# Why do midrange/premium boards dont have a decent amplifier



## Jism (Jul 3, 2020)

As title states,

I have to use tools like DFX audio enhancer to sqeeze more volume / bass out of my headphones, and ive used quite a few ones. My hearing is perfectly well but every motherboard i owned so far (Crosshair Z, X470-F and now a X570 Elite) lack serious volume. They all come with big marketing on how good and seperated the audio setup of the board is, but none really offer punch related to volume.

Why is that?


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## tabascosauz (Jul 3, 2020)

Because most users use "gaming" headsets that have 0 going for them in terms of audio quality, and RGB sways buyers like nothing else can.

Gigabyte used to make a big deal out of its ALC1150 solution with a socketed replaceable OP-AMP across most of its lineup during the Haswell/DC days, but evidently none of the gamer audience cared. The ones that did most likely used dedicated hardware anyway, and ALC1150 isn't that great nowadays.

If you have 200ohm cans, chances are you've already got a DAC/amp or soundcard ready on the side. Asus nowadays has a Sabre DAC next to its S1220 on the PCB on high end boards, but that's about it.

"Enthusiasts" are never really the norm. If we had our way, every board would have a dedicated DAC/amp and Smart Power Stages, components would be matte black and brushed metal, and "mechanical keyboards" would all be $400 TGR and Duck kits.


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## Jism (Jul 3, 2020)

It's just that, the maximum volume is just basic. Even my iphone 7 plus plays louder then this stuff. And i have stuff turned on to the max etc. It's so weird. So many (seperate) chips for a audio devision on the motherboard, none (premium) that could actually play loud as it would be intended by marketing.

Ah well. I guess it's either an external soundcard or a headphone's amplifier.


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## Frick (Jul 3, 2020)

The volume is too low for you, even on max? And your hearing is fine?



tabascosauz said:


> E"nthusiasts" are never really the norm. If we had our way, every board would have a dedicated DAC/amp and Smart Power Stages, components would be matte black and brushed metal, and "mechanical keyboards" would all be $400 TGR and Duck kits.



Audio enthusaists are the worst of the bunch.


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## biffzinker (Jul 3, 2020)

Jism said:


> Ah well. I guess it's either an external soundcard or a headphone's amplifier


The EVGA Nu Audio card gets plenty loud for me. It’s a external USB sound card through a Asmedia bridge chip to a internal PCIe x1 slot card.









						EVGA - Articles - EVGA Nu Audio
					

For nearly 20 years, EVGA has built the most powerful graphics cards to play your games at the highest settings, powerful motherboards to run your system at optimal settings, and reliably efficient power supplies to power your system. Now, EVGA extends its enthusiast tradition by partnering with...




					www.evga.com


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## Jetster (Jul 3, 2020)

It adds to the cost, and with interference even with a quality amp  would have problems   Get an external amp


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## Jism (Jul 3, 2020)

Frick said:


> The volume is too low for you, even on max? And your hearing is fine?
> 
> 
> 
> Audio enthusaists are the worst of the bunch.




Dont get me wrong; i'd like sound with a punch. Does'nt have to be screaming loud; but as long as your hearing it. Ive tried a bunch of headphones over time by now,




Jetster said:


> It adds to the cost, and with interference even with a quality amp  would have problems   Get an external amp



Well here's the thing i doubt a bit, the link of @biffzinker shows a card with a generic OP-amp, that could be found for less then 11 dollar: https://www.amazon.com/ANALOG-DEVICES-OP275GPZ-OP275-Bipolar/dp/B07GL4T7HR

(take note that bulk party's even come cheaper as well)

If you already buy a premum price for a board (crosshair Z formula was'nt cheap upon release and still is'nt), X470-F belongs to mid/high-end range, and X570 Elite is'nt a 50$ budget board either. Appearantly gigabyte is throwing in some higher grade components: https://www.gigabyte.com/Motherboard/X570-AORUS-ELITE-rev-10#kf related to audio.

I'd prefer motherboard makers stop throwing in overbuild VRM's that even on LN2 cannot be taxed fully, RGB etc and rather focus on *extra's*. You cant tell me they cant throw in a decent op-amp in a board of 200 up to 400 euro.


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## Nordic (Jul 3, 2020)

Why put on a crappy amp when 99% of people who care about an amp will use an infinitely superior external amp?


