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Post by Deleted on Apr 27, 2008 4:06:08 GMT
Has anybody got the Asus Xonar D2X Soundcard on their PC ? If so, have they compared it with the Creative cards, and was it worth the change to this card, considering it's >AU250 typical asking price ? I have seen a PC magazine review of this card, and seen the indepth review at the link below, but does it really live up to all the hype ? SandyK www.techreport.com/articles.x/14500 |
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Post by charleyphogg on Apr 27, 2008 4:48:04 GMT
I don't know anything about any of Asus' soundcards other then Asus produces quilty stuff. I'm not sure what you're looking for in a soundcard but I use an Azentech X-Plosion and I am very pleased with it. It's only $100US. Here's the site if you want to check it out..... www.auzentech.com/site/products/x-plosion.php Or the X-Meridian if you can find one. I assume they dropped it because it competed with their new Prelude, seeing as how you can still get the X-Plosion and that cards is 1 generation older then the Meridian. The Meridian uses the better C-Media CMI-8788 chipset then the X-Plosion. Both good from rolling op-amps |
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Post by charleyphogg on Apr 27, 2008 4:54:01 GMT
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Post by Deleted on Apr 27, 2008 5:06:11 GMT
charleyphogg
I am using Creative's X-FI Xtreme Music, which also plays DVD-A, so I am quite happy with it, but this card should be even better. Yes, I noticed the patch, but I am not going to install my copy of Vista for sometime yet.
SandyK
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Post by charleyphogg on Apr 27, 2008 5:27:19 GMT
OK, wasn't sure.
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Post by mistergreen on Apr 27, 2008 14:42:46 GMT
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Post by Deleted on Apr 27, 2008 21:16:40 GMT
Miguel The only DAC I have is the X-DAC V3, and I really don't need another for the PC. Lots of people seem to think you need USB DACs and all other bits and pieces connected to the PC to extract decent sound from it. That is wrong.  Analogue out from a recent electrically quiet PC, when using a decent soundcard, and played using the Soundcard's own player using ASIO drivers, IMHO, is damn hard to beat into a quality headphone amplifier. ;D Does the usual PC to USB DAC etc. sound better than a decent CD/DVD player into a high quality DAC, then into your headphone amplifier ? I very much doubt it ! But the previously described analogue route can !!! Alex |
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Post by Deleted on Apr 27, 2008 21:20:43 GMT
mistergreen
I have read the good reports of that card, but it is still basically a Creative X-FI with it's limitations. It does however start out with a decent I.C. for the Stereo out instead of the generic rubbish that Creative fits.
Alex
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Post by Deleted on Apr 27, 2008 22:47:34 GMT
Miguel
Unfortunately, the PC is in my bedroom, and the X-DAC V3 in the lounge room with the TV and sound system. I honestly believe that the present headphone listening method will outperform what you are suggesting. As I have said previously, it is a shame we are at different ends of the earth, as it is so hard to prove. At least Leo now has some idea of what I am on about,in general.
Alex
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Post by charleyphogg on Apr 28, 2008 1:07:20 GMT
Miguel The only DAC I have is the X-DAC V3, and I really don't need another for the PC. Lots of people seem to think you need USB DACs and all other bits and pieces connected to the PC to extract decent sound from it. That is wrong. Analogue out from a recent electrically quiet PC, when using a decent soundcard, and played using the Soundcard's own player using ASIO drivers, IMHO, is damn hard to beat into a quality headphone amplifier. ;D Does the usual PC to USB DAC etc. sound better than a decent CD/DVD player into a high quality DAC, then into your headphone amplifier ? I very much doubt it ! But the previously described analogue route can !!! Alex I just did a quick a/b, as quick as one can switch from amp, to headphone out and change setting from spdif to headphone out of the controller for my Logitech z-5300. Before I was wondering if amp/dac was worth the $1,100 or so I have wrapped up in it.Edit, maybe better if the jury is still out before I make such a bold statement. Granted it was just snippets of one song, and I probably should give it more of a listen before saying so. But then again for the price difference it should be drastically noticeable. I'm going to give it along listen, but really, is it needed?  And that's not even using ASIO. I tried ASIO and all I got out of it was various problems with Foobar and Winamp that makes it note worth the trouble, notto mention couldn't hear any difference in my setup. |
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Post by Deleted on Apr 28, 2008 1:21:29 GMT
Charleyphogg
Are you using a high quality soundcard ? You appear to be confirming my results about analogue out, with what you just posted ? BTW, you would probably need a high quality HA to readily pick the improvement using ASIO drivers.
