What would be the best soundcard to get to get the most out of my HD 555's?

What do plan on doing? Gaming? Movies? Music? All three? If just the last two I would get the $30 Asus card. If you do a lot of gaming I would go for one of the X-Fi Asus or Creative cards. I just got a Creative X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Champion for $100 shipped and counldnt be happier but I do some gaming. If I didnt game I would've got the $30 Asus card

I pretty much have the same question. I listen to music and movies and gaming all, too. But my system should be good enough to play all older and newer games well without an X-Fi based card, so wouldn't the Xonar DG be good enough anyway? Or would an X-Fi card actually SOUND better for gaming, rather than performance? For reference, I'm using an X-Fi XtremeGamer right now. Not the best X-Fi card and doesn't have a headphone amp, but would it be worth paying $17.60 (after rebate) on Amazon and replacing it? I'm expecting a pair of Sennheiser HD 598's arriving in the mail soon.

The T-HD (Titanium HD) is really the card to get for gaming support, also the best for games designed during the Windows XP era (or earlier).

The T-HD does not come with a dedicated headphone amplifier, but does a good job at powering headphones.

The Asus Xonar Essence STX & ST should do well with games designed for Windows Vista & Win 7.

Both T-HD and Essence use almost exactly the same op-amps

The Sennheiser HD-555 can very easily be powered by both sound cards.

The Asus Xonar DG (PCI, $35) can also power the HD-555.

Long story short, the X-Fi DSP is the only way to get genuine EAX 5 (and 3/4 along with the Audigy line), and CMSS-3D Headphone has the best positioning I've heard yet in games that use DirectSound3D and OpenAL (most of which were released in XP's heyday). If you still like to play such games, you'd be happier with the Titanium HD.

But I have to acknowledge that a lot of people only play games that use XAudio2 or (software-only versions of) FMOD these days, at which point the X-Fi DSP loses its edge over the C-Media cards and CMSS-3D Headphone is dragged down to Dolby Headphone's level. In that case, the Xonar Essence STX is a very strong contender.

If you do go the Xonar route, you might want to look into these drivers. Supposedly, the stock ones aren't really any better than Creative's...

Quote:

Originally Posted by jesb 
The Xonar I think is what I'm leaning towards.  But I wish I could find this for about $150 or less here in Canada.

Hopefully, the Xonar Essence STX sound card will go on sale soon.

I bought my STX used off eBay for $130.

I would say go for the Titanium HD, best for gaming.

Creative sells the refurb for $99.
 

Quote:

Originally Posted by jesb 
There doesn't seem to be a clear run away winner here between these two cards.  I guess you should be pretty satisfied with either, and between them it's mostly preference on a certain aspect you prefer?  So maybe I should be looking at what's cheaper right now, and that would be the Titanium HD.  Anywhere I can get this for $100 or less?  A google search and looking at a list of prices via shopbot.ca shows the cheapest this is going for is $119.99.  Any chance I can get this for $100 or less any time soon in Canada?  I don't mind waiting and continue to use my onboard sound until than.

Not sure about buying refurbed to be honest.
 

The website Bountii is a great site for finding the best prices on stuff.

Also most smart companies wait until after Christmas to announce new products.

Last month Creative Labs came out with the Recon3D PCI-Express (SB1350), which is only $100, but is not as good as the Titanium HD.

So Asus may have to come out with something soon to compete with it.

Quote:

Originally Posted by jesb 

There doesn't seem to be a clear run away winner here between these two cards.  I guess you should be pretty satisfied with either, and between them it's mostly preference on a certain aspect you prefer?  So maybe I should be looking at what's cheaper right now, and that would be the Titanium HD.  Anywhere I can get this for $100 or less?  A google search and looking at a list of prices via shopbot.ca shows the cheapest this is going for is $119.99.  Any chance I can get this for $100 or less any time soon in Canada?  I don't mind waiting and continue to use my onboard sound until than.

 

Not sure about buying refurbed to be honest.

Not sure about Canada...even in the US, the Titanium HD generally around $120 at the lowest, more commonly around $150, save for those lucky Best Buy shoppers who got it for under $50 (and presumably resold most of them for profit).

By comparison, the Essence STX is around $150 at its lowest, more often around $180-200.