[C38368]

I ran a quick search on this, and just wanted to verify what I think I got from it: do Creative's world's-bestest-soundcards resample audio sent via the digital out?

That's what the consensus in a couple other threads seems to be. Just wanted to make sure. TIA

 

[Riordan]

well, the CURRENT world's bestest soundcards ever (in creative's assessment

) do not compulsively resample any longer in one of their three modes, but anything before the current x-fi lineup did resample internally, according to some experienced users here and elsewhere.

(the x-fi still resamples in the game/entertainment modes, but it uses a whole lot of processing power for the process and does a more than adequate job).

replacing audigy 2 eX with x-fi made a huge difference for me when using the digital out (> benchmark > corda aria > k701). now i can finally switch sources (foobar2k or cd player) without necessarily degrading the sound.

(the reason i still use creative cards after all this time - remember sb pro, anyone? - is games... xfi is the first card ever for games AND music)

 

[AdamWill]

riordan is right, resampling was compulsory with audigy 2 and below (best you could do was pre-empt the horrible hardware resampling by doing it in foobar or something, but you couldn't avoid resampling entirely), but at least in some modes you can disable it on the x-fi.

Personally I got an AV710, $30, no resampling. Of course, I don't play games, I just need 44.1KHz stereo output and 48KHz DD / DTS.

 

[C38368]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Riordan well, the CURRENT world's bestest soundcards ever (in creative's assessment ) do not compulsively resample any longer in one of their three modes, but anything before the current x-fi lineup did resample internally, according to some experienced users here and elsewhere.

I'm still operating with an Audigy2. I really don't want to waste more money on more Creative products, but I'm trying to think up a, err.. creative solution to get music out of my M-Audio and games out of the A2 without cable swapping.

Currently, I'm forced to watch movies w/ the A2, and it's using analogue outs. The M-Audio is using it's digital out for movies. Then it dawned on me that I was essentially bypassing all the stuff on the card for DAC and amplification, which totally defeats teh purpose of having bought it.

So anyway, the whole reason I brought this up is because... the sample rate on DVDs is 96kHz, right? And that's exactly twice 48kHz, right?

Am I on to something here, or should I just cave in and buy another bloody Creative offering (yes, the A2 continues it's existence because of gaming)?