Sound cards

[Devirka]

OK, once upon a time there was a big hype on these... it seems to have faded. Besides 5.1 audio I never felt i needed it...

Until now.

I played a game that started to get choppy sound. The game did mention something about turning off some options to make better sound performance and this got me thinking....

Do audio cards actually impove performance by taking off the weight from the CPU? Will getting one actually help with WoW or other game's performance?

And besides performance what do they do?

Finaly, what card to go for?

I have no clue how you measure their quality other than if they have 5.1 output.

[DocBobo]

Do audio cards actually impove performance by taking off the weight from the CPU? Will getting one actually help with WoW or other game's performance?
Yes, by up to 10% of your processor speed, depending how slow your cpu is.
And maybe, but propably not so much.

And besides performance what do they do?
Provide hardware encoding for mp3 files, for example. Or they can stream lots of audio without using up cpu speed.

Finaly, what card to go for?
The Creative Audigy 2 system is an often recommended one. Actually, it's already overpowered for gaming. A soundblaster live! 1024 is more than enough. The onboard sound of nForce2 mobos is considered one of the best you can purchase.

I have no clue how you measure their quality other than if they have 5.1 output.Signal quality, software, output options (spdif, etc.) come to mind.

In most cases any (and I do mean any) 5.1 card will be fine for you. Modern CPUs are so fast that the speed gain by an expensive card is negligible.

[Minwee]

Not all nForce 2 boards have the same sound hardware. Many of the earlier ones came with Soundstorm but that was dropped in favour of less fabulous, cheaper solutions in later boards.

Always check the fine print before ordering. :)

[Zutan]

onboard soundcards can actually slow you down, it uses more CPU cycles than a PCI slot soundcard. also often not as good sound for those with a keen ear.

im just no big fan of onboard though (may it be sound or video, lans those are ok. cant muss to much up there lol)

and with how cheap soundcards are now. i dont see why you wouldent go and just get a soundblaster audigy 2 ZS i got mine for $125 canadian. good deal i figgure.

[Devirka]

OK, so another question, what can a game do if there is a good soundcard there that it would just not be able to do if it was not there?

I am not asking if or if not the publishers actually do it, as I guess since not many actually upgrade their sound card almost all programres dont bother with special sound intensive features but IF they did, what kind of features are only posible with a good sound card?

[DocBobo]

Plain and simple 5.1 surround sound. The defacto standard is EAX/2 and almost all newer sound cards implement it.

Probably 3d shooters profit the most of it. You can play the game with your ears as well, as it is possible to locate enemies without actually seeing them. It adds up to the atmosphere.

The drawback is that you have to arrange the speakers in a square so you can experience the effects of 3d sound properly. It's not so easy to arrange them so that you can sit right in the middle of all 5 of them (it was hard enough to arrange the 5.1 speakers in the living room). That's why I resorted to 3d headphones. Most of the games I play in stereo.

What the good cards do better than the cheap ones is eating less CPU time while offering a better output signal quality. And a lot of other goodies not related to gaming.

[Devirka]

OK, final question:

The fact that i sometimes can hear other people's voice emotes and other times i cant has then nothing to do with how many simultaneous sounds my pc can handle? It is just how the game is?

[DocBobo]

Good question. I have no idea what you are talking about. :)
Which game and which soundcard?

[Crimson13]

If you're talking WoW, that is just how the game is, the server decides which sounds to trigger and sends the packets to you, to prevent sound interruptions and breakup, sometimes you miss voice emotes etc.... which is why it's nice that the important ones are backed up with text.

[Devirka]

Ups, I did not specified, i did meant WoW.

[Andara Bledin]

I have a fairly spiffy sound card and I get the dropped voice emotes from WoW as well, so I assume that it's a server-side event.

It's kind of disappointing when latency makes it seem like the emote should have run, but .. *shrug* .. It's nothhing, really.

I don't care for 5:1 systems, as I have a computer room with multiple machines. And with just a stereo setup, it's only requires a minor turn to determine if something is in front or behind. I also hate the controls on my current card's setup, which don't let me adjust the bass, which is way too deep and can be heard in other rooms due to the speakers I have. *sigh*

^-.-^

[GorBash]

I recently purchased one of the CL Audigy 2 ZS cards and the sound is pretty impressive. My onboard sound just isn't the same but my MB is about 2 years old now, so things have changed a bit since then. ;)

The best bang for my buck that I ever got on a card was this card - still available I believe. If you want to be conservative with your cash and still get a good, but older, card take a look.

http://www.turtlebeach.com/site/products/soundcards/santacruz/producthome.asp

I never once had a single problem with any game I ever played while using it. It's still in my old PC and my wife plays EQ2 on it and hasn't complained once. I think the card only sells for about $50 or so compared to the $100+ range for the Audigy 2's.

[Arcfire]

Now that the Audigy 4 has been released you should see the OEM version (barebones) of the Audigy 2ZS come down in price, I have seen the OEM for as little as $40, the boxed versions will hang around $60. This christmas I picked up the platinum for $100 (199-100 rebate)

Doc Bobo is right, it todays game you want less sound eating precious processing time, so I dont think you can go wrong with an Audigy 2 ZS