Asus Xonar or USB DAC

[HarleyNorris]

Im just getting into audio and want to get a sound card to improve my audio experience over my old on board audio. (Mobo-Asus P5KPL-AM)

Im also warming to a USB DAC like the Fiio olympus E10 or something else..

I have a pair of Sen 558 that i use daily with videos, games and a range of music. 

also id want to use the E10 to connect it to my phone if i could but it would be connected to my pc mostly.

 

whats are your thoughts?

[CwGoh]

You'll get bombarded into getting the USB DAC since people here will bash you for getting a sound card.

 

I personally think a USB DAC is more versatile, since you are immune from interface incompatibility (Lack of PCIe slots), and can use it on a laptop or phone, in addition to the added benefit of less interference. But if you really like the fancy audio software that the Xonar card features, and audio quality is not your top priority. 

If I were you I would go USB, since I don't care about the Xonar surround software, but it is up to you to decide.

[Excon]

The E10 won't connect to your phone. Since it just seems like you want the best quality the E10 is the better option, unless you must have the software which can be very buggy.

[mr moose]

my thoughts are you need to weigh up what your feature requirements are against how much you want to spend.  as far as raw two channel audio quality goes you can't beat a USB dac. usually cheaper than a high end sound card and better SQ.  Unless you want to encode DD on the fly for s/pdif out.  Of course unless you onboard is broken you'll be pushing the proverbial excrement uphill to improve the SQ from onboard. The e10 won't connect to your phone, and if you did manage it (some phones support the usb standard for audio) it would drain the battery very quick.

 

so:

budget?

required features?

size/form factor?

[TheWhiteOne]

LOL, I have the same motherboard. I would go with USB dac, unless you need some special features of xonar.

[legodude]

Asus Xonar, I love my essence one.  

 

EDIT I meant STX not one!

[HarleyNorris]

my thoughts are you need to weigh up what your feature requirements are against how much you want to spend.  as far as raw two channel audio quality goes you can't beat a USB dac. usually cheaper than a high end sound card and better SQ.  Unless you want to encode DD on the fly for s/pdif out.  Of course unless you onboard is broken you'll be pushing the proverbial excrement uphill to improve the SQ from onboard. The e10 won't connect to your phone, and if you did manage it (some phones support the usb standard for audio) it would drain the battery very quick.

 

so:

budget?

required features?

size/form factor?

Budget is about £150

id like the sound to be flat if that makes sense, form factor doesn't bother me.

[TheDigitalRealm]

Asus Xonar, I love my essence one.

Just to be clearer to the OP, this isn't a sound card, but an external solution.

[mr moose]

Budget is about £150

id like the sound to be flat if that makes sense, form factor doesn't bother me.

 

Assuming the line level out on your motherboard is not shagged, I'd get the O2 amp and plug it into your line level out.  That will give you great results on your headphones and because the O2 has internal batteries so you can plug your phone into it and it will allow you to drive any headphones without draining the phone battery. 

 

If however your on board is completely shot, then I would forget the phone and go straight for an e10. 

[legodude]

Just to be clearer to the OP, this isn't a sound card, but an external solution.

 

Sorry I meant STX, I keep getting the two confused. I was given the ONE as a gift.

[HarleyNorris]

Assuming the line level out on your motherboard is not shagged, I'd get the O2 amp and plug it into your line level out.  That will give you great results on your headphones and because the O2 has internal batteries so you can plug your phone into it and it will allow you to drive any headphones without draining the phone battery. 

 

If however your on board is completely shot, then I would forget the phone and go straight for an e10. 

line level out?

isn't the o2 just an amp though? would that make a difference since my on board is old? wouldn't i get better audio with the Asus xonar essence or the E10

[Canoas]

Im just getting into audio and want to get a sound card to improve my audio experience over my old on board audio. (Mobo-Asus P5KPL-AM)

Im also warming to a USB DAC like the Fiio olympus E10 or something else..