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## Ferrum Master (Jul 3, 2020)

There is no space to implement a "decent" solution. Motherboards will carry Jack of all trades with incremental upgrades, they do not and never will care for some rare usage cases.

Buy a tailored dedicated unit, aimed at your gear to be matched.


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## Jetster (Jul 3, 2020)

Jism said:


> I'd prefer motherboard makers stop throwing in overbuild VRM's that even on LN2 cannot be taxed fully, RGB etc and rather focus on *extra's*. You cant tell me they cant throw in a decent op-amp in a board of 200 up to 400 euro.



I'd prefer they stop putting RGB on everything. But I like the quality VRMs and I'll hardly ever use the sound chip on the board


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## tabascosauz (Jul 3, 2020)

@Jism I can't tell what platform you're currently on, or whether you might be looking to upgrade. ASRock has been pairing its ALC1220s on its midrange to high end boards (keep in mind that "midrange" is X570 Steel Legend, not the Pro4s) with a TI NE5532 op-amp.

The X570 Steel Legend / Extreme4 / Taichi / Phantom Gaming X / Creator all have the NE5532, and so do the new B550 Steel Legend / Extreme4 / Taichi / PG Velocita. As for Z490, apparently only the Z490 PG Velocita, whereas the Taichi there gets a Sabre DAC. So essentially, all of ASRock's better ATX boards on AMD. The only reason they all get it is because ASRock loves re-using the exact same PCB, so if one has it, they all have it.

I can't find much else aside from ASRock parroting the tired "600ohm support" from the datasheet. From a quick glance, this isn't a high end part, and performance seems to be subjectively variable and also highly dependent on the implementation. Since copy+paste is one of current ASRock's favourite practices, whether the NE5532 is a good amp and whether they've made a good implementation of it literally makes or breaks all of those boards. There are other reasons why I'd shy away from ASRock B550 before they change their firmware, but I suppose you could give it a try.

I don't know what cans you're using right now, but from your description of preferring more volume and bass it just sounds like either you need a dedicated amp/DAC to handle insanely high ohms, or just aren't a fan of a flat/neutral/studio sound.


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## bubbleawsome (Jul 3, 2020)

While I get what you’re saying about sound profiles changing as you pump more power into headphones, you really should make sure you’re not going to damage your hearing. Using the internal 3.5mm from my laptop a loaned pair of 6XXs woke up well before 100%, and (pretty obviously) my 32ohm k371s start to get unbearably loud above about 25%.
Maybe it’s a better idea to stick to modifying the sound with a quality EQ than to try and get it straight from the headphones themself.


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## dgianstefani (Jul 3, 2020)

Just buy a good external AMP/DAC like every real enthusiast. Personally I use the Schiit Hel. https://www.schiit.com/products/hel


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## bubbleawsome (Jul 3, 2020)

dgianstefani said:


> Just buy a good external AMP/DAC like every real enthusiast. Personally I use the Schiit Hel. https://www.schiit.com/products/hel


OP, if you do go for this make sure you have clean power. At least for the Fulla (one tier down) some units had issues with whine and hiss, as a result of being USB powered instead of wall powered. For the most part though they make good stuff.


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## Chomiq (Jul 3, 2020)

Yeah unless you're using 32 or 80 ohm headphones you're better off using a dedicated soundcard or an external amp. 
My Fidelio's are super easy to run and I run them at 15-20% vol on work laptop/home pc.


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## rtwjunkie (Jul 3, 2020)

Chomiq said:


> Yeah unless you're using 32 or 80 ohm headphones you're better off using a dedicated soundcard or an external amp.


This problem is what most of the people who say board sound is good enough seem to miss. One of the biggest benefits of an add-in sound card is that it boosts sound level like the @Jism wants.


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## Chomiq (Jul 3, 2020)

Jism said:


> Appearantly gigabyte is throwing in some higher grade components: https://www.gigabyte.com/Motherboard/X570-AORUS-ELITE-rev-10#kf related to audio.
> 
> I'd prefer motherboard makers stop throwing in overbuild VRM's that even on LN2 cannot be taxed fully, RGB etc and rather focus on *extra's*. You cant tell me they cant throw in a decent op-amp in a board of 200 up to 400 euro.


