[FusionBoi]

ok i was trying to decide wither or not to upgrade my sound card, i have an asus a7n8x delux motherboard with the soundstorm onboard sound (have not installed to this motherboard yet, im waiting till i have recieved my water cooling supplies) and was wondering some other users opinions, this thing has gotten some great reviews, but its always better to get some real user opinions first. Is it good enought to use with some nice 5.1 speakers, or will i need to buy a sound card?

Thx for your time

[RangerJoe]

my friend has the same MOBO you have, and says SQ sucks...just go with an audigy 2 (mainly because you get alot more cool games and stuff with the audigy 2, and its not too much more $$) esp if you have 5.1 speakers, audigy = much better

[Maximouse]

I bought the same board hoping that I could get away with not replacing my burned out Audigy.

Tried the soundstorm for a week, ended up buying a new Audigy card. I could make out the difference.

Just my opinion.

Al

[RJ]

Your crazy if you go with Audigy...I have both SBaudigy platinum and the saanta cruz....If anything the Santa cruz i would invest in....Im using the soundstorm and it sounds just as good if not better than the Sb...Not only that but the Sb takes over your system with stupid splash screen and conficts......MY 2cents

[Shade00]

Honestly, if you're not going to use onboard sound, I would recommend the Santa Cruz over the Audigy any day. The Audigy seems to have more than its fair share of problems. Plus, I have friends who use both cards, and the Santa Cruz takes a load of the CPU when it comes to sound processing. Sound quality is subjective, yes, but I feel that the Santa Cruz's is superior to the Audigy's.

[james.miller]

Originally posted by RangerJoe
my friend has the same MOBO you have, and says SQ sucks...just go with an audigy 2 (mainly because you get alot more cool games and stuff with the audigy 2, and its not too much more $$) esp if you have 5.1 speakers, audigy = much better

not much more? last time a looked, the audigy2 cost more than an asus an78x deluxe. how could you possibly justify the cost of it? lol

anyway to add my opinion, the soundstorm is a terrific performer

[Namagomi]

Originally posted by RangerJoe
my friend has the same MOBO you have, and says SQ sucks...just go with an audigy 2 (mainly because you get alot more cool games and stuff with the audigy 2, and its not too much more $$) esp if you have 5.1 speakers, audigy = much better

Woah woah woah.. I never said soundstorm sucks. I just assumed it did.

[four4875]

i was perfectly happy with mine. then my bios died, and im waiting for my new one from newegg..... but anyways..... with my creative 5.1 speakers, it sounded the same, i love the control panel thing with the asus. and the SPDIF out is great.

[gahdzila]

I'm very pleased with the onboard sound on my A7N8x Deluxe.

I would suggest (at the very least) trying it out yourself for a while before you lay down the cash for an *cough* OVERPRICED *cough* expensive Creative card.

[RangerJoe]

Originally posted by Namagomi


Woah woah woah.. I never said soundstorm sucks. I just assumed it did.

im not talking about you, my friend from WA has the deluxe asus board

james.miller
audigy 2 is $112
asus deluxe is $151.99

if you have the cash to get an audigy, get one, they rule

[gahdzila]

audigy 2 is $112
asus deluxe is $151.99

sorry...but someone had to say it.

a sound card from a company known for dodgy driver support and spyware...$40 more for perhaps the most feature rich AMD motherboard on the market, with VERY competative onboard sound. hmmm...

besides...the guy isn't trying to decide between buying an audigy or a mobo. He's already bought the mobo.

maybe the audigy2 is great...I really don't know, I've never had one. But before laying down >$100 for a sound card, I really think the originator of the thread should at least check out the onboard sound of the motherboard that he's already bought.

[Penguin4x4]

Originally posted by FusionBoi


Is it good enought to use with some nice 5.1 speakers, or will i need to buy a sound card?

Thx for your time

The SoundStorm onboard audio has about the same SQ as an Audigy 1. It benfits on full stream digital 5.1 outputs, (which mean absoultely nothing unless you have the new Klipsch GMX 5.1 speakers, which ATM are the only digital input equipped surround speakers). The SoundStorm should suffice for the time being, invest in a sound card later if you want to

[james.miller]

Originally posted by RangerJoe


im not talking about you, my friend from WA has the deluxe asus board

james.miller
audigy 2 is $112
asus deluxe is $151.99

if you have the cash to get an audigy, get one, they rule

well im sorry for the mistake. but i was looking at the price of the audigy 2 ex, for which the lowest price ive seen over here is £159, while i brand new a78nx delux can be had for £120. so yes, they are more expensive (even if i was talking about the wrong model! lol)

[Floatempole]

What about the Asus P4PE onboard sound?

Quote from Asustek about the onboard sound...

"The SoundMAX Digital Audio System is the industry's highest performance and most reliable audio solution for business professionals, audiophiles, musicians, and gamers. SoundMAX Digital Audio System can output 5.1 channel surround sound and features state-of-the-art DLS2 MIDI synthesizer with Yamaha DLSbyXG sound set, 5.1 Virtual Theater™ and supports all major game audio technologies including Microsoft DirectX™ 8.0, Microsoft DirectSound 3D™, A3D, MacroFX, ZoomFX, MultiDrive 5.1, A3D and EAX."

I would like to hear opinions about this from the owners of the mainboard...

