[Soymilk]

i have a decent setup (ppa v2, dt770/80, hd555), and i figure it's about time to upgrade my source. my old computer had an audigy 2 zs, but i sold the computer when i built a new one and i'm currently running off of the motherboard built in sound card (realtek alc889). i play games, so im thinking x-fi, but obviously sound quality would be important as well. as far as the x-fi cards go, i've been seeing people suggest the auzentech line of cards a lot; the prelude seems to be the top end for that. the creative x-fi elite pro is comparable to that, right? from searching the dac that each uses, it seems like they're regarded as relatively equal in quality, some like one more some like the other. i could get an elite pro and hotrod it for cheaper than i could get a prelude, so im thinking this is the way to go.
 
on the software side, i've always been hearing about foobar and how it's great but i've also always been too lazy to actually check it out / set it up. are there any recommended settings or a link to a guide for setting it up?
 
thanks

 

[Soymilk]

nobody?

 

[silverxxx]

Foobar is great, there is not much to set up in it though. I think some use the WASAPI output, for better quality, I do not know about it since i believe it is not working in windows XP. Give it a shot, although the sound improvement from the player is probably minimal considering other components. It does have other features such as flac support,format converter, etc. And also VST support using a bridge plugin if you are into that sort of thing.
 
The foobar wiki might help if you have questions/ or need more information.
http://wiki.hydrogenaudio.org/index.php?title=Foobar2000:Foobar2000
 

 

[Soymilk]

ok, cool. whenever i saw people recommending foobar (from what i remember) i'd always see people mentioning how it's super customizable and looks like crap unless set up properly or something like that so i never got around to actually trying it. i guess that was wrong?