I own this board. There ain't nothing special about it's audio section apart from ALC1200. If it wasn't for lack of regular PCI I'd be still using my old Xonar DG, since it had built in headphone amp and had good virtualization options for 7.1. Only more expensive GB boards get separate Sabre DACs (whatever's that worth).
So yeah, soundcard or DAC/AMP if you want better audio.


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## TheLostSwede (Jul 3, 2020)

tabascosauz said:


> Because most users use "gaming" headsets that have 0 going for them in terms of audio quality, and RGB sways buyers like nothing else can.
> 
> Gigabyte used to make a big deal out of its ALC1150 solution with a socketed replaceable OP-AMP across most of its lineup during the Haswell/DC days, but evidently none of the gamer audience cared. The ones that did most likely used dedicated hardware anyway, and ALC1150 isn't that great nowadays.
> 
> ...


I can boost the output on the front audio jack on my board in two steps and there's a setting that allows you to adjust for high impedance headphones. So the feature isn't gone as such, it's just that you do it in software now.


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## Deleted member 67555 (Jul 3, 2020)

tabascosauz said:


> @Jism I can't tell what platform you're currently on, or whether you might be looking to upgrade. ASRock has been pairing its ALC1220s on its midrange to high end boards (keep in mind that "midrange" is X570 Steel Legend, not the Pro4s) with a TI NE5532 op-amp.
> 
> The X570 Steel Legend / Extreme4 / Taichi / Phantom Gaming X / Creator all have the NE5532, and so do the new B550 Steel Legend / Extreme4 / Taichi / PG Velocita. As for Z490, apparently only the Z490 PG Velocita, whereas the Taichi there gets a Sabre DAC. So essentially, all of ASRock's better ATX boards on AMD. The only reason they all get it is because ASRock loves re-using the exact same PCB, so if one has it, they all have it.
> 
> ...


I'm on my 3rd ASRock mobo with 2 MSI's in between and a Gigabyte here and there and it's been my experience that ASRock does indeed have the best audio levels.
But they have limits...and as mentioned here sometimes a Headphone amp is needed.


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## Jism (Jul 3, 2020)

Chomiq said:


> I own this board. There ain't nothing special about it's audio section apart from ALC1200. If it wasn't for lack of regular PCI I'd be still using my old Xonar DG, since it had built in headphone amp and had good virtualization options for 7.1. Only more expensive GB boards get separate Sabre DACs (whatever's that worth).



I had the choice in between this one and the more expensive, 320 euro Wireless board. I hate wireless because of the random disconnects and primarly added latency and speed caps. Mind you my internet here is 1000MBit glasfibre so my wireless would be topping out at exactly 200mbit. When i installed it i was kind of dissapointed in the BIOS featureset, and the impossible XMP profile that woud'nt boot properly even when the memory is on the QVL list. I know reset CMOS, manually put voltage to 1.35V, save/reboot and then activate XMP, but it still does'nt hold the speeds as it simply does'nt boot up (only safe modus / 2133mhz). I got it running on 3000Mhz now instead of the rated 3200Mhz. 

My Asus X470-F is up for warranty, the NIC blew up, and later the complete board died. When i have that back i'll replace it as the X570 adds no real benefit for me at all. A 470 chipset is just as good.


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## $ReaPeR$ (Jul 3, 2020)

because its cheaper and because the vast majority does not care. audio enthusiasts or even people that want that little bit extra, like me, will just get dedicated hardware and call it a day.


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## robot zombie (Jul 3, 2020)

bubbleawsome said:


> OP, if you do go for this make sure you have clean power. At least for the Fulla (one tier down) some units had issues with whine and hiss, as a result of being USB powered instead of wall powered. For the most part though they make good stuff.


USB is garbage for audio ime, for a variety of reasons. But yeah... USB power is the worst sin next to data hash noise popping down the ground and up thru ya outputs. And even when it works, it doesn't sound as good as proper spdif. Worth mentioning, you can now get their Unison USB in their new Modius DAC. Until now, you had to spend about 8 hundo chunks to get it and there was nothing better. Really makes other USB audio stuff look lame. It's much closer to being immune to the follies of USB audio. Schiit hates USB. They've been at war with it from the beginning.

It's funny. Asus likes to push thier whole sound suite. Really it's not bad. Just kinda average. But you know what's NOT average? Their USB. Probably the worst possible USB bus to feed a DAC from. I mean it. You will hear your computer's thoughts through your speakers. All of their AMD boards, anyway...

