Asus Xonar Essence STX + Westone 3 + Logitech Z 5500

Westtones should be fine. it is possible that you may hear some very very faint noise with them with no music playing but my fealing is that it would be so faint that you wouldn't hear it at all. Your speakers will be your weak link in your system so I recomend you replace them when you can. This soundcard is really much more capable than these speakers of yours can reveal.

I suggest some proffesional nearfield monitors such as M-Audio or Yamaha or KRK. These will give much better sound than Logitech will.

In that price range, the Audioengine are said to be good, Yamaha and KRK are a bit more expensive I think.

Quote:

Originally Posted by tolisgtr 

Thanks for your reply, germanium.Could you suggest some specific speakers capable of revealing the STX's true sound quality ? 

M-Audio seem good to me.

 I suggest you head to guitar center & hear them for yourself if you can as I'm not sure what your tastes are as to your prefered balance in sound. I have some modified M-Audio BX5's that sound terrific but they weren't exactly the cats meow to begin with. I liked thier balance stock but they had a paper thin image that I couldn't tolerate so I modded the amps by D.C coupling them & I removed the subsonic filter which improved the bass to the point where they were usable without the subwoofer as I was getting complaints about the bass coming through the floor with the sub. The BX5A's  & BX5A deluxes are better than my speakers were stock by a long shot but less adjustable to the room than mine are. The Yamaha ones with the 5 inch woofer have very similar sound in terms of balance as my modded BX5's but seem to have a odd  charachter to the mids that makes voices sound somewhat phasey. KRK definately has some good monitors & you may also try the JBL ones with the 5 inch woofer. These have very impressive bass that is very smooth & not boomy at all, Mids & top end on these seem too laid back for me though. The Mackie MR5's to my ears anyway are boomy as hell. Very disapointed with the Mackes though perhaps a different setup could cure the boominess I heard. Perhaps if they were placed away from the walls more 

Sorry just noticed you are from Greece so you probably don't have a Guitar Center near you but you do probably have some pro sound type stores there.

I have an Essence ST which I occasionally connect my UM3x to.  The Westone IEMs are very easy to drive and sensitive anyway so it won't be a huge difference, but you would get much better clarity and also free of the onboard sound card noise.  

As for connecting the sound card line-out to your speakers, just get a RCA to 3.5mm cable.  Actually I think the sound card comes with a RCA to 3.5mm cable adaptor because they predicted people would want to use computer speakers and those speakers predominately uses 3.5mm connectors, whereas the soundcard's output jacks are RCA.  Just hook up the line out from the soundcard to the the front speaker input on the speaker's control station (the green jack) and that should be it.  I'm pretty sure the the speakers can also detect the number of channels on the analog inputs and adjust its output accordingly as well.

I just ordered the M-Audio AV40's....should have them by Friday/Saturday. I was considering getting the Xonar Essence STX to replace my Creative X-Fi card....  not sure if I'll notice a BIG difference....

Quote:

Originally Posted by tolisgtr 

Thanks for the help, nanaholic.I'm pretty sure the solution you mentioned about the connectivity between the Essence STX and the Z5500 is the appropriate one,but I have a question.Should I follow your instructions,is it 100% sure that the subwoofer will function ? Because the front speaker input and the subwoofer input on the speakers are different.

I'm pretty sure it would work.  If you want to be safe just find another source like a portable mp3 player and connect up the headphone jack to the front speaker jack on your speakers with a standard 3.5mm cable and turn it on and try it, sure fire way to test it and make sure.