Good sound card?

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tehfire
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Good sound card?

Post by tehfire » Sun Jun 24, 2007 6:23 pm

I was gonna post this question on a different site's forum, but seeing that I'm appealing to one's sense of hearing...what better place to post than here.

Does anybody have a recommendation on a good sound card? I was using a Creative Audigy 4 for a long time, but I just sold it and I can't stand onboard audio :-P.

I'd want it to be between $40 and $80 with really good sound quality. I've been using Creative ::cringes:: almost exclusively for the past couple of years so I don't even know what other options there are.

If not a specific sound card, is there a brand or a chipset that I should be looking for?

Thanks for your help

Michael Sandstrom
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Post by Michael Sandstrom » Sun Jun 24, 2007 8:01 pm

I really like my M-Audio Revolution 5.1 PCI soundcard for music and DVD sound playback. The card has native ASIO output which combined with the Winamp ASIO output plugin (used with MediaMonkey Gold) allows me to bypass Windows XP Kmixer avoiding unnecessary resampling. Newegg has the card for $67.99.

Before I purchased the M-Audio card I had a Chaintech AV710 which is favored by many HTPC builders. The chaintech card only costs $21.99 but lacks native ASIO. ASIO output is possible; however, by using ASIO4ALL.

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Post by TheAtomicKid » Sun Jun 24, 2007 8:44 pm

I own a m-audio revolution 7.1 and I must say, the output is quite good. If you need a pure gaming solution where everything else is secondary, stick with creative labs. I myself, am a step down from that. I game, but it's not my be-all end-all. I listen to music and... primarily... watch lots of anime/movies etc. Anything with the via envy 24 (they bought up another company to get it, so I give them no credit for actually doing something right with this one :D ) will make for a pretty good card. It's got up to EAX 2.0 compatibility, it's enough for basic 3d positional sound.... as (almost) always, better with headphones.

If you're dreading onboard sound, but you happen to have a motherboard with an analog devices sound solution, you might give it a try. They're generally well regarded as far as onboard sound goes. I wouldnt even take the time to throw dog poop at the others, however.

Start with a via envy 24 solution.

If you can't find that, you might try something with a C-Media chipset.

If pure gaming performance is your thing, stick with an x-fi. (lowest end cards fit in your budget range... can someone chime in here and confirm whether the low end x-fi's actually do hardware acceleration? I'd heard they don't, but can't confirm it with certainty)

Atomic

(Extremely happy with my Revolution 7.1... based on the via envy 24 chipset, btw)

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Post by mr. poopyhead » Sun Jun 24, 2007 10:17 pm

it really depends on your ears...

some people are perfectly happy with onboard sound and dinky computer speakers. no sense in spending money there...

if you're going to run a separate amp and speaker setup, you'll definitely want to get a good sound card. i personally would stay away from creative... they're not HORRIBLE, but they're notorious for hyperbole in their marketing... stuff like "better than CD quality" DSP crap.

if you're going to take a dive into the audiophile world, try and find a chaintech AV-710. you can find it for about $30 CAD, new. it won't break your bank, and if you end up not noticing the difference, then it won't be a big deal. the AV-710 is based on the same chip family as the m-audio revolution series, which are substantially more expensive...

always make sure to match your components though... i don't know much about computer speakers so you'll have to wait for help on that one... but there's no sense in getting a high(er) end sound card and hooking up some cheap powered speakers to it.

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Post by tehfire » Mon Jun 25, 2007 8:51 am

Well I already have good speakers (not gonna name names because haha they're from a...less than appreciated company...their treble response and clarity are amazing, though), so I'm just looking for a sound card that will be a boost over this freaking onboard audio. My old Audigy was pretty good as far as SnR goes, but with onboard everytime I move my mouse it causes noise...haha it's driving me crazy! I'll start with the Chaintech and then look into some Envy cards. Thanks for the suggestions.

tehfire
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Post by tehfire » Mon Jun 25, 2007 8:57 am

Alright I've been looking at the Envy24 chips, and that Chaintech is rediculously inexpensive! I'm always weary of things that seem `too good to be true`, however...why is the Chaintech so cheap? Can anybody vouch for its sound quality? Why's it so cheap?