I gave up on mobo audio a long time ago. Modi Multibit and Vali 2 for me. You wanna drive high-impedance headphones? Gotta have a dedicated amp. Generally. Why buy enthusiast cans just to plug them into a mobo, right?


They are running out of excuses, though. See, I've got an LG G8 ThinQ that drives 300ohm HD6xx's pretty close to "WAYYY TOO F***NG LOUD" territory, sounds good, has DSP correction, EQ, and even different DAC filtering modes! Adaptive gain for line-level, low impedance, and high impedance. It ramps up/down for whatever you plug-in. Here's the kicker: this is a not a revolutionary development by LG. It's all on one chip: an ESS ES9218P. On this thing, you get a DAC (clock built-in too, this does matter when you consider that even decent DAPs tend to use the cheapest clocks they can get that work,) variable gain amp, and the post processing magicks. You can pretty much drop it in for a full audio solution and it sounds damned good... like actually pretty resolving, a little slammin... with nice, even timbre. I'm picky and I like it. Worth mentioning, I HATE Sabre sound as much as I hate AKM's velvet warmpoo. This still impressed me.

Not sure how it would affect BOM, but a chip like this is probably the simplest way to get audio on a board, period and have a consistently good, versatile sound. Simpler than what's on your mobo that's failing to keep up.

For many many years, DACs and opamps didn't really improve much. Times have changed though, and so much can be had on a couple of chips, or now even all on one! Both ESS and AKM have done changed the game these past 7 odd years. I get that it's not a top consideration for mobo makers, but it doesn't require a revolutionary effort anymore. Baseline good audio is trivial and mobo makers are lagging. Some of these combo chips out there are so good you can pretty much drop them in and call it a day, and they will DESTROY any of the current mobo audio implementations fairly easily. Again, they are really running out of excuses, especially ones like Asus, who make audio a selling point. They need to look at what is happening with mobile audio and realize they can have that for pretty cheap and actually free up board space and streamline their process. Software stuff is firmware on those types of chips... just hook in and get fancy features. It should be a no-brainer. They just aren't thinking about it at all.

Of course, they'll probably never compare to discreet boxes. A few people mentioned Schiit. What I really like about Schiit is that they're actually engineering their budget stuff. For ~$200 you can have a stack with actual discreet circuits. Modi 3/Magni 3 is hard to beat. Or Asgard. Not just chip-in-a-box, or by-the-datasheet op-amp designs. You'll never get that inside your PC case, and the sound will reflect that.


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## Frick (Jul 3, 2020)

robot zombie said:


> USB is garbage for audio ime, for a variety of reasons. But yeah... USB power is the worst sin next to data hash noise popping down the ground and up thru ya outputs. And even when it works, it doesn't sound as good as proper spdif. Worth mentioning, you can now get their Unison USB in their new Modius DAC. Much closer to being immune to the follies of USB audio. Schiit hates USB. They've been at war with it from the beginning.



The various USB driven audio interfaces I've used over the years disagree with this ... but you may be talking about "DACs", which honestly I have never seen the point with. Why would I want an expensive computer audio thing but with less options?

And btw, isn't a DAC just slang for a small amplifier? I know exactly what a DAC is in electronics and have always been confused by the term since it started popping up incomputer audio related discussions a few years ago. edit: because everything with any audio output these days have dacs in them.


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## dgianstefani (Jul 3, 2020)

robot zombie said:


> USB is garbage for audio ime, for a variety of reasons. But yeah... USB power is the worst sin next to data hash noise popping down the ground and up thru ya outputs. And even when it works, it doesn't sound as good as proper spdif. Worth mentioning, you can now get their Unison USB in their new Modius DAC. Until now, you had to spend about 8 hundo chunks to get it and there was nothing better. Really makes other USB audio stuff look lame. It's much closer to being immune to the follies of USB audio. Schiit hates USB. They've been at war with it from the beginning.
> 
> It's funny. Asus likes to push thier whole sound suite. Really it's not bad. Just kinda average. But you know what's NOT average? Their USB. Probably the worst possible USB bus to feed a DAC from. I mean it. You will hear your computer's thoughts through your speakers. All of their AMD boards, anyway...
> 
> ...



Schiit hates USB huh?


