[No Smoking]

I'm looking at getting a new sound card to be either coupled with a dedicated headphone amp or a zero. I was just wondering which of the above sound cards offer a better analogue signal and which offers a better digital signal, in terms of sound quality? Both are around the same price and I am not interested in a D2X as it is too pricey. Also do you think the above sound cards digital signals would be any better than onboard digital outputs?

Thanks

 

[Alydon]

The Xonar DX is superior to the 2ZS in both analog and digital out. It has a better DAC and higher quality components throughout the card's analogue stage. And the 2ZS's digital out isn't bit-perfect since it resamples all signals internally to 48KHz (and not very well either) before it sends the signal to any of its outputs (even digital out).

Not sure how either card compares to onboard digital out, tho. I guess it depends on if the onboard can do bit-perfect digital out or not (I don't think many can). I've heard mention about onboard audio having clock-sync/jitter issues as well, but I'm far from an expert on the matter having never played w/ onboard digital myself. I suspect the Xonar DX would be better than most onboard implementations as well, though.

 

[obobskivich]

either will be better than onboard, however the DX will be better in terms of pure SQ, as the A2ZS does resample to 48khz (however it will output a true signal @ w/e sample rate you're working in, so if you want 192khz, you get 192khz output)

to be 100% honest, VERY few people are capable of hearing this difference (1 in a million, 1 in a billion, etc, its all in your head that its really a "problem", don't let head-fi'ers hear that though, they'll be annoyed with the lack of justification for their multi-thousand dollar purchases)


if you're buying new, I'd go with the DX, mostly because Asus' drivers will be better for Vista overall, and the DX is a newer card, so overall it should have better/more current driver support

although, which 2 ZS are you looking at? the Plat Pro on Creative's website as a refurb? (because the Plat Pro is a different beast in terms of SQ abilities)

 

[ROBSCIX]

I doubt even a Audigy 2 ZS Plat. Pro would be on par with a DX. It just doesn't have the parts.