Hakon

Thank you for the replies. I got the soundcard for two reasons mainly. The DT770's felt like they lacked something off the onboard, the Essence STX II has more power to drive them and thus the audio feels richer. It also has a line-out which eliminated the noise issues I had with the Modmic 4.The Fiio A3 I added recently is mostly for portable use with the V-Modas but I like it allot so I wanna use it at home as well. Seems as tho the RCA outputs is the way to go, however one thing I noticed this far is if I lower the volume to like sub 5% the right channel will cut of. Whats the reason for this?

So I recently bought a new headphone amplifier and I'm wondering whats the best way to connect it while using it at home by the desktop. I have the choice of either running it straight off the onboard audio via auxillary or through an RCA to auxillary adapter and then connect it to my soundcard(via RCA). Amplifier: Fiio A3/E11K Onboard audio: Asus Sabertooth Z87 Soundcard: Asus Xonar Essence STX II Headhone(s): Beyerdynamic DT770(80 Ω) and V-Moda Crossfade Wireless in passive(essentially the M100). What is the best solution, what has the least "signature" and would render the audio "as is"?

The last few months I've been having issues every now and then where my system would appear to be unstable. It's kind of hard to describe exactly what "type" of unstability I'm experiencing but to give you some examples I will list the following. - Windows gives me an error saying the memory is full, but when I open the resource monitor I'm at like 14% usage overall. - Demanding games like Arma III will sometimes crash upon startup or a little into the game, again the error points to the memory. - BSOD's every now and then, the latest error I got was: "System_Service_Exception win32kbase.sys" - Low performance compared to the HW I'm using, close to the same performance regardless if I use the 980Ti or the 660Ti. - The system generally feels less responsive at times, easy tasks like opening the control panel can cause stutter and hiccups. I'm not able to pinpoint what triggered these problems to begin with. I've recently been doing some changes in both HW and Software. I upgraded both the PSU and GPU not to long ago, but although not as often I still had the occasional hiccup prior to this. I also changed my RAM sticks a little while ago, now this upgrade might match up more to when the problems started but I can't really be sure. I've also made the jump from Win7 to Win10, but the problems followed me across. Parts list is in the signature, everything running stock as I need to stabilize it first. 1. I wanna start my troubleshooting by looking for HW error as I'm pretty sure it's not Software based considering I'm currently running all stock with a fresh Windows install and all the newest drivers. What I need help with is to find out what software will help me stress the components enough to either uncover faults or rule them out as the culprit. Here is what I'm thinking; Are these good for testing? (Any others I should run..?) - Memory, Memtest86? Others? - CPU, Aida64 and / or Prime95? Others? - GPU, Furmark? Others? 2. Any other reason than HW failure you guys can think of? I haven't dug to deep yet as I wanna start with stressing the HW and look for errors. As I said, I'm running a fresh install of Win10, all the latest drivers and all temperatures are normal. Any input is very much appreciated. If anything comes of as unclear, feel free to ask.

Yes, I've re-applied thermal paste three times now but no decrease in temperature. I've even tried re-fitting the back plate, but temperatures stays the same. I'm fairly certain the H80i is the problem. The pump recently started to make this "humming sound", almost like it's running dry..? Anyway, if the setup otherwise looks alright it might be time for a replacement.

I'm struggling with CPU temps and I'm not sure whether it's the airflow of my case which is all wrong or if my H80i is dying on me. I think it might be the H80i, but just to confirm before swapping it out I would like to get your opinions on my cooling setup to see if theres room for improvements. Next time around I will be looking to go with an air cooler rather than an "all in one closed" solution. The case is a Fractal Design Define R4. - Components can be found in the signature. Fans and cooling. - x2 Front intakes. I stuck with the stock Define r4 fans as they are rather quiet and gets the job done. - 1x Bottom intake. Noctua NF-F12. - 1x Top rear exhaust. Noctua NF-F12. - 1x Rear exhaust. Noctua NF-F12. As it sits right now this is where the H80i is placed, configured in push/pull and acting as exhaust. I had to link a picture rather than post it because it came out so big: http://i.imgur.com/OzppvFz.jpg So, any recommendations on improving the cooling and airflow in general?