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Post by qviri » Mon Jun 25, 2007 9:22 am

tehfire wrote:Well I already have good speakers (not gonna name names because haha they're from a...less than appreciated company...
On SPCR, that would normally be Thermaltake, but somehow I don't recall them making speakers ;)
tehfire wrote:Alright I've been looking at the Envy24 chips, and that Chaintech is rediculously inexpensive! I'm always weary of things that seem `too good to be true`, however...why is the Chaintech so cheap? Can anybody vouch for its sound quality? Why's it so cheap?
I have one. The rest of my setup is not too high tech, but I can definitely hear the difference between AV-710 and onboard. It's worth the $25 IMO.

One thing to be aware of: the high quality output (Wolfson DACs) only works in two-channel mode, good for music but it won't apply if you're into surround sound movies. (It should still be cleaner than onboard, of course.) I found the Windows drivers kind of meh, in particular the VIA control panel likes to eat 30% of CPU power whenever opened.

I take it you've seen the Head-Fi review?

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Post by Michael Sandstrom » Mon Jun 25, 2007 9:36 am

Most of the HTPC people who favor the Chaintech AV710 for multi-channel sound are using the optical S/PDIF out which bypasses the DAC's. The Chaintech is not advised for multi-channel analogue but for two channel is ok. For multi-channel analogue go with the M-Audio Revolution 5.1.

tehfire
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Post by tehfire » Mon Jun 25, 2007 10:56 am

qviri wrote:On SPCR, that would normally be Thermaltake, but somehow I don't recall them making speakers ;)
You do have to admit...Thermaltake sure does make a lot of noise ;)

Looks like I'm gonna get the Chaintech, as I'm only using a 2.1 system right now. I primarily listen to music, and something about surround sound is just odd...when you're at a concert you're listening to music from in front of you - you're not standing in the middle of the band. Thanks for your help, guys.

One more question: AFAIK the Chaintech has coaxial digital out...what are the chances that when I move to a surround sound system it'll require Optical?

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Post by Mr Evil » Mon Jun 25, 2007 11:47 am

tehfire wrote:...when you're at a concert you're listening to music from in front of you - you're not standing in the middle of the band...
Nonetheless the sound doesn't only come from in front of you, it is reflected from objects beside and behind you too. Recreating that with only two speakers is possible but incredibly hard. Unfortunately, proper multi-channel recordings are still rare, but it's possible to do a fair job of extracting the ambient sound field from a stereo track with a bit of clever processing.

Michael Sandstrom
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Post by Michael Sandstrom » Mon Jun 25, 2007 12:01 pm

tehfire, The Chaintech has optical S/PDIF rather than coaxial,

tehfire
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Post by tehfire » Mon Jun 25, 2007 1:15 pm

Michael Sandstrom wrote:tehfire, The Chaintech has optical S/PDIF rather than coaxial,
Yeah, I saw that when I ordered it, I don't know what I was looking at earlier...perhaps the 5.1 version? ::shrugs::

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Post by Steve_Y » Tue Jun 26, 2007 3:52 am

I've played around with surround sound, but whether it was due to the recordings I tried, or because I'm so used to stereo, I just didn't find it a particularly pleasant experience. An interesting novelty rather than something that actually made the music more lifelike and enjoyable.

Personally I like headphones for careful listening and in my experience onboard audio invariably sounds pretty poor through decent headphones. That's even true of the onboard sound on my modern AMD 690G board. As that's intended for media centre use, I expected its onboard sound be a bit better.

I know Creative Labs don't have a great repuation for audio quality, but I really like the sound of my EMU 1212 hooked up to a decent amplifier. Playing FLAC encoded audio it sounds just as good as my pretty expensive stand alone CD player.

