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will the Xonar DG work well for my setup? Post contains lots of questions

post #1 of 6
1/28/11 at 7:33pm
Thread Starter 

 

I do not own a home theater or tv. I use my pc for music, tv, games, and movies and listen through headphones. My pc runs windows 7 64-bit, has realtek alc888 audio, and I use ad700 headphones. For a music player I currently use foobar. I saw that the xonar dg has a low price, dolby headphone, and currently, it has a rebate so I am thinking of replacing the onboard audio with it but have these questions: 
 
If I hook up an xbox 360 to the line-in on the asus xonar dg, will it give similar sound to an astro mixamp? Won't the 360 output dolby prologic ii to the line-in of the sound card and then the soundcard can turn that into dolby headphone? according to this info it seems like it may be possible: http://www.dummies.com/how-to/content/hooking-up-xbox-360-sound.html and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dolby_Headphone. A user review on newegg said the xonar card can add EQ and EAX effects to the line-in audio, does that mean that it can also add dolby headphone effects to the line-in audio? The xbox360 will be hooked up to my computer monitor so the xbox 360 will be right by the pc. 
 
I got one ps2 game that I would like to play again but in hi-def using the pcsx2 emulator. Am I correct in assuming that if the card can turn prologic ii into dolby headphone for the xbox, it should also be able to turn the emulator's output of prologic ii into dolby headphone? 
 
If I get a bluray drive on the pc, will I be able to use dolby headphone with the movie or will I not be able to use dolby headphone due to some drm? Is there a significant difference in sound quality being this sound card does 96khz and not the 192khz that bluray supports? Will Dolby headphone work with ac3? Can I have a 2.1 speaker system, xbox360, and a pair of headphones all hooked up to the xonar dg at the same time? Won't this take up 3 out of the 4 analog ports on the card? Should I use something like asio or kernel streaming with the xonar dg and does the card have to support it or can asio be run on any audio setup?
 
Is there some other sound card for under $60 that I should buy instead of the xonar dg?
 
Any advice you can give will be greatly appreciated.
 
Thanks
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post #2 of 6
1/31/11 at 12:22am
Thread Starter 

I did some more research, am now wondering if it would it make more sense for me to get an earforce dss?

 

My onboard audio's spdif out does not appear to support dolby digital, would that be a problem when playing pc games or watching a movie on a pc that is hooked up to an earforce dss?

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post #3 of 6
2/1/11 at 10:02am

 

Welcome to head-fi newgamer I'll try my best to anser you questions:

 

Quote:
If I hook up an xbox 360 to the line-in on the asus xonar dg, will it give similar sound to an astro mixamp? Won't the 360 output dolby prologic ii to the line-in of the sound card and then the soundcard can turn that into dolby headphone?

No because the DG line in is stereo, pro logic ii could simulate surround but that is a backwards way of doing things. You would need a card to have optical in.

 

 

Quote:
I got one ps2 game that I would like to play again but in hi-def using the pcsx2 emulator. Am I correct in assuming that if the card can turn prologic ii into dolby headphone for the xbox, it should also be able to turn the emulator's output of prologic ii into dolby headphone?


If you are running the emulator from the PC or any audio application then the Xonar DG will be able to apply DH to the signal and produce simulated 7.1 in your headphones. If you are runnig it home brew from the 360 then you will need an Earforce DSS or mixamp.

 

 

 

Quote:
If I get a bluray drive on the pc, will I be able to use dolby headphone with the movie or will I not be able to use dolby headphone due to some drm?

I am pretty sure there will not be a problem although I have not used this in person.

 

 

Quote:
Is there a significant difference in sound quality being this sound card does 96khz and not the 192khz that bluray supports?

There will be a small difference but this will be negated by using dolby headphone which adds its own colouration to the sound. Other head-fi'ers can elaborate but this is more of a concern when your looking a higher end speaker setups or stereo with higher end headphones. 

 

 

Quote:
Will Dolby headphone work with ac3? Can I have a 2.1 speaker system, xbox360, and a pair of headphones all hooked up to the xonar dg at the same time?

AC3 = yes,  you can apply DH to any sound signal obviouly some are better than others, you can add pro logic in too for stereo sources.

All hooked up at the same time: Not really, you cant have the 360 connected unless its stereo line in. The 2.1 speakers would have to use the front and maybe center analog out but this depends on the speaker cabling configuration. And so no room for headphones which means cable swapping.

 

On the Xonar you can only have one input and one output active at any time and you apply the dolby effect to that output.

 

 

 

The best way to achive your goal is to spend more money and possibly include an amp in the mix with two inputs so it would go like this

 

XBOX -> Earforce -> Headphone amp input 1 ----->
                                                                          Headphones
PC Xonar DG > Headphone amp input 2 ----------->

 

or you would have to swap headphones over when switching between 360 and PC.

 

 

Quote:
Is there some other sound card for under $60 that I should buy instead of the xonar dg?


You could consider http://www.turtlebeach.com/products/sound-cards/audio-advantage-micro-ii.aspx

 

This is PC USB to SPDIF toslink external sound card with Dolby Digital Live output which could feed the Earfoce DSS couple that with a toslink cable switch have could have the 360 connected as well and have the headphones just out of the E-DSS. 

