[Evshrug]

More accurate than binaural? - lol no, binaural is how it would sound in real life if its done correctly, id like to see them do it more accurate than that

Did you read the article? Binaural HRTFs are algorithms based on two mics placed inside a dummy head... but nobody's ears and head are shaped just like this generalized dummy's head. That's why we often vary in processing preference and percentage. Supposedly, this should be an HRBF, whatever that stands for, and the algorithms are based on starting with how the brain interprets distance, degrees, and elevation.

Obviously I have no idea how well it'll work in practice, but more developments in this field are a good thing for everybody!

 

[Solarium]

Solarium, you need to sit down and figure out what it is you want from a sound card. You are all over the place man. Lol.

@evshrug

Yes 120% you can not get headphone hrtf from line outs. At least not until someone makes a custom driver or creative adds a switch in software for this.

Basically the best sound quality for the best price, good 3D positional audio, ability to switch between the headphones and speakers easily, and included headphone amp (with low output impedance). The SBZ has the advantage of plugging both headphones and speakers in at the cost of not having as nice of DAC, while as the TiHD you pretty much need to unplug the speakers to listen to headphones and vice versa everytime.

 

[DJINFERNO806]

Then sounds like the z is your choice and at $65 on newegg, its a no brainer!

Now if newegg.com shipped to Canada I'd grab one right now! Arghhh

 

[Solarium]

Then sounds like the z is your choice and at $65 on newegg, its a no brainer!

Now if newegg.com shipped to Canada I'd grab one right now! Arghhh

Gonna test them both to see if there's a big difference in the DAC's

 

[DJINFERNO806]

The biggest difference will.come from the z's headphone out isn't as clean as the line outs. The headphone amp on the z is mediocre at best so the sound is so so from there in comparison.

 

[Axaion]

Did you read the article? Binaural HRTFs are algorithms based on two mics placed inside a dummy head... but nobody's ears and head are shaped just like this generalized dummy's head. That's why we often vary in processing preference and percentage. Supposedly, this should be an HRBF, whatever that stands for, and the algorithms are based on starting with how the brain interprets distance, degrees, and elevation.

Obviously I have no idea how well it'll work in practice, but more developments in this field are a good thing for everybody!

You only linked page 2, and my browser didnt show page 1 (noscript D, so no i i hadent.
 
However, if this is staying AMD only, its not going to get far i fear

 

[Solarium]

The biggest difference will.come from the z's headphone out isn't as clean as the line outs. The headphone amp on the z is mediocre at best so the sound is so so from there in comparison.

 
So I'll be using the line-outs for both SBZ and TiHD... which kind of makes TiHD more appealing.
 
Btw, if TiHD, ZXR and STX all use the Burr-Brown DAC, do they all sound identical using the line-out (with all post-processing effects off)?

 

[xnor]

All of these cards are clean down to below -100 dB on the line-outs so I don't see how they would sound different. Using similar or even the same chips won't make audible differences more likely...
 
Main difference when driving headphones are caused by two things:
a) different output impedance
b) different noise floor
 
that is with no funky processing going on.

 

[Solarium]

So I'm trying 50% ACM volume on the ZXR with windows volume 50/100, versus 100% ACM volume (to bypass any degrade of AQ from ACM) with windows volume 20% to simulate similar overall volume. Listening to dance/house music, I notice that the lower beats around 50hz to be overly loud, kind of drowning all the other sounds making the overall sound "muffled" sounding. I wouldn't get this when I put the ACM to 100% volume and lower windows volume to whatever I'm comfortable with.
 
By the way, I'm not sure why it's not recommended to plug in the headphones directly to the ZXR's line-out RCA jacks. Don't the RCA jacks have ?no output impedance therefore result in much better AQ than the headphone jack's 36-ohm output impedance?

 

[DJINFERNO806]

I mentioned already in a previous post that line outs have typical output impedence of 100 ohms +.

Not sure why you'd want to plug headphones into a line out, especially with the headphone out being as good as it is.

 

[xnor]

Indeed. Since the ACM seems to be a simple potentiometer it will increase the output impedance if you turn the volume down.
 
It could easily be a 10,000 ohm pot, so the increase in output impedance could be enormous. Btw Z has about half the output impedance of the ZxR.

 

[Solarium]

I mentioned already in a previous post that line outs have typical output impedence of 100 ohms +.

Not sure why you'd want to plug headphones into a line out, especially with the headphone out being as good as it is.

Why is it recommended to connect the external amp on the line-outs instead of the headphone jack then? Had no idea the output impedance is so high on the line out.

What do you mean by headphone out being as good as it is? It has pretty high output impedance too

 

[DJINFERNO806]

Yes there is impedence mismatch on the headphone out ports if you use lower impedence headphones.  But are you unhappy with the sound? Do you hear distortions to the point where it actually sounds terrible? Trust me it wont be better with the line outs, I will tell you that.  Also you wont get headphone surround through the line outs, so there goes one of the biggest features of the card itself.
 
It is recommended to connect the amp to the line outs because of some people are scared of double amping.  But I would test the amp on both ports and see what it sounds like to you with YOUR headphones.
 
Lastly if you are adding an amp to the ZXR, then output impedence is irrelevant as you only have to worry about the output impedence of the last source device in the audio chain's impedence.  This case you amp, not the ZXR.  

 

[stv014]

Why is it recommended to connect the external amp on the line-outs instead of the headphone jack then? Had no idea the output impedance is so high on the line out.

 
The output impedance of the line out is not an issue when it is driving a line input (which is its intended purpose), since those typically have resistive impedance at least in the kΩ range. Connecting an external amplifier to the headphone jack instead is not necessarily audibly worse, but it does usually have worse measured performance (like higher noise level), and setting the optimal volume level is also not as obvious - a line output is normally expected to be usable at 100% volume, while a headphone output may have excess gain and clip at that level, or just output higher voltage than what the external amplifier can handle.

 

[stv014]

Gonna test them both to see if there's a big difference in the DAC's

 
There should not be with a reasonable implementation. I have listening tests on the Sound Science forum (like the one in my signature, but there are a few more as well), some of which include audio recorded from a CS4398 DAC. You can try these to see if you can tell the output of the "low quality" DAC apart from the original. The quality of the headphone outputs is usually more problematic on sound cards (common issues include high output impedance, capacitor coupled outputs, using a chip not well suited for this purpose as a "headphone amplifier", audible noise with sensitive headphones due to digital volume and gain control, and sometimes simply not enough power). Another frequent problem is ground loops with grounded external amplifiers.