best sound card for g4oo max?

[SteveC]

http://www.hoontech.com

For all your SBLive! (and value) upgrades.

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Cheers,
Steve

PS: Some or all of the above message may be wrong, or, just as likely, correct. Depends on what mood I'm in. And what you know. ;¬)

[PurpleHaze]

Jammrock, waitaminit! Okay, about the AC3, fine, they don't decode AC3 to analog. However!

No need for high quality DACs in the PC industry? Hold on now! I don't see why these cards can' thave RF shielding on them; I've seen it odne before on modems and TV tuner cards! I put on my Sennheiser headphones and I'm telling you, between my old SB 16 and my Event Gina, there *IS A DIFFERENCE!* And you CAN notice it! Compression hsa little to do with white noise, it only effects quantization and bit aliasing, the two are not even in the same domain! Why compound it with a noisy card!

The -120db I was talking about was noise FLOOR not S/N ratio. If you have a high noise floor, then you plug in your amp and it's going to be amplifying that noise. Maybe some people are immune to this but I can't even fall asleep in my room with my speakers plugged in because the hiss keeps me awake!

Anyways. This is horribly OT at this point.

(Fizzy digresses, and puts her flamethrower away for now.)

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Ami Y. Koriuchi - foxyviolet@hotmail.com
Asus P2B 1010 - P3-500 - And a G400Max now.
256MB 6NS 70 GB of 10k RPM SCSI UW

Mustard is illegal here.

[This message has been edited by PurpleHaze (edited 09-17-1999).]

[BuGGz]

Well, I changed from an MX200 to a SB Live. and the Live beats it hands down. I mean beats it bad. Havn't had any experience with the MX300.

[DentyCracker]

Purplehaze, the soundcard itself probably does have close to -120dB noise floor. I know in my machine it is damn quiet at full volume once unused inputs are muted or the cables disconnected. I was pissed with the "high" noise floor (listening to my DSS receiver through the TV98) until I discovered the culprit (the TV98). Routing the (analog) audio from the DSS directly to the line in inputjack cured that. Yeah and movies sound better using Movie mode too. At least they do on my FPS1000.
Sniff, I sold my machine yesterday, i'll only have it for one more week.
Next month i'll put together a better one (no SCSI though, not yet). G400Max will definitely be part of it. It will not be intel.

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Cracker_99
VA-503+rev 1.2A, 450 MHz K6-III, 96 MB EDO DRAM, 10 GB Maxtor HD, SB Live!, Millennium G200 8MB AGP, AVerMedia TV98, AOPEN CRW 9420, FPS 1000, 2 MS SideWinder Gamepads
Win98 (2222A), BeOS 4.5.2, RedHat 5.2 with Kernel 2.2.12

[Helmchen]

Is that everything? :-)

I use a EWS64s pluged to yamaha ??? surround receiver with a simple Subwoofer/satellite System(no rear speakers yet) Booms good and loud the subwoofer pumps directly in my back!!!
Together with my force feedback gaming is really good:-))

Helmchen

[Pertti]

SB 32 AWE RULEZ

Pertti

[EchoWars]

Turtle Beach has had a reputation as the professional's choice for a while. The TB Montego II Quad is right up there with some very expensive cards. 97db S/N ratio, samples at 18 bit, dithered to 16 bit. Got mine to do some transferring of old LP's (remember them?) to CD. Supports 48Khz sampling in stereo, which the SB Live can't do. Monster MX300 uses same chip (Aureal) and has similar specs, but the Montego has it hands down with better S/N and software (Turtle Beach and Voyetra are same company). The wave editor that comes with the SB Live is crap. Best friend bought the Live to do LP transfers too, but we had to load up the Voyetra software that came with my Montego II Quad to get any copying done. Lastly, the AudioStation 32 that comes with the Montego II has a nice ten-band graphic EQ...and the Live doesn't

[This message has been edited by EchoWars (edited 09-18-1999).]

[Jimmy]

I'd recommend the SB Live too.Good audio quality,and digital Dolby AC-3 audio out.Of course U need a good amplifier as well to make use of digital sound.