 

 

 

Quote:
Should I use something like asio or kernel streaming with the xonar dg and does the card have to support it

You can get the latest beta drivers from ASUS which supports ASIO but this is not really realated to the other questions and is somthing to read  up on the other ASIO threads

 

 

Quote:

Originally Posted by newgamer View Post

I did some more research, am now wondering if it would it make more sense for me to get an earforce dss?

 

My onboard audio's spdif out does not appear to support dolby digital, would that be a problem when playing pc games or watching a movie on a pc that is hooked up to an earforce dss?

 

Yes it would be a problem as the earforce is expecting a 5.1 signal which would only come from a Dolby Digital Live encoded output. This would be ok with the Xonar as it has DDL out from its SPDIF  but there is no point as you could just process the dolby headphone on the xonar and plug your headphones in directly.

 

The E-DSS only makes sense for 360 gaming taking its optical out and applying DH to it.  You could keep things stereo but that would be a waste of good audio.

 

I hope that ansers your many questions.. i'll check this post for errors later as im in need of a coffee!

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post #4 of 6
2/2/11 at 8:05pm
Thread Starter 

BlutoSlice, thanks for answering all of my questions.

 

I pulled out my old altec lansing 4.1 speakers from storage and they have 2 inputs: front and surround. Hopefully, the speakers still work and hopefully, I only have to hookup the front input to use them as 2.1 speakers. Mostly, I will use my headphones so the speakers quality is not really important to me. The Xonar DG having only one input and one output active at a time should not pose any problems that I can see. 

 

I went ahead and ordered the Xonar DG because I could not find an internal sound card that accepts Dolby Digital over the spdif in port. I think I will be satisfied with the Xonar DG for my computer use. If I really like how Dolby Headphone sounds on computer games after a couple of weeks then I will get the Earforce DSS. I do not play on Xbox Live so I do not need the chat function of the more expensive Mixamp. I just do not know if I will be satisfied with the bass on the DSS, atleast on the pc I can use an equalizer. I know the Earforce DSS has a dial for bass, I just do not know if that would be enough to make decent sounding game explosions on the 360.

 

If I get the Earforce DSS I will be able to take optical out from both the pc and the Xbox 360 into an optical switch and then hook the optical switch to the Earforce DSS.  I like this setup since I would only have 1 volume control to adjust and I won't have to constantly switch cables. The only thing that worries me about such a setup is will I have enough bass for my music and xbox games. If I get the Earforce DSS and am not satisfied with the amount of bass for music, I will come back to head-fi for suggestions. Can I use an equalizer on the digital out of the Xonar DG, in case the DSS does not have enough of a bass adjustment for music? If it is only the xbox games that do not have enough bass, I will learn to deal with it.

 

Thanks

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post #5 of 6
2/3/11 at 7:49am

 

Quote:
If I get the Earforce DSS I will be able to take optical out from both the pc and the Xbox 360 into an optical switch and then hook the optical switch to the Earforce DSS

Yes if you wanted  to but I Dolby headphone would be best directly from the DG and not adding in an extra stage with e E-DSS. you could allways run a headphone extension cable to the front of your desk so you can easily swap headphones between the DG and earforce.  The DG has a built in headphone amp which will allow you have have the power to drive the bass to your liking - The EQ works very well. The lack off bass issue you  have is that the AD700 is bass light to begin with and you may be served better by upgrading to something meatier.  If you wanted to boost bass from the E-DSS cheaply you could try a portable amp attached after the DSS. I have a bass boost CMoy amp on ebay now, PM me for details.

 

Check out mad lust envys headphone guide it will give you some options for gaming headphones.

 

http://www.head-fi.org/forum/thread/534479/mad-lust-envy-aka-shin-cz-s-guide-to-headphone-gaming-particularly-with-dolby-headphone/345#post_7248189

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post #6 of 6
2/3/11 at 5:30pm
Thread Starter 

I had mad lust envys headphone guide bookmarked already but have only read the first page.

 

I did my research before buying the ad700 so I knew the bass might be low. I wanted an open headphone for less than $100, that was durable, and good for tv, music, gaming, and movies. That basically left me with the ad700 or the hd555. I did not get the hd555 due to the plastic on the headband near the earcup sometimes cracking after a year or two of use. The hd555 are also known to have little bass so no matter which one I chose I would have little bass. I was able to get the ad700s for $65 refurbished and read that they respond well to using an eq. I have been mostly satisfied with the fit(I think I will try the phatpad mod) and they sound good with a little eq on my pc. I think they are great considering the price I paid. Currently, I am not willing to spend $200 on headphones, otherwise, I would have tested the beyerdynamics.

 

If I get the Earforce, can I take the analog out from the Earforce and the soundcard using 3.5mm extensions and hook them up to a 3.5mm stereo splitter that is hooked up backwards. So instead of the splitter having one input and two outputs, it will have two inputs and one output? If that is possible, I know I will only be able to listen to one device at a time which wouldn't be a problem. I also would have two volume controls (pc and earforce) but since they would be located on the same desk that would not be a problem either.

 

Thanks again for the response.

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