2013-01-19, 19:18
Hi,
I have the following external soundcards on tryout :
ASUS Xonar U3 USB
Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Surround 5.1 Pro
How it will be used
In this case the card will be connected to my Intel NUC(HTPC/XBMC/Windows 8) and my receiver(no HDMI input) will get a Digital optic S/PDIF from the soundcard.
Known limitations
Digital out will transform 5.1 sound to stereo as long as its not compressed, if its however is DTS or AC3 it will be sent as 5.1. With Dolby Digital Live(that both these cards have) all sounds will be compressed so even games with 5.1 sound without DTS will be 5.1.
Digital out will transform 24 bit sound to 16 bit and this makes this feature on the Creative less interesting.
This will be using parr through so I think that the quality of the soundcard will not matter right?
Creative
The Creative card is large but do offer alot more flexibility, more ouputs and a volume wheel. The drivers is vary large, alot of bloatware I suspect.
Problem
Problems that exists with this card is that the surroundsound is checked in the controlpanel by defualt and this will generate a low and static sound after 10 min in VLC(mkv file). If the surroundsound is turned off it will be fine but still 5.1 sound. In XBMC we get the same problem if we use WASPI while Directsound will make it sound good.
The sound is played a little but noticable before the video so no 100% sync by default(in XBMC).
Asus
This card is just a little USB stick with 2 outputs which makes it vary easy to use but less felxible.
There is no syncproblems.
Problem
Even when all drivers and codecs is installed we will get a blue screen when trying to play any mkv file in VLC(windows 8). This works however perfect in XBMC and Windows mediaplayer.
Questions
What do the syncproblem on the creative card really tell us? Could it be that my 60" TV have some input lagg while the Creative have no or less input lagg and this generates the syncproblem? Maby the Asus card have about the same input lagg as the TV?
Will the qaulity of the soundcard matter for the digital out port?
Is there somthing else I should think about when choosing one of these cards?
The Creative is about 21 EUR more.
I have the following external soundcards on tryout :
ASUS Xonar U3 USB
Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Surround 5.1 Pro
How it will be used
In this case the card will be connected to my Intel NUC(HTPC/XBMC/Windows 8) and my receiver(no HDMI input) will get a Digital optic S/PDIF from the soundcard.
Known limitations
Digital out will transform 5.1 sound to stereo as long as its not compressed, if its however is DTS or AC3 it will be sent as 5.1. With Dolby Digital Live(that both these cards have) all sounds will be compressed so even games with 5.1 sound without DTS will be 5.1.
Digital out will transform 24 bit sound to 16 bit and this makes this feature on the Creative less interesting.
This will be using parr through so I think that the quality of the soundcard will not matter right?
Creative
The Creative card is large but do offer alot more flexibility, more ouputs and a volume wheel. The drivers is vary large, alot of bloatware I suspect.
Problem
Problems that exists with this card is that the surroundsound is checked in the controlpanel by defualt and this will generate a low and static sound after 10 min in VLC(mkv file). If the surroundsound is turned off it will be fine but still 5.1 sound. In XBMC we get the same problem if we use WASPI while Directsound will make it sound good.
The sound is played a little but noticable before the video so no 100% sync by default(in XBMC).
Asus
This card is just a little USB stick with 2 outputs which makes it vary easy to use but less felxible.
There is no syncproblems.
Problem
Even when all drivers and codecs is installed we will get a blue screen when trying to play any mkv file in VLC(windows 8). This works however perfect in XBMC and Windows mediaplayer.
Questions
What do the syncproblem on the creative card really tell us? Could it be that my 60" TV have some input lagg while the Creative have no or less input lagg and this generates the syncproblem? Maby the Asus card have about the same input lagg as the TV?
Will the qaulity of the soundcard matter for the digital out port?
Is there somthing else I should think about when choosing one of these cards?
The Creative is about 21 EUR more.
