Need some help and advice choosing a sound card

Discussion in 'Soundcards, Speakers HiFI & File formats' started by Vomit, Dec 26, 2012.

  1. Vomit

    Vomit Member Guru

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    Well i am currently using the on-board sound on my pc, (one of the better realtec chips) its not too bad but i do get some sound lag occasionally when playing BF3 and sometimes i don't get footsteps from other players, that my main problems with it.

    Now this is the tricky part, i currently use the HD Audio output as a second output for TS3, just one ear bud for that and the game sound from surround speakers. This set-up up works OK for me and very well for the misus as she doesn't hear the the screaming and swearing that goes along with a busy TS channel.

    I need a sound card that will do the above but i have bitter memories of the creative labs, vista and the x-fi driver affair (yes i do hold grudges, especially when it costs me money) I bough an asus Xonar d2 as a replacement and that worked very well in my last pc but has decided not to play nice on my z68 motherboard (channels swapping randomly), has no front panel connector and very poor driver support from asus. So that card is currently collecting dust.

    So I need a half decent card that i can have 2 separate sound outputs that can run two different sources simultaneously, one for the surround sound and one for TS3 ect. It needs to be under £100 and work properly under win7 64 bit, any one have a tried and tested set up that matches my needs?

    Thank for your help :)
     
  2. ROBSCIX

    ROBSCIX Ancient Guru

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    I would say check out one of the more budget priced Xonars.
     
  3. Vomit

    Vomit Member Guru

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    well i got the ol asus xonar out and refitted it, tried it with the latest asus drivers and it still swaps channels (updated main board bios since last attempt), did a system restore and now running the unified driver that has been around for a while, so far no channel swapping. I have left the realtec audio and drivers on, but disabled the primary output and just using the mic and second output enabled, so far so good. a bit messy but it seems to be working out ok so far. only time will tell if this will be a suitable solution to my problem.
     
  4. ROBSCIX

    ROBSCIX Ancient Guru

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    A friend of mine had a channel swapping thing when he would use 5.1 the odd time.
    He said if, he switched it back to stereo and put it back to 5.1 it would fix it. Until the next time.
    Hopefully the new drivers will fix the issue for you.
     

  5. Vomit

    Vomit Member Guru

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    keeping my fingers crossed, its very annoying when it swaps the sound about, mine seems to like turning the sound field 90 degrees or more :bang: still ok atm though, just played bf3 for an hour no problems so far
     
  6. ROBSCIX

    ROBSCIX Ancient Guru

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    Perhaps, the new drivers fixed it.
     
  7. nikavelli

    nikavelli Master Guru

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    Sometimes previous installations or co-existing sound devices can manifest into weird sound behavior. I've seen it happen before. I would start from scratch, uninstall all sound devices on your computer. Disable any onboard sound in BIOS. Then download and install Driver Sweeper. Great little program, scans your registry for leftover bits and pieces from installs that can cause problems. Then simply reboot and install your Xonar as normal.

    You also mentioned a new motherboard. Did you reformat and install Windows fresh after putting it in?
     
  8. Vomit

    Vomit Member Guru

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    yes i did, the problem started from the outset on a clean fresh machine. I gave up with the sound card fairly soon after building the pc as i had read on other forums that the xonar d2 doesn't play nice with z68 chip-sets, supposed to have been a firmware update available for it, but i have searched and found nothing to support the claim.

    The drivers were thoroughly removed when i gave up on the card the last time, i did not remove the on-board sound drivers though as i am still using it purely for team speak. From what i have read so far running them both together shouldn't cause me any trouble, so far so good.
     
  9. nikavelli

    nikavelli Master Guru

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    I've seen it go both ways. I used to run a Audigy 2 ZS and Icemat Siberia USB headset together and switch between the two devices depending on the game. Did not recall any problems. But again, on other setups I've noticed weird sound behavior exist when two devices were installed at once. Generally, I recommend you only have one sound device installed at a time though. If you read the manual that came with your sound card, it states the same thing.

    Have you tried the UniXonar drivers? I don't even touch the officials anymore..
     
  10. Anarion

    Anarion Ancient Guru

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    I'd consider Creative Sound Blaster Z. £73.56 from Amazon UK with free shipping.
     

  11. Vomit

    Vomit Member Guru

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    Yes, that's the drivers i have installed earlier, they seem to be working out ok, not had any silliness from the card at all since i put them on. Granted running them both is not ideal, and i would prefer not too so i will have a look for a z series card (would prefer to get it locally over the counter) the 3rd option which i have used in the past is a mobile (cell) phone blue-tooth hands-free set, that did work okish, a pain when the conection was lost and a bigger pain to swap between the 2 i had on the go when their batteries ran out mid game.
     
  12. ROBSCIX

    ROBSCIX Ancient Guru

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    You can run multiple sound devices if you want.
    I have friends that run up to 5 soundcards/interfaces. If the drivers play nice together and you don't have resource conflicts, you are fine. If they have issues, they will come up right away.

    Any device set for default in your main system control panel will be used for games. You can also set players, such as video or audio players for whatever device you want. You can also set recording for any device you want. To note, you can have one device for playback and another for recording if you want.
     
    Last edited: Dec 27, 2012
  13. Vomit

    Vomit Member Guru

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    Thanks for you help and advice,

    I think i will leave it as it is now with the two as they are, no problems with it at all and the sound lag has completely gone from bf3 and i even get to hear peoples foot steps. Pleased to have the xonar working again.
     

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