I have a pair of Sen 558 that i use daily with videos, games and a range of music. 

also id want to use the E10 to connect it to my phone if i could but it would be connected to my pc mostly.

 

whats are your thoughts?

Your "old on-board audio" is a VIA VT1708B which actually pretty good. What exactly is your current problem? Is the sound not loud enough?

[VincentC]

The Xonar has ASIO, input, and better hardware (DAC and Caps). USB DAC are more affordable and niche that functions for listening only which has isolation, separate clock, and modifiable opamps.

[ShearMe]

The Xonar has ASIO, input, and better hardware (DAC and Caps)

 

Seems legit.

[Canoas]

Seems legit.

What he said is true, but it's about the Xonar ST, not the Xonar DG, which is like twice the price of the E10.

[dhbiker]

if you go Asus Xonar way get UniXonar drivers because they are updated and a bit hacked (lower latencies and less hassle than original ones). 

[mr moose]

line level out?

isn't the o2 just an amp though? would that make a difference since my on board is old? wouldn't i get better audio with the Asus xonar essence or the E10

The biggest killer in audio for headphones is the amp on either onboard or sound cards etc.  I didn't see the board name before, so My suggestion was based on the line out not having any interference in it, which would be all you need.

[Lamarkuss]

Ugh I don't even wanna touch this question because it so dependent on your setup and what your looking for out of your system. I myself would prefer a dedicated sound car maybe even higher than a xonar but I also am looking for expansion possibilities which a dac simply just does not provide. For example if you can ever see yourself doing recording or using spdif speakers and use it dedicated to your machine or do you just want an upgrade in your sound quality that you can use across multiple machines easily.  Its all so dependant on your intentions.

[Art Vandelay]

Im just getting into audio and want to get a sound card to improve my audio experience over my old on board audio. (Mobo-Asus P5KPL-AM)

Im also warming to a USB DAC like the Fiio olympus E10 or something else..

I have a pair of Sen 558 that i use daily with videos, games and a range of music. 

also id want to use the E10 to connect it to my phone if i could but it would be connected to my pc mostly.

 

whats are your thoughts?

I have a pair of Sennheiser HD558s and they do seem to benefit a small amount from amplification and a fairly large amount from a better DAC.

 

I have a Fiio E10, and it sounded pretty good on my 558s, but I felt like the bass on it wasn't amazing.

 

I thought my Xonar DX sounded better with my HD558s than my Fiio E10, despite being unamplified. I listen to a lot of bass heavy music. If you are listening to something like Nirvana, the Fiio e10 is pretty disappointing, but if you're listening to something fairly jazzy, it's pretty good sounding.

 

 

Assuming the line level out on your motherboard is not shagged, I'd get the O2 amp and plug it into your line level out.  That will give you great results on your headphones and because the O2 has internal batteries so you can plug your phone into it and it will allow you to drive any headphones without draining the phone battery. 

 

If however your on board is completely shot, then I would forget the phone and go straight for an e10. 

Sennheiser HD558s benefit from a good DAC better than a good amp. I'd not recommend you spend your entire budget on an amp.

 

I'd personally recommend the Asus Xonar DX over that amp.

 

I really wouldn't recommend spending too much money on HD558s. I'd upgrade the headphones before I bought an amp worth more than the headphones themselves.

[mr moose]

I have a pair of Sennheiser HD558s and they do seem to benefit a small amount from amplification and a fairly large amount from a better DAC.

 

I have a Fiio E10, and it sounded pretty good on my 558s, but I felt like the bass on it wasn't amazing.

 

I thought my Xonar DX sounded better with my HD558s than my Fiio E10, despite being unamplified. I listen to a lot of bass heavy music. If you are listening to something like Nirvana, the Fiio e10 is pretty disappointing, but if you're listening to something fairly jazzy, it's pretty good sounding.

 

 

Sennheiser HD558s benefit from a good DAC better than a good amp. I'd not recommend you spend your entire budget on an amp.