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Post by Rusty075 » Tue Jun 26, 2007 8:10 am

Yeah, I agree with comments about surround sound for music playback. On paper, sure, it seems like it should outperform good ol' stereo, but I've heard a recording that captures the feeling of having the performer right there in your living room. I have my own personal theory for why that is:

On a conventional two channel recording the goal of the recording is to capture that sound that is coming from the musicians, with as little influence from the recording environment as is practical. With surround-sound recording the effects of the recording environment are an intrinsic part of the recording. The resonances, the reflections, the reverbs of the recording space al come through in the final recording. With either type of recording, when you play it back in your listening environment you are adding your own layers of environmental acoustics to the sound. With stereo recordings those environmental acoustics are basically the only ones you are hearing, so they sound more natural to your ears. With surround sound playback you are hearing both you own environment, plus the recording environment effecting the sound. I think that the effect of your environment on top of effects of the recording environment messes with your head a little. It's like hearing the echo of an echo.

But I love surround sound for movies. Go figure. :lol:


I second all the recommendations for the Chaintech too. I used one for several years until I went to an external DAC. Getting it set-up and working in ASIO from the Wolfsen DAC chip can be a pain in the ass though. There's a couple of good guides online if you go googling for it. If you have any trouble getting it to work give a yell here.

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Post by Mr Evil » Tue Jun 26, 2007 8:36 am

Rusty075 wrote:...On a conventional two channel recording the goal of the recording is to capture that sound that is coming from the musicians, with as little influence from the recording environment as is practical..
There are two philosophies for music reproduction:

1) Make it seem as though the performers are with you in your room.
2) Make it seem as though you are with the performers at their location.

Recordings can be based on either philosophy, although live recordings and films will almost certainly be best suited to 2. Multichannel playback improves 2 the most.

How good a stereo track sounds when played back through more speakers depends strongly on how sound is directed to those extra speakers. The simplest way with 5 speakers is to play L+R through the centre speaker and L-R and R-L through the rear speakers. This works pretty well, depending on the recording. There are more sophisticated methods, e.g. Ambisonics includes a method to upmix stereo to any number of channels that sounds good, and Dolby Pro Logic II is not bad. The sort of upmixing that many sound cards do automatically is often very poor, being nothing more than mirroring the front channels to the rear. That makes the sound appear to be far too spread out, rather than focussed properly in front of you.

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Post by aristide1 » Mon Jul 02, 2007 10:13 am

Mr Evil wrote:
Rusty075 wrote:...On a conventional two channel recording the goal of the recording is to capture that sound that is coming from the musicians, with as little influence from the recording environment as is practical..
There are two philosophies for music reproduction:

1) Make it seem as though the performers are with you in your room.
2) Make it seem as though you are with the performers at their location.

Recordings can be based on either philosophy, although live recordings and films will almost certainly be best suited to 2. Multichannel playback improves 2 the most.

How good a stereo track sounds when played back through more speakers depends strongly on how sound is directed to those extra speakers. The simplest way with 5 speakers is to play L+R through the centre speaker and L-R and R-L through the rear speakers. This works pretty well, depending on the recording. There are more sophisticated methods, e.g. Ambisonics includes a method to upmix stereo to any number of channels that sounds good, and Dolby Pro Logic II is not bad. The sort of upmixing that many sound cards do automatically is often very poor, being nothing more than mirroring the front channels to the rear. That makes the sound appear to be far too spread out, rather than focussed properly in front of you.
Rusty's theory unfortunately remains only that. Really good labels strive for it, but commercial labels pretty much suck. Most pop is pushed passed clipping for maximum volume, sound quality is not an issue. If the consumer base is a bunch of kids with boom-box cars the results can and will be mastered to sound best on a 6 by 9 car speaker, all others be dammed.

"1) Make it seem as though the performers are with you in your room.
2) Make it seem as though you are with the performers at their location."

