog voltages and outputs these to some sort of amplifier (an A/V receiver or an amp built into the speakers themselves), which then outputs it to the speakers. To hear surround sound from your PC, you need a wire for every pair of channels, so for 5.1 sound, 3 wires.

The other way to output from your computer is digital. In this case, the digital sound from the game goes out of the sound card still in a digital format and doesn't get translated into analog until it gets to an A/V receiver (so you need an A/V receiver to output digital sound from a computer). When outputting digital, it's just a single wire from the computer to the receiver (this wire will be either fiber optic or coax, and the output on the sound card will probably be labeled "S/PDIF"). So the digital sound going across this wire has to be encoded in a way that the receiver will understand. If you just want to output stereo, there's no problem, but if you want to output surround sound, the digital output needs to be encoded in a proprietary format from a company like Dolby or DTS. To do this encoding, however, the maker of a sound card needs a license from Dolby. And because of this license, the games themselves (at least on PC) don't output in dolby format and neither do most sound cards. This means if you try to play your game via a digital output from most sound cards, you will not get 5.1. You'll get stereo (or maybe three channel? Not sure). Note this isn't a problem for movies because their surround sound track is encoded in one of these proprietary formats.

The only way to actually get surround sound via a digital output from a computer is to buy a sound card that supports taking surround sound output from a video game and encoding it in one of these proprietary formats. There aren't many cards that do this that I'm aware of. And I'm not aware of any on-motherboard sound devices that do this (though I've certainly not looked hard for such a mobo). The card I found that did this has something called Dolby DIgital Live, which is the name of the encoder that takes the digital surround sound output from the game and encodes it as Dolby digital, which the receiver will understand. The card is the Createive Labs Soundblaster Recon3D PCIe). With this card, you can use a digital sound output from your computer and still get surround sound from video games.

So, to summarize, if you're outputting analog sound, either directly to speakers with a build in amp or to an A/V receiver, any sound card you find will allow you to output surround sound from video games as long as the card has enough outputs. If you want to output digitally to an A/V receiver (no built-in speaker amps have the ability to take digital input as far as I'm aware) and you want surround sound from video games (again, movies will work fine), you need a sound card that has Dolby Digital Live or something similar.

So the only question is is there are reason to want digital output over analog. Digital is billed as "better" than analog, but just like everyone said for the balanced vs unbalanced thing, it's unlikely you'll hear much of a difference in sound quality between digital and analog. The exception may be if you have some sort of interference in your system or the area that is introducing noise into the analog voltage. Of course, this doesn't stop me from always using digital sound outputs whenever possible - I doubt I need it, but I do it anyway One thing digital does give you is fewer wires. You can output surround sound with a single wire when going digital, and it's always nice to reduce wire clutter. In short, if you want less wire clutter, and the "best" sound possible, you may want to consider digital output. Remember that to do digital sound, you'll need an A/V receiver, too.

So there ya have it. Merry xmas to you too!

You're welcome! Your mobo sound specs look to be good enough and inline with what I've seen on many of the dedicated sound cards on the market.

I did just go and look at the specs for the Asus card Shoggy mentioned, and they are better. The question you have to ask, though, is if you could actually hear the difference between the two. Imho, it's unlikely you could, and it would probably be dependent on what you're listening to. For example, very dynamic music with very quiet parts may allow you to hear the advantage the Asus has in signal-to-noise ratio. I'm not trying to dissuade you from buying a sound card. My mobo has similar specs and I was happy with it and only upgraded the soundcard to get the dolby digital live functionality. So that may be something to look at: if your onboard sound device has the functionality you need (e.g. number of channels, output configuration), you may want to just stay with that. But hey, I like sound too and understand the need to upgrade Good luck!

LossMentality is exactly correct. He knows what he is talking about and makes perfect sense, so if you want to potentially save $200 please consider what he says. You may (probably) not be able to tell the difference between your mobo's built in sound system and a $200 sound card. If you think you will eventually want the Dolby Digital Live encoder, then maybe it will make sense to buy a sound card. And, by the way, the HT Omega Claro Halo has a Dolby Digital Live encoder too. But, unless you listen to, say, classical music, in a very quiet and noise-free environment, and have highly trained hearing, you probably won't be able to tell the difference. As good as the Corsair speakers you ordered are, and they are very good computer speakers, you would probably need much better speakers and power amplifier too, etc. to be able to hear the difference between your built-in sound system and a sound card.