SandyK
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Post by charleyphogg on Apr 28, 2008 2:02:00 GMT
SandyK,
Yes, I have the Auzentech X-Plosion with rolled op-amps, I beleive BB -2134 I think. Before I got my OMZ dac the Solo could be pretty fatiguing on some recordings. The OMZ really smoothed, or tamed the Solo.
I'm using kernel streaming, even that has some issues, but at least I can listen gapless. ASIO I couldn't listen gapless. Maybe its just me and I have to play around wiht it some more.
I've listened to some otehr tracks, and granted, the Solo/OMZ has alot more detail, and the bass is better, tighter and everythign else is too. But still.....
I'll play around some more with ASIO and see if I can improve it.
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Post by charleyphogg on Apr 28, 2008 3:30:19 GMT
I have redone everything and just went with ASIO4ALL instead of using plug-ins.
Something just has to be wrong wiht how I have my dac and amp set up. Surely going from the headphine jack on my controller shouldn't be this close to my amp/dac.
My speaker set up, I'm assuming it has an amp in the sub-woofer. The controller has a stepped attenuater for the volume. It's a 5.1 set-up, and the controller is used naturally for volume, but also can adjust all of the speakers and the headphone jack.
SAndy, by HA I assume you mean headphone amp?
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Post by Deleted on Apr 28, 2008 3:36:59 GMT
Charleyphogg
If you mean from analogue out of your Soundcard, then that is exactly what I have been trying to say about how good analogue out using the proper ASIO drivers with a good soundcard can be. I believe that many people have wasted their money. Perhaps it may often be better to get a good soundcard instead ?
Yes I meant Headphone Amplifier.
SandyK
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Post by charleyphogg on Apr 28, 2008 4:40:04 GMT
SandyK,
Sure is looking that way. My soundcard even has the same tonal signature. Really ahrd to detect any difference otjer tjem the soundcard seems a bit distant so far. Certainly makes me wonder whats going on. I mean, this just can't be right, just can't, can it?
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Post by Deleted on Apr 28, 2008 5:04:09 GMT
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Post by charleyphogg on Apr 28, 2008 5:20:34 GMT
Wonder if something is wrong with my dac, I can't get it to play 24/96. My soundcard manual says you can with coaxial or optical, so I should be able to play them. The audio program that came with my soundcard has diferent seeting s for digital audio out, 44.1, 48, 96, s/pdif loopback. When I play 24/96 flac files wit ht the program set for 96KHz, all I get is some static. I have to drop down to 48 or 44.1 KHz to get music.
It makes me wonder if the dac is holding the SOlo back. With the dac I ca listen to the Solo at higher volumes then I was able to before. But that's not much help I don't think since I didn't have the ideal situation to begin wiht. I had to use adpater's and I wonder if that was allowing HF, or RF noise, but then again that would of been all the time, not just on some recordings.
I wish there was a way I could a/b the Solo and the soundcard, but that whould be too much of a pain in the ass and would take way to long to even bother.
Oh well. time to scamper off to bed with my tail between my legs. I have to try and get some sleep. Someone made an early appointment for me, even though they know I never know when or how I will sleep, or how I'll be when I wake up.
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Post by charleyphogg on Apr 28, 2008 5:36:21 GMT
SandyK,
No I haven't seen that, I'll have to read it more carefully tomorrow. Right now I just can' tthink, but I did get as far as.....
For example, my friends can readily pick the difference between .flac files that I reconverted to .wav, then burned to CD-R,and the original .wav file burned to the same type of CD-R.
After reading that about 15 times.... where did the original flac files come from? and Have you tried coverting an original flac file then burn that to disc and then compare those two?
The only difference I have ever expeirenced when converting a flac file, then burning it to disc is volume related. Which it would make it extremel;y easy to overdrive whatever else you play the cd in, or vise-versa. Ive converted flac to wav and have done back to back comparicons on my pc and can't tell the difference. So maybe how you're doing it is like creating a second generation of the file, hence, worsen the quality. Just a guess as I'm not able to understand exactly what it is at this time.
Ill try and read it tomorrow.