Actually #1 is not the goal, it just happens first. The info of the performers is intact enough to give you that realism while real life room acoustics interferes and obliterates #2. #2 is extremely difficult to achive because the listener and the recording must get every last thing exactly right, and even then, a cathedral hall may sound that way but diminished in size.

#1 also happens when music is recorded at a dead dry studio room, totally devoid of room acoustics. Artifical reverb always sounds that way. Like an error on a high-def 65 inch TV once you recognize it then it's hard to miss. Reverb is not natural decay of sound, though in a studio it's better than nothing. But the best way to go is to record in a church or any place with its own natural and pleasing acoustics.

You have to hear a music system that makes the listener think the walls in the room have melted away. Mere words just can not do it justice and typically neither can digital, although there are always exceptions.

Mixing boards tend to destroy room acoustics. The best recordings come from the simplest high quality setups. Mixing boards are Band-aids, acoustical problems need to be handled the right way, not the easy way. Too bad year after year mixing schools generate hundreds of knob-twiddlers who routinely do more harm than good, because they can.

Rusty needs to fold. <--- Hint.

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Post by aristide1 » Mon Jul 02, 2007 10:35 am

Rusty075 wrote:...

On a conventional two channel recording the goal of the recording is to capture that sound that is coming from the musicians, with as little influence from the recording environment as is practical. With surround-sound recording the effects of the recording environment are an intrinsic part of the recording. The resonances, the reflections, the reverbs of the recording space al come through in the final recording. With either type of recording, when you play it back in your listening environment you are adding your own layers of environmental acoustics to the sound.

...

I second all the recommendations for the Chaintech too. I used one for several years until I went to an external DAC. Getting it set-up and working in ASIO from the Wolfsen DAC chip can be a pain in the ass though. There's a couple of good guides online if you go googling for it. If you have any trouble getting it to work give a yell here.
Not always, stereo done right includes everything you say it does not, not that any commercial recording company would give a rats' turd about this subject.

Surround sound is the over emphasis and deliberate manipulation to make it noticable. True surround, say recorded at a nightclub, there would be almost no perceivable info, borderline subliminal, until the applause starts.

Surround sound is a toy right now. I saw an Eddie Murphy movie where he's standing near a highway. You hear cars whizzing from right to left in front of you and left to right from behind you. It was really neat, like yor first rollercoaster ride until you notice that Eddie Murphy is not standing in the middle of a highway, the entire highway is in front of him. But the sound makes it seem he's in the middle of the highway. It's fun, but it's totally bullshit.

Surround sound music is grossly misapplied. Nobody is his right mind would sit in the middle of a band or orchestra with instruments behind him. Turning your head to hear an approaching helicopter is one thing, but a guitar player going off behind you? That's just dumb. But since many recordings have no real sense of room acoustics and the recording engineers want to give the buyer his money's worth by exaggerating the effect we end up with performances more akin to video games than to live music. You watch somebody like David Chesky, his surround sound adds just 2 rear channels to pick up more room acoustics. There's never a center channel or the idea even of a single subwoofer as that compromises the location of all the instruments.

The Chaintek is famous as being one of the few audio cards that doesn't take 96/24 audio and down convert it to 48/16 before outputting it digitally. Many HT receivers also pull that nasty little stunt.

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Re: Good sound card?

Post by aristide1 » Mon Jul 02, 2007 10:49 am

tehfire wrote:I was gonna post this question on a different site's forum, but seeing that I'm appealing to one's sense of hearing...what better place to post than here.

Does anybody have a recommendation on a good sound card? I was using a Creative Audigy 4 for a long time, but I just sold it and I can't stand onboard audio :-P.

I'd want it to be between $40 and $80 with really good sound quality. I've been using Creative ::cringes:: almost exclusively for the past couple of years so I don't even know what other options there are.

If not a specific sound card, is there a brand or a chipset that I should be looking for?

Thanks for your help
What's the main purpose for your card? To enjoy and or record music? No crackling or breaking up during intense games? Just better overall sound?

