how to get the best sound from pc

well for me

when  the sound mixer voulme is full

i hear better sound quality

then i control the volume from the headphone

How do headphones get their own sound control?

Could be wrong but I think he means via the amp? ...not controls on the phones lol.

Could be wrong?

I guess there's no external dac then?-- if he's talking about both computer amp and headphones amp.

Use the last link in your chain to do the volume control. Mine is 100% windows volume out to my interface, which I use to control the volume in the headphones/monitors.

Since the signal on a computer is purely digital I've always been under the impression that it's best to put any digital source at full and then only fiddle with volume once it hits an analogue device where lowering volume doesn't effect the actual audio stream.

Quote:

Originally Posted by DougofTheAbaci 

Since the signal on a computer is purely digital I've always been under the impression that it's best to put any digital source at full and then only fiddle with volume once it hits an analogue device where lowering volume doesn't effect the actual audio stream.

Very much agreed so.

I run (all) digital volumes with no attenuation, controlling volume through amp alone, even though the DAC has a volume pot as well.

The only issue some people seem to have is when they're using less than optimal parts that start clipping near max volume, for which they have to set it slightly lower than full, but having a reduction in dynamic range.

Quote:

Originally Posted by TMRaven 

How do headphones get their own sound control?

first make windows mixer volume full

also wave volume

and any other voulume your using

what i mean control the volume from headphone

there is volume control that you make up and down

Most people here are way too concerned about digital volume controls doing damage to the sound. Most music is mixed on mixers that use digital volume controls so if there was to be damage the damage is already done. While it is true that you lose some dynamic range with digital volume controls at less than max volume many DACs have more than enough dynamic range today & in most cases you will not hear any noise as the noise will be way below background noise levels even with closed earphones on your ears. It is pretty much hyperboly to say that you need that much dynamic range. It looks good on spec sheets but makes little difference in real life.

In fact digital volume controls bring many advantages such as maintaining correct channel balance no matter the volume level & having extremely fine control of volume levels in the process. Something that can't be done with most analog volumes as you will either need to trade off one or the other quality with the analog control or even worse have to go to an electronic volume control which while has both the other areas covered properly they add thier own losses due to the fact you have to use coupling caps with them due to thier single ened powersupply nature & most of them use the lowest grade coupling caps with conciderable loss of low level detail making instruments like piano lose thier life like sound pronto. Digital volume controls do not do that, pianos retain thier lifelike sound. I use piano sound for comparison because it loses its sound very quickly if there is any loss. 

For the most part if your DAC has a dynamic range of 110db or better you will not hear any noise from anything but the absolute most sensitive IEM's.Anything beyond that is icing on the cake. basically if you don't hear any noise with your setup you are good to go Digital volume controls do not raise the noise floor they only limit the max volume so the loss of dynamic range is of zero consequence in real life as all the remaining dynamic range is sufficient to deliver the full spectrum of usable sound at that volume. Basically as long as you set your bit depth to 24 bit in your sound properties you are good to go.

I actually get my best sound by going direct to my amplified speakers from the line out of my STX card & using the digital volume control available on the PC rather than going though a preamp or such to get the analog volume control. Sound is much better in my setup this way.

First post yeah!

I'm pretty sure the manual for my Essence stx (or maybe it was an online guide since the stx doesn't really come with an instruction manual) said to turn " itunes' " (or other relevant player's) volume all the way up and adjust the volume with the sound card. I don't really know what difference that makes.

Some programs such as Foobar 2000 offer finer control of volume than the soundcards driver offers as the sound card drivers only offer 100 different levels & the foobar seems to at least double that making it easier to find that perfect volume. I have tried foobar & while it is a worthy program I don't like it's interface & hoops you have to jump through to set up a library for it especially if you already have one setup in anouther program. Perhaps I would think differently if I was setting up a library for it from scratch But it would take me massive time to setup foobars library when I already have one setup that incedently works well with J.Rivers media center & Windows media. I never heard sufficient benefit from either program though to justify the expense of time (Foobar) or money (J River). I liked the interface of J.Rivers Media Center  & the fact that I didn't have to jump through any hoops to set up media library for it (at least the money spent does buy that much).  One doesn't need to exclusively use the volume control of the sound card to get get really good sound as didn't really notice any advantage either way. Just make sure that everything is setup to use 24 bit output though to get great results.