Hi All; Have a Gigabyte GA-K8NSC-939 motherboard with onboard 8ch.Realtek Surround Sound.Is It better to use this sound for Gaming,or a PCI add in Soundblaster 5.1 Card?? These are the 2 options I have,what one is better of the two? Anyone have a apinion on this? Thankyou in Advanve.
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What's better for gaming,Sound Blaster 5.1 PCI Card or Onboard Audio? 2
- Thread starter lordgalla
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You will get many opinions on this topic. My personal choice would be to use onboard, but I am not a gamer. Since your MB/CPU is not the latest and greatest, you might see some real benefit to releasing the CPU cycles needed for the onboard sound controller and handing that chore off to the sound card.
I would try benchmarking with/without card to help make the decision.
Finally, what do your ears say? How does the sound compare? I bought a SB Live! card to attempt to eliminate the background noise, still there, so off to eBay it went. Xfi and e-Mu offer better components, but as you said that is not an option.
Sound is highly subjective; technically, the onboard is more advanced, and may offer better sound, but it has to deal with the noise from proximity to the other components and costs CPU cycles to run...your choice should be based upon your needs and ears.
Tony
I would try benchmarking with/without card to help make the decision.
Finally, what do your ears say? How does the sound compare? I bought a SB Live! card to attempt to eliminate the background noise, still there, so off to eBay it went. Xfi and e-Mu offer better components, but as you said that is not an option.
Sound is highly subjective; technically, the onboard is more advanced, and may offer better sound, but it has to deal with the noise from proximity to the other components and costs CPU cycles to run...your choice should be based upon your needs and ears.
Tony
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- #3
The only time I know of that a discreet sound card will help for gaming performance is the XFi cards from Creative. They are the only ones that have a dedicated processor for handling audio processing. But all of the reviews I have seen only up game frame rates by 1-2% (maybe 1 to 10 FPS depending on the game). As for sound quality the 8.1 channel on board, the ASUS I have sounds great for gaming! The only thing I do miss about my old SB-Audigy is the break-out box with the added jacks and midi ports.
If you are having noise issue as wahnula was you might try the SB-5.1 card but keep it as far from the any other cards (graphics, nic, etc.) or any cables as possible. I have a system with my SB-Audigy card I use exclusively for audio work. But the Audigy card had to be placed in the very last pci slot to keep it from picking up noise from the cpu fan and graphics card.
In most cases the speakers will make a bigger impact on the overall sound. Like wahnula said trust your ears.
If you are having noise issue as wahnula was you might try the SB-5.1 card but keep it as far from the any other cards (graphics, nic, etc.) or any cables as possible. I have a system with my SB-Audigy card I use exclusively for audio work. But the Audigy card had to be placed in the very last pci slot to keep it from picking up noise from the cpu fan and graphics card.
In most cases the speakers will make a bigger impact on the overall sound. Like wahnula said trust your ears.
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firewolfrl
Technical User
I have a Gigabyte board and I use the 5.1 live card....the sound seems (to me at least) to be richer with more depth. I also use a 5.1 creative speaker system...though you have to watch what slot you use for those cards as they do like to conflict with other hardware.
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