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## biffzinker (Jul 3, 2020)

robot zombie said:


> Worth mentioning, you can now get their Unison USB in their new Modius DAC.


Is this the product your referring too?





						Schiit Audio: Audio Products Designed and Built in Texas and California
					






					www.schiit.com


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## robot zombie (Jul 3, 2020)

Frick said:


> The various USB driven audio interfaces I've used over the years disagree with this ... but you may be talking about "DACs", which honestly I have never seen the point with. Why would I want an expensive computer audio thing but with less options?


It's luck of the draw. I'm telling you man, I have mobos that will make junk of those same interfaces. USB isn't the best for audio. Great for mice, printers, etc. Digital is digital, but compared to spdif, USB is dirty digital. Whether it will be noticable depends on how dirty. Some USB outs are perfectly fine. Others are garbage. And it's not a matter of cheap/expensive. You can have a cheap laptop with problem-free USB. Or an expensive mobo with borderline unusable USB that drops out or brings noise to whatever interface you use, especially USB-powered ones.

Honestly, the second question, I don't know how to explain to you with words. When you try enough of them, you realize they all sound different. The conversion from PCM to an analog signal has a lot of steps, and what you're getting is an approximation of the PCM signal that goes into the DAC... before it was made into a digital signal. So what you're getting coming out isn't close to 1:1. A lot of people look at couple of measurements and say they must all be the same. It simply isn't true, the measurements people go by only show you part of the picture. Yes, they all have distortion so low you can't hear it. Doesn't mean they sound the same. There are so many different ways to get that job done. A lot of it is in the filtering. The conversions aren't perfect on their own and introduce ringing, which needs to be smoothed over before things sound like they're supposed to. It generally works a bit like anti-aliasing for sound waves. And in the process, they all change things in the phase/time domains. Meaning they're all imperfect in different ways.

People will reduce them down to this simple thing, but for people who are really interested in audio, the most basic possible DAC isn't going to cut it. Granted, they're arguably the last thing to upgrade. Better headphones/speakers/amp will take things a lot further. But when you have those things squared-up, a DAC upgrade makes the whole thing sound much better.

Now, I will say... there's no reason why YOU should necessarily want one. I can sit here crafting theory all day, but it's in the hearing. If you're not the type to nitpick the sound you get, there's probably nothing there for you. I don't even mean this in a condescending way. It's more just most people don't care, some do. But it's not for no reason that people who care, do. It's not total snake oil, like cables or magic rocks.



dgianstefani said:


> Schiit hates USB huh?


Yes, they do! But they also understand it is the most common option. So they try to make it work the best it possibly can, rather than just toss it on and hope for the best like most tend to. They're on like the 6th iteration of their USB implementation on virtually all of their DACs. If they liked it so much, why would they spend so much time trying to fix it? 

I'm not gonna go digging it up, but the two main guys from Schiit have written at length about thier disdain for USB, and things they have tried to make it better. To them, it is a compromise. I'm not just pulling this from nowhere, I swear!



biffzinker said:


> Is this the product your referring too?
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Yeap. Shaping up to be a winner. True balanced outs, too. Which is awesome if you're running studio monitors.


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## thesmokingman (Jul 3, 2020)

What's a decent head amp? 

You might want to invest in a decent one whatever that is so you don't rely on the board to provide it? Filo K5 pro for example ftw.


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## robot zombie (Jul 3, 2020)

thesmokingman said:


> What's a decent head amp?
> 
> You might want to invest in a decent one whatever that is so you don't rely on the board to provide it? Filo K5 pro for example ftw.


Most of them will perform better than what's on the mobo, unless you get some dirt-cheap noname box o crap. I think those would actually be hard to find these days, though. Not the biggest fan of Fiio, but the K5 pro has some nice things in it. Definitely falls in the class of "don't need to spend megabucks for actual good sound."

And you really don't. Generally the things you can have for ~$100 are quite good. Less than what you'll pay for the headphones you'll plug into em.

You also have the benefit of keeping it across mobo swaps or even plugging it into things that aren't a computer if you ever want to. That's the big thing. You can pay up for a mobo with good sound (if that was a thing) and keep it for a few years. Or get an external combo unit and conceivably keep it basically forever. I think most people could buy one and forget about it forever, never worry about the sound not being good enough again. Much better investment than a sound card.