[natopotato]

u guyz realy need to learn somthing

99% of "PC" speaker systems SUCK ASS
the remaining 1% is only *decient*

if u want to hear quality sound from ur PC hook it up to a home theater reciever, then get some GOOD speakers

im using onboard asus sound and im positive hooked up to my reciever via optical from my onboard realtek abit sound with my hometheater surround system it sounds better then any crappy pc speakers.

so my vote is keep the onboard at least for now and get a home theater reciever & speakers

[james.miller]

im asuming most people here will be using klipsh or logitech speakers, so yes, they ARE just as good. By saying they are crappy speakers, it shows you have not actually listened to them.

if u want to hear quality sound from ur PC hook it up to a home theater reciever, then get some GOOD speakers

yeah, thats what i did. my pc is currently hoocked up to my 6.1 Yamaha RX-V630. Good enough for you?

you need to think about this for a second. what good is a *decent home theater amp* and *decent speakers* when connected to your pc? are they gonna make your badly encoded mp3's sound better? hell no, they actually make them worse. Pc quality is only so good. When you start talking about expensive speakers and amps, it ISNT a PC you should be connecting to them.

Klipsh and Logitech make ausome speakers, totally suited to pc's, and not at all out of place as home theatre speakers either.

[natopotato]

ok obviously all pc speakers are not all crappy but no u cant asume every body here has klips speakers...

and NO they are not "just as good" have u noticed that klips's pc speakers are only around 100 for 5.1 setup and there HT speakers are more like 100-500+ each?

"you need to think about this for a second. what good is a *decent home theater amp* and *decent speakers* when connected to your pc? are they gonna make your badly encoded mp3's sound better? hell no, they actually make them worse. Pc quality is only so good. When you start talking about expensive speakers and amps, it ISNT a PC you should be connecting to them."
a good speakers system is not going to make crappy mp3's sound better then they are. but when i sit down to watch a ac3 DD divx movie i certainly want to hear some quality. i mean ppl are spending $200 on these audigy cards ur telling me they only want to hear "pc quality"

there is no reason u would not want quality sound coming out of ur system. i mean if ur gona spend all that money on the sound card jeez

yes that yamaha is nice im running a kenwood vr505 plans for a pioneer 7.1 system

[Evil_Eye]

ok i was trying to decide wither or not to upgrade my sound card, i have an asus a7n8x delux motherboard with the soundstorm onboard sound (have not installed to this motherboard yet, im waiting till i have recieved my water cooling supplies) and was wondering some other users opinions, this thing has gotten some great reviews, but its always better to get some real user opinions first. Is it good enought to use with some nice 5.1 speakers, or will i need to buy a sound card?

If you already have a 5.1 SoundCard, then use it. If not, then get one. I never have had very good experience with OnBoard sound;I usually found them to be resource gobblers with poor quality. While I'm not to sure if this is the case with the SoundStorm, I still would not recommend using it.

[Namagomi]

Originally posted by james.miller
need to think about this for a second. what good is a *decent home theater amp* and *decent speakers* when connected to your pc? are they gonna make your badly encoded mp3's sound better? hell no, they actually make them worse. Pc quality is only so good. When you start talking about expensive speakers and amps, it ISNT a PC you should be connecting to them.

Easy solution. Encode everything in .wav that's what I do. I've got a pretty good "home theather" setup back in Tulsa. Ask one of the rangerjoe's.

128kbps mp3's just don't cut it once you get full-size, high powered gear, however, HDD space is cheap these days, so just spring for a couple extra gigs and encode everything in .wav (or 320kpbs mp3's if space is tighter).

Also, natopotato, dear god man, type entire words. All the"u" and "ur" and "guyz" are making my eyes bleed. This is a forum, not an AOL chatroom.

[Amino]

Originally posted by natopotato
u guyz realy need to learn somthing

99% of "PC" speaker systems SUCK ASS
the remaining 1% is only *decient*

if u want to hear quality sound from ur PC hook it up to a home theater reciever, then get some GOOD speakers

Originally posted by natopotato
ok obviously all pc speakers are not all crappy but no u cant asume every body here has klips speakers...

If you can't assume everyone has Klipsch speakers, you can't assume they have "GOOD speakers" connected to an HT reciever.

Yes, most "PC" speaker systems suck ass. But they're just speakers, like any other kind of speaker that uses stereo in/out. But yes a lot of PC speakers ARE just as good as HT speakers. Obviously not the thousand dollar floor speakers, but just because HT speakers cost more doesn't mean they're better.

Next, you have to realize that people are not going to want to hook their computers up to their HT system which is likely in a completely different room. I have mine set up with my HT system, but that's only because I'm using my 42" Widescreen HDTV as my computer monitor, but if people don't have klipsch speakers, I doubt they'll have an HDTV as their monitor either.

Anyways, to answer this fella's question, I'd go with the SoundStorm if you want to save yourself about $100, and where I come from $100 is a lot of money no matter how you look at it. I've have had an Audigy 1 and a SoundStorm off of an Abit NF7-S and I can tell you that I kinda liked the Audigy better, but that's only because I was used to the control panel cuz I've had it for so long, and was used to the sound. The SoundStorm was awesome though, and infact, I'm going with a soundstorm in another PC that I'm building, so there's that for ya .