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Any difference between sound card and motherboard coax out?

post #1 of 4
1/23/12 at 12:32pm
Thread Starter 

Hello. I just ordered a Schiit Asgard to drive my HD650's but I'm still a little confused about all that stuff. I currently have an Auzentech Bravura that I could use as a DAC and I also have a FiiO D3 which I hear is pretty good despite its low price. Both my motherboard and my sound card have spdif out through coax, and I was wondering - since the output is digital, they're both "equal", are they not?

 

That was kind of messy so I'll reword it. I'm just wondering if my sound card's coaxial output yields higher quality sound than my "cheap" onboard sound. I figure it's the same unaltered digital sound, is it not?

 

Thanks

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post #2 of 4
1/23/12 at 2:41pm

The sound cards digital out is likely to be better. While it will contain the same digits, they might also have less noise along for the ride. Unlike normal computer digital, digital audio send timimg information as part if the digital signal, and the noise can alter this. That is what creates "jitter". The sound card might have less jitter due to lower noise on the signal. If its a bad card it might not, but most cards are better than the motherboard.

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post #3 of 4
1/23/12 at 8:55pm
Thread Starter 

Interesting. Anyone know if the Auzentech Bravura does a decent job? It's a $80-100 sound card so it's almost certainly better than onboard, but I'd still like to know =)

 

Cheers!

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post #4 of 4
1/24/12 at 8:31pm

The sound card might have more encoding and/or DSP features for manipulating that SPDIF signal if you care about that.  But If you want pure unadulterated sound with no processing features, then yeah, the difference should be minimal.

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