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## Anymal (Jul 3, 2020)

dgianstefani said:


> Just buy a good external AMP/DAC like every real enthusiast. Personally I use the Schiit Hel. https://www.schiit.com/products/hel


Dont buy anything Shit.


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## robot zombie (Jul 3, 2020)

Anymal said:


> Dont buy anything Shit.


Thier 'house sound' isn't for everyone. But why not? Lots of people seem to prefer it over similar options.


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## John Naylor (Jul 3, 2020)

I have never had a volume  issue with "gaming headsets => Pro Audiophile headphines with ALC 1220.  JJ from Asus had equated the ALC 1220 as equivalent to their $90 sound card offering.   Personally , I find the terms "audiophile"  and "headphones" mutually exclusive as sound is experienced thru more than ones ears.  When I play the 1812 Overture. I wants pencils to jump off the desk each time a canon is fired .


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## robot zombie (Jul 3, 2020)

John Naylor said:


> Personally , I find the terms "audiophile"  and "headphones" mutually exclusive as sound is experienced thru more than ones ears.  When I play the 1812 Overture. I wants pencils to jump off the desk each time a canon is fired .


Ahaha, too true. But then really expensive, dinky 5" ported speakers are a big thing with audiophiles too, and I still haven't figured out why that is  Give me PA speakers with big ole woofers over any of that boutique stuff... like 10" minimum.

Headphones and speakers are just different experiences to me. If you really wanna feel it, you have to have big speakers. No replacement for displacement. But headphones are cool too, just in how they present fine details. It's very textural. It's cozy and you can better hear the subtle characteristics of things. Not many speakers have that extra 'finesse' to them. I think it just gets lost to the room, crossovers... hell, even just sending different frequencies through air over distance can change things. But you do sacrifice the impact, space, and imaging with headphones. And they're intrinsically all a little weird tonally, just due to the physics of trying to hold full range drivers directly over your ears. They're just never gonna be interchangeable. Some stuff, I will say I prefer through headphones. But some genres are just never great with them. Rock, metal, and classical all lose key things through headphones. They can be amazing for more ambient stuff, though. Mostly I prefer speakers, but good headphones are cheaper to get into and can be pretty convenient. But I think past a certain point trying to get certain things out of them is a waste of time. It just isn't out there.


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## Hardcore Games (Jul 5, 2020)

I have a JBL Flip 3 I use for my PC for audio, it is plenty loud enough. The unit is surprisingly good sound for its small size.

I feed it from my LCD output which is derived from the video card.


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## RadFX (Jul 5, 2020)

I ordered a B350 mobo with pci just so I can make use of my HT Omega Claro Halo. I tried it though a pci-pci-e adapter card but the only thing that worked was the optical.


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## Frick (Jul 6, 2020)

robot zombie said:


> It's luck of the draw. I'm telling you man, I have mobos that will make junk of those same interfaces. USB isn't the best for audio. Great for mice, printers, etc. Digital is digital, but compared to spdif, USB is dirty digital. Whether it will be noticable depends on how dirty. Some USB outs are perfectly fine. Others are garbage. And it's not a matter of cheap/expensive. You can have a cheap laptop with problem-free USB. Or an expensive mobo with borderline unusable USB that drops out or brings noise to whatever interface you use, especially USB-powered ones.



Are we talking about the same thing? Cause I mean external sound cards for recording, with proper mic/instrument inputs and proper outputs.


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## robot zombie (Jul 8, 2020)

Frick said:


> Are we talking about the same thing? Cause I mean external sound cards for recording, with proper mic/instrument inputs and proper outputs.


I think so. Recording interfaces, right? Little boxes you plug in via USB with high-power headphone amps, balanced output for speakers, at least a couple of 1/4 and XLR hookups, usually with phantom power.

Most things with USB are susceptible to 'dirty' USB. It's a matter of whether the output side of the USB connection has it or not. I've seen fancy tricks and such to get around it and taken a lot of useless advice, but the only fix I've ever found for running USB audio out of a board with bad USB is to actually hook it into something that will re-clock it and convert it to SPDIF coax or something similar. Some of the nicer interfaces take things like thunderbolt, or maybe even AES or some kinda i2s, which mitigates the problem. That's the real-deal pro stuff, though. Big 8/16 boxes and rack units.

