On-board audio or dedicated sound card - pros and cons

[Havok]

Hey,

I have ( and currently using) onboard audio for my sound output. It is Realtek onboard audio for an ASUS MOBO. Its 8 channel audio and im purchasing a sound card. It's a Creative Labs 7.1 sound card with EAX. Is it a good upgrade? I'm sure it is but im just looking for some quality advice first

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=4514390&CatId=2771

 

[9Nails]

It's not quite the same as switching from on-board video to a discrete video GPU card, but it's the best comparison that I can think of. At least with the video you can see a significant difference. With audio it's a little harder to hear a difference, especially since you need a good speaker set to reference from. If your CPU is a little down in power then you'll notice some improvement in games too. A lot of the crackling and poorly addressed effects will be cleaned up. For me, I was also able to hear other players further in a map than I could with on-board audio.

One thing to add to this brand of card that you're buying: The manufacture makes different audio profiles available in their software for this card. These profiles are designed for entertainment, games, etc... Enabling or disabling a profile might make the difference if EAX is available in-game or not. If it does not come with the manufacture's software, I would suggest looking for a disc ISO since this software would be necessary to configure the card for these options. And the updates at the manufacture's website might be incomplete.

 

[Havok]

Thanks!

Hey Nails,
Sorry that I wasn't able to reply sooner- beginning of school week is kinda crazy. =p
Anyways, I went ahead and got the card-its an amazing addition to my P.C! I love the EAX sound quality and crystallizer. Its all in all very cool. =)

Thanks,
Havok

 

[teklord]

The sound card is supposed to relieve the duties of the CPU of processing sound and improve the sound quality at the same time. This means higher FPS in games. X-Fi has excellent quality and I really like mine a lot.