[citizenkane]

Hi. I'm wondering if you guys could give me some advice. My headphones are Alessandro MS-1.

I'm looking to buy a soundcard for my PC. My usage is probably 80% music listening and 20% games playing. All of the music is MP3 (avg. 192K) and various web radio (avg. 96K).

I originally intended to get an E-Mu 0404 and headphone amp but I am starting to think that, for my uses, the X-Fi Music Edition would be more appropriate. I'm not going to be doing any recording. Just playback. I'm hardly listening to the highest quality recordings so would the E-Mu 0404's quality be somewhat wasted or inappropriate? Or maybe the X-Fi's processing might be more suited to the files I'm listening to and, in my case, actually give a better listening experience than the 0404? Of course the hardware accelerated game features of the X-Fi are definitely welcome but not a deal-breaker. Which card should I go for?

One final thing. I've already bought the headphone amp that I was going to use with the 0404. Would this improve my experience when paired with an X-Fi (does the base 'music' model have a line out?) or would I be better to just sell the amp and plug my MS-1s directly in to the X-Fi?

Thanks for any help.

 

[Bones13]

The XFi card has both a line out jack and a multiplug which can be configured as a SPDIF out - you need a cord with a mini plug on one end and an RCA connector to put to your external DAC if your amp has one. Otherwise the line out can be split to dual RCA for your amp in analog mode.

The front panel connector for the XFi extreme music has a 1/4" headphone jacks and an amplifier for it. Most of the audiophlie reviews don't give a lot of credit to the amp chips in it, have not gone that route myself. I don't like the idea of the music going thru the 2 foot ribbon cable past all the working of my video card, a few fans and the hard drive to get to the front panel. Worth a try though if you have the model with the front panel.

 

[citizenkane]

Thanks for the reply. The headphone amp I'd use receives a plain 1/8" stereo jack plug and outputs to my headphones using another 1/8" output.

I don't think the X-Fi Music comes with a drive bay panel or an external breakout box. It's just the bare card:

These are the more expensive versions:

or

So.. are those 1/8" analogue outputs on the actual card "line level" in the same way that the E-Mu 0404's outputs are? Would they benefit from being fed in to a headphone amp before the headphones in the same way that it's suggested you do so with the E-Mu 0404?

Thanks