My understanding is really primordial, but it seems to come down to how USB uses the ground, it can carry interference that can impact the analog output section of audio devices. Normally it wouldn't be considered an issue. It's how it's meant to operate. But the crud on it sometimes messes with audio stuff. And it seems to get amplified when something is USB powered. If you already have a mobo with USB you know doesn't affect audio stuff negatively, you will never have issues with anything you use. But if it affects one, it affects everything you plug into it. It's like bad juju. You'll hear pops and pulses. Remember the sounds speakers made when you put an old flip-phone too close? It's a bit like that, with some hiss behind it.

Dropouts are are more common complaint I see, though. When I tell people I've had noisy USB they look at me crazy. I thought it was weird, too. Until I encountered people who had the same problem more than once and tried to learn at little about what causes it. USB was never made for audio. It became sort of the standard because if you have *only* one potential digital out for audio, it's probably USB. There are other issues with it, too. But that's getting sliiightly into audio mysticism. This stuff is not mystical, just not all that common.

That kinda stuff aside, I would still recommend most people avoid being tied down to USB and use toslink, at least when possible. Just because those tend to be headache free.


There is another reason I'm not big on recording interfaces for general use. They are unbeatably cost-effective... they'll do any headphones and active speakers in one box, with a preamp for volume control on your speakers. I probably wouldn't talk someone wanting something like that out of it if they want something that just works and sounds decently good. Pick a well-known one for $100-$200 and go, yanno?

But the added stuff that makes them good for recording adds significantly to the cost and often a lot of the nitty gritty audio stuff is thus nothing special. Unless you really pay up, you are still getting the same consumer stuff there. It's not super-serious equipment, yanno? Some of them may use a better design and better parts for the last leg of the output where the jacks actually are, after the DAC and everything. Better capacitors and such, or if they're super fancy something other than coupled capacitors. That's a plus, but only part of the story.

It has to have all of this I/O, software/firmware, some computing oomf for low latency monitoring with multiple inputs, phantom power, etc. More selling points, more cost. If you're not using half of them you're paying for more stuff you don't need, potentially at the expense of what you really want. Everything inside of them is a compromise, including the sound coming out. Most of them sound strident/lean or warm/diffuse to me. It wears me down quickly, compared to other stuff I have that I can listen for hours and just kinda forget. There's really nothing special inside of them. Of course the chips they use have ultra-low distortion, low noise floor. Their outputs tend to be by the books, just reliable and supposedly tonally flat, though I've never bought that part. But it'll be inoffensive and neutral for the most part, with decent amounts of detail. They do nothing bad. But I think they sound flat... tonally, dynamically, spacially.

There is a trade-off there with DAC filters and latency. Traditional DAC filters have an almost imperceptibly slight delay between when they get the input and when it gets through the filter. This results in good rejection of the aliasing distortion inherent to the conversion. The ringing gets pushed out of the audible range with minimal time/phase disruptions across the audible band. But often, recording interfaces use a 'fast' filter that eliminates filter latency and pre-ringing almost entirely, but generally tends to mess with phase considerably more. The pulse is shorter, but louder and more likely to noticeably impact the sound you actually hear. Phase distortion is no fun! On it's own it's not much, just another thing holding it back. But it's not benefiting you unless you're editing video or something like that.


Nonsense theorizing about shit I don't really understand aside, to me, buck-for-buck they're just not as enjoyable for listening to music/watching movies as something made only for that tends to be. I have a Scarlett 2i2 Gen2 because I use my PC for guitar amp sims, but when I'm not doing that, I'm not using it, because it really does not sound as good as the Modi Multibit I got for around the same money. Maybe I'm sensitive, but it's not even close. The Modi is so much smoother, clearer, and more layered. With headphones and a decent amp I hear finer details in a more natural-sounding way (I might call the Scarlett oversharpened,) and the different sections of the frequency spectrum congeal more. I wish I knew a way to convey it. The Scarlett's got that same etch to the sound that most standard-fare digital stuff tends to have. And the bass is sad. Sub tells the whole story. Completely different animal, depending on which I choose.

I'd say they get close or match some entry-level DAC/amps, but not always, and they have some things stacked against them that people making simpler DAC/amps don't even have to worry about.

If I was gonna buy an interface, it'd be something like a Motu UltraLite mk4 for sure. SPDIF in coax and toslink. Dedicated power. Pricey though.


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