 

I'd personally recommend the Asus Xonar DX over that amp.

 

I really wouldn't recommend spending too much money on HD558s. I'd upgrade the headphones before I bought an amp worth more than the headphones themselves.

Nope. The DAC has nothing to do with it. They are virtually identical now. It is the amp that drives the headphones that will cause majority of the issues.

[HarleyNorris]

Nope. The DAC has nothing to do with it. They are virtually identical now. It is the amp that drives the headphones that will cause majority of the issues.

I was hoping to get the best out my sen 558 i thought my on board may have been holding it back in some way, i was thinking that if i bought a sound card like the the Asus Xonar Essence STX or the E10 my music and games would come alive have i just bought into the marketing?

[mr moose]

I was hoping to get the best out my sen 558 i thought my on board may have been holding it back in some way, i was thinking that if i bought a sound card like the the Asus Xonar Essence STX or the E10 my music and games would come alive have i just bought into the marketing?

Not really, clearly there is an issue with your current sound setup. Given this, anything is going to be better. What I meant by my statement is that the DAC itself is not the issue because the specs between the fiio, onboard the odac and the xonar DAC are within bulls spit of each other as far as what we can hear. The difference in sound quality will come primarily from the analogue stages of the sound card/DAC. This is the bit that drives the headphones and requires the most consideration. Hence why I suggested that if your onboard was still good (no interferance, loud crackling etc) then you could just upgrade the amp part by using a headphone amp. I hope this makes better sense.

[HarleyNorris]

Not really, clearly there is an issue with your current sound setup. Given this, anything is going to be better. What I meant by my statement is that the DAC itself is not the issue because the specs between the fiio, onboard the odac and the xonar DAC are within bulls spit of each other as far as what we can hear. The difference in sound quality will come primarily from the analogue stages of the sound card/DAC. This is the bit that drives the headphones and requires the most consideration. Hence why I suggested that if your onboard was still good (no interferance, loud crackling etc) then you could just upgrade the amp part by using a headphone amp. I hope this makes better sense.

ok that makes sense, there is no issue with my on board audio.

I was just wondering that because it was old, if i were to upgrade to a card or usb solution would i notice the difference in quality.

people say you can when upgrading to a sound card from onboard its night and day apparently.

 

Just thought id come here first and check sorry if im being a pest asking loads of questions 

[mr moose]

ok that makes sense, there is no issue with my on board audio.

I was just wondering that because it was old, if i were to upgrade to a card or usb solution would i notice the difference in quality.

people say you can when upgrading to a sound card from onboard its night and day apparently.

 

Just thought id come here first and check sorry if im being a pest asking loads of questions 

not a pest at all, people only learn if they ask questions.  I would say from personal experience that the reason most people say the difference is night and day is because a sound card with dedicated headphone amp will be louder and people definitely correlate loud with better. 

 

Here are some of the most common problems and reason people upgrade from older onboard sound solutions:

 

Noise floor - this is heard as a shhhhh or hiss sound in the background, most notible when a quiet piece of music is playing.

 

Top end roll off -  for the most part it will be hard to detect as quite a number of headphones also have roll off. Google a tone generator and play an 18Khz sine wave, if you can hear it you don't have a roll of bad enough to warrant a new sound solution.

 

Interference -  this can be quite audible pops, clicks, noisy playback and staticy sound like an old vinyl record.

[Sammael]

I am still using an older Asus Xonar DX card that has been around for at least 3-4 years in my pc (if not longer, this sound card has survived a complete board swap out).  Clean signal, only issue for some headphones like my akg q701s was that they did not drive them very well.

 

So I picked up a fiio E09, a relatively cheap and good desktop amp.  Good combo if you just want to use it on the desktop.

 

http://www.amazon.com/E09K-Output-Desktop-Headphone-Amplifier/dp/B008J26ZL4/ref=zg_tr_13880161_2

 

 

 

plenty of power for the headphones I intend to drive, with room to spare.