Take care,
Charleyphogg
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Post by Deleted on Apr 28, 2008 5:47:47 GMT
charleyphogg
I ripped a CD to the HDD using EAC. I then converted the resulting .wav files to .flac. I then took these .flac files that I had created, and converted them back to.wav, using the flac program. The original ripped .wav files were burned to a CDR , and the files that were reconverted from .flac back to .wav files, were also burned to the same type of CD-R at the same speed as the ripped .wav files were.
If the .flac conversion was perfect, then both discs should have sounded identical. The flac processed CD-R was clearly inferior to the other CD-R when played back through my Class A amplifier.
BTW, I have also downloaded several CD albums that had been posted in the binaries groups as flac files. I converrted these back to wav, and burned CDs. They should have sounded identical to the commercial CD of the same album, but they always sounded inferior, and disappointing.
SandyK
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Post by charleyphogg on Apr 28, 2008 13:00:10 GMT
SandyK, Damn man, you're just full of all sorts of good news  I get what you're saying now. That is disappointing and makes you wonder why they call them lossless then. With the souncard, I wonder that since the soundcard has already done the dac conversion, if that takes the external dac out of the equation? |
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Post by Deleted on Apr 28, 2008 21:13:14 GMT
charleyphogg Leo,one of our resident DAC gurus and electronics whizkids , sent me the following about one of the ASUS cards. This should answer your questions. Alex "I see it uses programmable PCM1796, basically almost same as whats in the X-dac V3, specs are a bit different Also uses a nice little analogue to digital converter which would be handy, it has mainly cheapo op-amps BUT also uses a LM4562, that will probably be for the main left and right output! It got a decent instead of fantastic review on sound quality" aphnetworks.com/reviews/asus_xonar_d2/6 |
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Post by charleyphogg on Apr 28, 2008 22:20:11 GMT
Wonder if something is wrong with my dac, I can't get it to play 24/96. My soundcard manual says you can with coaxial or optical, so I should be able to play them. The audio program that came with my soundcard has diferent seeting s for digital audio out, 44.1, 48, 96, s/pdif loopback. .. I thought with digital out of a soundcard you could only get 16/44. In analogue a different story.  Miguel, Only 24/96 out of digital, and 16/44.1 or 48 out of analog. I'm pretty sure that's the case no matter what, but don't quote me on that. |
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Post by charleyphogg on Apr 28, 2008 22:50:26 GMT
I find this paragraph awful contradictory...... " The general design of this card is to sound natural, and I can clearly see this intention because after some testing with my headphones I can clearly see this when compared to the Creative X-Fi I have installed on another system. I can say I am impressed by the midrange, as well as the cleanness and detail related to it -- it's clean, clear, with detail and does not sound overemphasized on any frequency. However, with this the Asus Xonar D2 also sounds very neutral -- almost to a point that it lacks a contrast for deep, low bass and sharp, wet sounding treble." So neutral means flat? "Because the Xonar D2 does not respond to significant equalizer changes as mentioned earlier, nothing much can be done with the raw output of the card in terms of software configuration -- I found that the Asus Xonar D2 performs the best by far when it's on neutral EQ settings." If the card sounded neutral, wouldn't it respond to EQ settings to where it was lacking? Basically, as opposed to Creative sound cards and audio products which are generally the punchy type, the Xonar D2 is the Basically, as opposed to Creative sound cards and audio products which are generally the punchy type, the Xonar D2 is the neutral type -- having a large emphasis on the layered and equal midrange output with precision and detail in every aspect. So punchy = good I givce up,. ive redone this danmn thing 5 times and it keeps adding what i copy and paste and i delete then copy and paste and it adds it again... So they are saying pounchy good, nuetral large emaphissi on layered and equal mids with predision and setail in every aspevt bad? |
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Post by charleyphogg on Apr 28, 2008 22:57:52 GMT
Srty dor typo's hoepfully you can undersatn it.
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Post by Deleted on Apr 28, 2008 23:18:47 GMT
charleyphogg
Neutral means that it doesn't alter tonally the sound that it processes. i.e. no part of the audible range is either accentuated or reduced, i.e. a flat response. I prefer this kind of approach, because I believe that any deficiencies should be corrected externally.
Not everybody will agree with this, however. "Punchy" doesn't normally translate to neutral, unless the playback amplifier has a really good and accurate low end, AND an extended high frequency response, which with things like drums, because of the very fast rise and fall times of their waveforms, gives the impression of "punch"
SandyK
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