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Post by Alex » Mon Jul 02, 2007 11:38 am

Hello aristide1.
I like your point of view and your knowledge of the cause.
May I ask you which sound card you recommend for stereo sound listening?

Also while I am at it maybe you can recommend any speakers and amplifier?
I realize price range is an issue but I am personally curious of what you would recommend. :D

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Post by aristide1 » Mon Jul 02, 2007 6:49 pm

I am an old school minimalist at heart, so when I listen that's all I do, lights off, no distractions. Some people go so far as to run all their equipment off of batteries (yes there are amps that do this.)

My CD-Player is the Rega Planet. It has no tray at all, they resorted to a top loading design to bypass the issues with flimsy plastic trays. It too has Wolfsen DACs. But it's main point is a much more sophisticated error correction and delivery of the bits to the DAC.

The Chaintech is a good all in one solution that addresses important issues related to sound cards. It allows 96/24 out to an external DAC if you are so inclined. The issues with sound cards in no particular order:

1. The DAC
2. The op-amp, a very common place to cut corners.
3. The pc environment itself (ie noise)
4. All those electrolytic capacitors.

I have some links at work I need to access. There are some sound cards with all solid state non-electrolytic capacitors, but no word yet on how they sound. More expensive cards have better DACs for listening but also better ADCs for converting sound to digital. I've heard good things about the EMu 1212M. At $200 dollars I can't recommend it to others, but it actually records at 192KHz/24 bit resolution. Clearly I am not following the MP3 crowd, though I have friends happy with FLAC files (lossless compression I believe) and after their, what's that thing called? After their box was upgraded with a decent power supply.

I've heard that the new HD pc audio standard is a nice improvement, I haven't tried it yet, and it's on my current motherboard. Onboard sound quality does not seem consistent across brands or chipsets.

"Also while I am at it maybe you can recommend any speakers and amplifier? "

Ahh, that's like asking me what car is good for you? You want speed or economy? What can you afford because there is good stuff at many price points, like the Chaintek, and M-Audio stuff. The pro-stuff has functions I don't need or will ever use, much like the car that can do 180 mph. It's unfortunate that when somebody asks about audio equipment you need to ask back how much money do you have, but how else is there to do it?

If I did a PC music server I want to do 192KHz/24 bit 2 channel and that's all. My records are 2 channel (there were 4 channel records for a brief period). I want to convert them, but there's always something bothering me about one sound card or another. It's a time consuming process to convet it all anyways, which is another reason I haven't done so. I suspect I would send the digital data out to an external dac if I were to make such a system, where all stages, DAC, and amplifcations, power, were all given the respect they deserve. That would be neccessary for proper playback.

To learn the most go to an audiophile store, a small mom and pop shop, no big ass chains. Bring your favorite music and you will learn a lot from them.

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Post by aristide1 » Tue Jul 03, 2007 5:38 am

Alex wrote:Hello aristide1.
I like your point of view and your knowledge of the cause.
May I ask you which sound card you recommend for stereo sound listening?

Also while I am at it maybe you can recommend any speakers and amplifier?
I realize price range is an issue but I am personally curious of what you would recommend. :D
Alex, I don't know what brands are available where you are. You may look for NAD, Rotel, Arcam, or Rega electronics. B&W and Epos are some speaker brands that have reasonably priced offerings. Keep in mind PC speakers should be internally shielded, but I don't think that's an issue with flat panel displays, I am not sure.

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Post by aristide1 » Tue Jul 03, 2007 5:55 am

". I've been using Creative ::cringes:: "

Creative is a typical commercial company, as opposed to an audiophile company. They make and market at all price points for all customers. They undertstand sound effects are more important to gamers, loud explosions, versus the differences in sound between a low quality violin and a great violin, or any other instrument.

So Creative makes the most basic stuff, and makes fancy stuff as well. The Emu line is highly regarded.