And, keep in mind that if you buy a Soundblaster Recon, or a Claro Halo, and compare the sound with your old system after you install the new sound card, it probably isn't a valid comparison. The study of psychoacoustics is very revealing. You would need to compare them against each other instantly, switching back and forth between them, the sound levels would have to be perfectly matched (study after study shows that people favor the sound of the louder system, no matter what), and it really should be a blind A-B comparison or even better a double-blind comparison.

Here is a link to a page that contains some interesting info about acoustics and psychoacoustics: Roger Russell's Audio Distortions Roger was one of the truly great pioneers of speaker design, he was the Director of Acoustic Research at McIntosh Labs for 25 years, founded their speaker line, and, among other things, designed the McIntosh XR-290 speaker system. Many audiophiles think the XR-290 is the best speaker system ever designed. Here is a link to his page about them: Just imagine hooking these things up to your computer and a good, powerful amplifier! For reference, the 290's are 7 feet tall and weigh 335 lbs each. Roger has plenty of credibility, degrees, and experience. I'd bet he would tell you the same thing that LossMentality did.

Meanwhile, enjoy your new Corsair speakers and have fun.

SLG - thanks for the link to Russell's webpage. He and Bob Carver help disuade deluded friends that tube amps "sound so much better" than modern power amps. I have owned both types...sold the tube amps (very fast due ti the mystique!) - It all comes down to the quality of the source material.

"Pancake syrup"?

Yeah, Scott, thanks for those links. I hadn't ever heard of the XR-290 speakers. Hmmmm, now I just need to get a pair!

Pegleg, as you develop more and more knowledge of audio equipment be careful you don't get led astray with technical sounding but entirely false and misleading bullshit, that promotes the "superiority" of some way, WAY overpriced equipment. For an example, look at these cables.[url]http://store.acousticsounds.com/d/36807/AudioQuest-Niagara_Interconnect_w72v_DBS_15_Meter-Analogue_Interconnect[/url] These are simply 1.5 meter or about 4.5' RCA to RCA cables, nothing more, nothing less. But take a look at the price, $2,300.00!!! For a cable!!? Please notice how they hype up plain, ordinary features to make them sound like something special: Air tubes are nothing more than oversized insulation. And, if you think about it, the conductor can't physically stay suspended in its "air tube," It will lay directly on the "air tube," defeating its supposed purpose. But it will still fulfill its hidden primary purpose: To separate gullible suckers from their money, lots of their money.

I thank and greatly respect people like Roger Russell for having the strength of character to tell the truth about audio equipment and keep innocent newbies away from the rip-off artists that want nothing more than the purchaser's money, as much as they can get.

I also thank Roger for the great sound qualities of the equipment he designed. As I write this I am listening to streaming classical music being played on: McIntosh ML-2C speakers (designed by RR), powered by a McIntosh MC 2205 power amplifier (a great amp in its own right, and the meter circuits were designed by RR), fed by a McIntosh C 28 preamplifier (based very much on the C 26 which was designed by RR). And connecting it all are plain-old RCA cables and 14 ga zip cord wire for the speakers. Works great, and I dare anyone to a double-blind test of the cables against such rubbish as the $2,300 cables linked above.

LossMentality: I have only heard the XRT-20, the predecessor of the XR-290, and they were incredible. The 290s are said to be much better. If you want a pair, you had better start saving as the price is usually staggering.

jpmBoy,

I have just sold a tape deck to a guy that used to own a large audio dealership for 30 years. Bob Carver gave him the last amplifier to be made in the Carver factory when the factory shut down. Bob Carver even signed the amp for him. I have photos of it,




and

Oh... That IS sweet! BC used very forward technology which many poopooed when he first brought it out. I have four of his early tracking downconverter amps feeding bi-amped Mirage M-1s. The price of highend stuff has gone through the roof, but you can get very good quality sound from reasonably priced stuff today. I still struggle with the quality of digital music commercial bitrates basically suk.

Those ML-2c speakers are good stuff. Enjoy!

Ps: recently I've been enjoying IEMs (vs headphones) - no need to bother folks with my music preferences, and sound quality is quite good.