Sound Card upgrade or adding an external DAC

Just about any DAC would be an upgrade for a computer soundcard.  There's simply to much noise in a computer system, especially a PC for on-board, or internal soundcards to reach higher levels of fidelity.  A good option would be the uDAC, or HRT streamer.  I would recommend the streamer as it not only is powered from the USB port, making power cable upgrades a thing of the past, it also reconstructs power from the USB bus to power the circuit, making computer noise non existent. 

I don't see how a sound card is bad and there is noise in a computer.  Anything that gets its power from USB is going to have just as much supposed noise as an internal sound card.

With a computer there are so many things going on thats not related to audio.  All of this ends of as noise in the system which is amplified with the signal to give you dirty sounding audio. 

This I pulled off the 6moons review of the HRT Pro.

"Kevin Halverson commented on the presumption that the problem with a host computer as power source is somehow related to having to clean up the 5V supply: "That's incorrect. Cleaning up nasty raw power supplies is a fairly trivial task. It can be accomplished by methods known to anyone skilled in the art of power supply design. There are a number of ways to accomplish this. Clean power is neither the only problem associated with a computer as audio source nor even the most important. Even if one had a completely independent power supply (battery or mains supplied), computer contamination remains. The power isn't the problem. The common ground is. Here all the noise gets conducted. The D+ and D- data pair of USB must be accompanied by a ground connection. It is this ground connection which conducts all the computer-generated nasties right into the analog audio ground. Unless some extraordinary efforts are made to isolate the computer and audio sides, all power supply clean-up efforts are wasted. The ground of the USB link maintains a constant connection of the computer with the rest of the audio system. 


'In the case of the Streamers, we provide complete isolation between the computer and analog sides. Not only do we regenerate the power (thereby breaking the common ground), we do the same with all the data moving between the two halves. This allows us to draw power from the host computer. Because we are completely isolated, the fact that we're connected to the computer has no impact on the performance of our product.' "

Quote:

Originally Posted by moonshake 

Thx for the input

Basically I´m trying to choose from these options with a $300 budget :

 

1) Xonar ST

2) Keeping my Xonar D2 -coax- used DACMAGIC, LITTLE DOT DAC 1, MATRIX  ,V-DAC, ETC-  worth the hassle ???

I'd take the 2nd option any day

I would go for the used DAC magic,  It should outperform the others, if you can find one used.

You should really do what you want to do.  You'll only gain a better understanding through your own experiences and choices.  We can guide, but if your gut and or wallet says to go another way, forget us and do it.  It would seem that no matter what choice you make, it'll only improve things.  The Gamma2 I have no experience with, but the HRT streamers are fantastic as are the uDACs.

I recommend finding a good used DAC from the 90's for the same money and keeping your soundcard for its coax out.

External DAC's can be great and so are many soundcards.  Assuming one is always better then the other indicates misinformation as there are good and bad units in both groups.

Look at the measuremeants of modern soundcards, in many cases they easily surpass many external DAC's for SNR, dynamic range and noise.  If the inside of the PC is so noisy and it is getting into the soundcard then where is the noise?

It is not shown on the output measurments or quality.  If you want to use an external DAC that is fine but using one based on misunderstandings and bad information regarding internals is not too good.

I would check the specs, I am pretty sure the unit in the D2 is of higher quality then the unit in the DACMagic.