[Meek]

For games, it is MX300, or even a cheap no-name Aureal Vortex card. No probelms with IRQ sharing etc. as many SB Live (value) users have.

M.

[MentalVacuum]

Morpheus: Buy according to your needs. For gaming I'd definately go with the Vortex2 based cards as it'll just do a lot more for you in terms of creating a 360 degree illusion (assuming quad speaker setup).

I've got a 50 buck Aureal SuperQuad that works flawlessly, no conflicts, no hazzle just great for those FPS games, my G400Max displays.

For the discussion on noise, I find the computer to be an unacceptable medium for reproducing music altogether. I'm Pro Turntable, and still consider the purchase og my cd player a blasphemous act. Yes, there's a 50dB S/N ratio difference between even a cheap ass CD and my modified Project 6.1 turntable, but Music-wise, It'll whoop any sub $2,000 Cd ass anytime.

Anyways, just wanted to point out there's a heckalot more to sound reproduction than noise...



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"In the beginning the Universe was created. This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move." -"The Guide"by D. Adams)

[KvHagedorn]

Alright, you guys, reading all this crap is pretty difficult when all I can think about is "most of these people are listening on multimedia computer speakers, and they want to talk about sound quality?" One of my best friends here was going on and on yesterday about a $250 set of multimedia speakers that somehow managed to get THX approval. I was like "what the hell?" Look, this is just THX selling out, you know.

Look, guys.. all the technical crap and circuitry they put into receivers and soundcards doesnt mean squat without a good speaker (wake up, all.. you can't buy these at a computer store) and a good quality high current amp.

Ami is probably doing the best thing by using headphones (how could you hear anything over that bank of whirring hard drives and fans otherwise? ), but sound quality is not in the sound card (At least for the greatest part). Why are you buying these cheap multimedia speakers and spending more time and trouble figuring out which sound card to buy? This is analogous to your buying a MAX and then running a $99.00 14 inch El Cheapo monitor with it. Go to a real audio store (NOT Circuit City) and listen to music on some real speakers with a decent amp. (Helmchen has the idea, except for the Yamaha speakers ) This will make you realize what crap multimedia speakers are.

I have a decent small audio system for my computer sound: A Nakamichi RS1 mini receiver and Phase Technology PC40 bookshelf speakers. The receiver was around $300 and the speakers were $400 for the pair when I bought them. (unfortunately, both have gone out of production)

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Kind Regards,

KvH


[This message has been edited by KvHagedorn (edited 09-19-1999).]

[Pige]

Hi there,

KH, deffo has the right idea. I have my sound card routed through a denon amp and a couple of mission speakers and although I only get stereo, it sounds the bollox.

I have both an old Awe 64 gold and a Diamon Sonic 90 (Vortex) but would have to recommend the Awe 64. Mainly because I do a lot of recording through the soundcard and it appears to be more sensitive. The sound through the Sonic 90 is all wishy washy compared.

Pige

[EchoWars]

O.K....for my Turtle Beach card, four Dynaudio MDY-4's, Adcom GFA-7000 Amp, vintage Kenwood tube pre-amp. I can hear the f!%#@&n' difference. (Audio buff long before the first Apple II hit the streets)

[This message has been edited by EchoWars (edited 09-19-1999).]

[PaulS]

PurpleHaze: The inside of a computer is a pretty horrendous place for any analogue signal. I think you've pretty much got to keep everything digital until you get outside the case.

Paul.

[Himself]

I have an MX 300, it's the best card I have. Can't say anything about cards I don't have.

For you MX 300 owners out the the latest beta drivers are a must to get (3dsales.com), they sound a lot better in A3D mode with quad speakers, that X demo sounds amazing, HRTF(sp?) for both front and rear speakers has been added to quad mode. Also, for AMD users, it now supports 3D-Now! to a point where you can see a noticeable speed in crease in games. Get the beta drivers, now!

Oh, if you don't have a set of computer speakers with a sub woofer, I just picked up a set with one for $33 CDN or $20 US (http://www.accelerated.ca/), Juster 3DFX1, sounds great. Works well with my el cheapo set I am using for the rear speakers. Games really need an oomph'er to sound proper.