An audiophile company would not have any customers than would put price first, so they don't have to deal with as much of that. IE they wouldn't have a reason to compromise to the point of making a sound card retailing below $50.

Note - Note putting price first does not mean "price is no object". Of course it is, but it's not everything either.

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Post by thejamppa » Tue Jul 03, 2007 7:26 am

I use basic Terratec Aureon 5.1 Sound card, cost like 15€'s. But I did spend 85€'s on speaker (2.1) and music do sounds much better than with onboard audio and basic speakers. I think good speakers are essential for good audio playback.- Good speakers can forgive quite a lot.

Auzentech has excellent sound cards but unfortunately they're expensive 99€ X-Mystique 7.1 to 140€'s X-Plosion 7.1.

Pair those with high quality speakers (maybe some Logitech's more expensive models but generally we speak real Hifi speakers you get from Hifi stores) and enjoy ^^

Edit:
Here's link to one review on X-plosion:
http://www.extremeoverclocking.com/revi ... ion_6.html

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Post by aristide1 » Tue Jul 03, 2007 9:04 am

A sound card with no electrolytic capacitors.
Image

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Post by Alex » Tue Jul 03, 2007 12:21 pm

aristide1 wrote:My CD-Player is the Rega Planet. It has no tray at all, they resorted to a top loading design to bypass the issues with flimsy plastic trays. It too has Wolfsen DACs. But it's main point is a much more sophisticated error correction and delivery of the bits to the DAC.

The Chaintech is a good all in one solution that addresses important issues related to sound cards. It allows 96/24 out to an external DAC if you are so inclined. The issues with sound cards in no particular order:

1. The DAC
2. The op-amp, a very common place to cut corners.
3. The pc environment itself (ie noise)
4. All those electrolytic capacitors.

To learn the most go to an audiophile store, a small mom and pop shop, no big ass chains. Bring your favorite music and you will learn a lot from them.
OK this is what I liked most of your reply. I agree with you. I was deeply interested in this high end stuff some years ago trying to build a DIY Gainclone amplifier at the time. Thank you aristide1. :D

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Post by tehfire » Tue Jul 03, 2007 7:20 pm

Thanks for all your advice, I settled on the Chaintech AV-710. I'm glad I did.

Some reviews complained about a harsh treble sound, my card sounds great to me. Bass reproduction is much stronger than with my Audigy 4. I wasn't expecting that.

I'm very pleased with the card (especially the $30 price point); However, about every 10 boots or so the card will emit a continuous, shrill sound during bootup. It's at the part when all my sound cards usually make a little blip noise, sort of like when you plug speakers in. I'd imagine this is when the card's detecting the resistance of the speakers?

Anybody know of this problem or how to fix it?

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Post by tehfire » Sun Jul 08, 2007 6:27 pm

bump

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Post by angelkiller » Sun Jul 08, 2007 6:46 pm

tehfire wrote:I'm very pleased with the card (especially the $30 price point); However, about every 10 boots or so the card will emit a continuous, shrill sound during bootup. It's at the part when all my sound cards usually make a little blip noise, sort of like when you plug speakers in. I'd imagine this is when the card's detecting the resistance of the speakers?
:!: :!: And I thought I got a bad card!!

*sigh*

I'm so relieved that it isn't just me. But luckily for me, I rarely reboot my system. I have no idea what causes this
Last edited by angelkiller on Sun Jul 08, 2007 6:49 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Post by angelkiller » Sun Jul 08, 2007 6:48 pm

Double post. Sry bout that. :oops:

Wasn't there a way to delete your post if it was the last one?

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Post by aristide1 » Mon Jul 09, 2007 10:17 am

tehfire wrote:Thanks for all your advice, I settled on the Chaintech AV-710. I'm glad I did.

Some reviews complained about a harsh treble sound, my card sounds great to me. .....................
Any sound electronics should not be judged for such harshness until after the first 100 hours of use.

Sorry I can't help you with that other problem.

Aris

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