My main rig I use for gaming (5yrs old now), I'm beginning to have issues with the on-board sound. Every now and then, the game will freeze with the repeating sound in the background. I can't think of anything else it could be. Happens with Diablo III and Steam games.
In board is a SoundMax Digital HD. I have a 5.1 speaker setup. I'm running XP, but eventually I will be upgrading to 7.
Sound card recommendations
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Executioner
- Life Member
- Posts: 10354
- Joined: Wed Nov 22, 2000 11:34 am
- Location: Woodland, CA USA
I have two sound cards setting in their boxes right now. One is an Auzentech Prelude 7.1 - PCI. Great card and I'd still be using it except that when I bought by second 560ti for SLI the card was too close to the fans on the card. Although it has a Creative Chip, I never had any issues with it due the drivers coming from Auzentech.
Here's a link to the card: http://www.auzentech.com/site/products/x-fi_prelude.php
I'm willing to part with it for $75 plus shipping.
My second card is a Creative X-fi Titanium Fatality PCIe-1x. I picked it up so I could remove my Prelude and not have to worry about by bottom 560ti overheating. I was able to install the Creative in my top PCIe-1x slot. I installed the latest driver at the time from Creative and didn't have any issues. The card worked find and sounded good until I updated my Bios. After that, I couldn't find a driver that didn't make the card sound like crap. There are drivers from PAX that are supposed to be better than Creative's and there are updated drivers from Creative since I started having issues. I think the card itself is fine but I got frustrated with the drivers and started using my onboard.
I'd take $40 +shipping for the Creative.
While I haven't tried them, ASUS is supposed to make excellent sound cards. The XONOR series is supposed to be ver good: http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&N=100008658%2050001315&IsNodeId=1&name=ASUS
HT Omega are also supposed to be really good but very pricey: http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductLi ... HT%20Omega
Here's a link to the card: http://www.auzentech.com/site/products/x-fi_prelude.php
I'm willing to part with it for $75 plus shipping.
My second card is a Creative X-fi Titanium Fatality PCIe-1x. I picked it up so I could remove my Prelude and not have to worry about by bottom 560ti overheating. I was able to install the Creative in my top PCIe-1x slot. I installed the latest driver at the time from Creative and didn't have any issues. The card worked find and sounded good until I updated my Bios. After that, I couldn't find a driver that didn't make the card sound like crap. There are drivers from PAX that are supposed to be better than Creative's and there are updated drivers from Creative since I started having issues. I think the card itself is fine but I got frustrated with the drivers and started using my onboard.
I'd take $40 +shipping for the Creative.
While I haven't tried them, ASUS is supposed to make excellent sound cards. The XONOR series is supposed to be ver good: http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&N=100008658%2050001315&IsNodeId=1&name=ASUS
HT Omega are also supposed to be really good but very pricey: http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductLi ... HT%20Omega