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Sound Card Recommendations

c4sK
By c4sK
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Go to solution Solved by ErickS89,

Creative ZXR is what I have, but you may want to look for an external solution. 

Posted

Current Specs:

 

Mobo: Asus P8P67 Deluxe

Sound Card: Creative X-Fi Titanium HD

Headphones: Sennheiser PC360

Speakers: KRK RP5 G3 (x2)

 

I am/will be using my sound card 50/50 for gaming/music. The problem I have at the moment is that my sound card will not allow switching between speakers and heaphones on the fly. In most cases I will need to reboot in order to switch without problems which is a real pain in the ****. As far as I know, the only sound card that offers a solution to this is the Creative ZxR?

 

Is going external an option? What are the pros/cons?

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Budget? External ones aren't as great, unless it's just an amp, and your motherboards audio doesn't look to be the best, so adding an amp to that or something would be pointless.

Not really. 

For those headphones, adding anything would be mostly pointless and or harmful. 

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right now I have a asus stx. seems fine for pretty much anything it's good if you can grab a good deal on it.

 

pretty much it's better than on board at least against my gd658D mobo. but any real amp and dac would most likely blow it away specially those used for music production or something.

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I used to have the Asus STX and that allowed switching from headphone to speakers via their software. Or you can get an external amp and switch plugs that way.

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Another option is to plug speakers into the soundcard and headphones into onboard and use windows to switch between the two. Sometimes it's a little glitchy though. Changing plugs is the simplest but can be annoying sometimes. 

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Seems odd that you need to reboot. I have that exact same sound card & I can switch outputs on it on it without requiring a reboot. How do you have your headphones & your speakers connected to it? And how are you trying to switch outputs?

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  • Solution

Creative ZXR is what I have, but you may want to look for an external solution. 

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Syba DAC has a physical switch for speakers.

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Well for some reason I didnt get notified on any responses. I subscribed with instant notification o_O

 

Seems odd that you need to reboot. I have that exact same sound card & I can switch outputs on it on it without requiring a reboot. How do you have your headphones & your speakers connected to it? And how are you trying to switch outputs?

 

Budget is $340 for a soundcard. Currently looking at ZXR due to the ability to switch between speakers and headphones without rebooting several times. Titanium HD is crap for that.

 

Tried switchign through both Creactive console. Headset is 3.5mm and speakers are RCA as mentioned. I read online in quite a few places that the card doesnt support it. You must be one of the lucky ones!

 

Thanks for the advice all.

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Well for some reason I didnt get notified on any responses. I subscribed with instant notification o_O

 

 

Budget is $340 for a soundcard. Currently looking at ZXR due to the ability to switch between speakers and headphones without rebooting several times. Titanium HD is crap for that.

 

Tried switchign through both Creactive console. Headset is 3.5mm and speakers are RCA as mentioned. I read online in quite a few places that the card doesnt support it. You must be one of the lucky ones!

 

Thanks for the advice all.

 

So it's not something I had to do often since I don't typically run anything off my RCA ports but when a friend brought his headphone amp over we were able to switch back and forth between the amp on RCA & the headphones on 3.5mm without rebooting. To switch back and forth I did have to unplug my headphones so I could plug them into the amp which may be why I was able to switch without rebooting. Never tried switching with both things plugged in.

 

Still don't find it surprising, Creative has never had very good software support IMO. 

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So it's not something I had to do often since I don't typically run anything off my RCA ports but when a friend brought his headphone amp over we were able to switch back and forth between the amp on RCA & the headphones on 3.5mm without rebooting. To switch back and forth I did have to unplug my headphones so I could plug them into the amp which may be why I was able to switch without rebooting. Never tried switching with both things plugged in.

 

Still don't find it surprising, Creative has never had very good software support IMO. 

 

Yeah I just had to reinstall my drivers just to get my sound back after plugging both in at the same time. Very annoying to say the least. Apparently they ZXR drivers are an improvement.

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Get a switcher thingy.

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oh, you just need Switcher.

 

i use it daily

http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1656534

is that dl link still valid? i cant seem to dl it

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is that dl link still valid? i cant seem to dl it

 

I found it and installed it here: Audio Switcher | Free software downloads at SourceForge.net

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