[450]

Alright...

I've heard all this talk about how the PC case is really noisy and not a good environment for a soundcard. So I thought...

Why can't I just desolder the pins on the mobo and then get lots of wires and mount it a wood chassis along with some dampening stuff. I have an EMU 0404. This is on an older computer when the mobo is essentially worth $15 so I'm willing to risk it. If it helps my music listening I'm all for it.

 

[cotdt]

it's much easier to just add shielding onto the back of your sound card. you can buy them from many places.

 

[450]

Darn. I wanted to do an extreme mod.

 

[cotdt]

Quote:

Originally Posted by 450 /img/forum/go_quote.gif Darn. I wanted to do an extreme mod.

haha. well the shielding not only gets rid of the background noise but also improves the treble. the measurements also improve dramatically. look here:

http://www.head-fi.org/forums/showthread.php?t=141880

you'll own one of the very few soundcards that actually have shielding! the shielding paper is electrically conductive so be careful what it touches. add a layer of insulation onto the back of the soundcard and then apply the shielding. optionally you can also apply shielding to the front of the soundcard.

 

[joe_cool]

In reference to the linked thread, I think silicon carbide is a hard material used to cut steel and glass. How you could ply enough layers of abrasive cloth or paper to make an 8mm panel is not clear. Neither is it clear how this would provide electrostatic or electromagnetic shielding. But it would probably cost enough to buy a good sound card to replace the game-blaster or xi-fidelity thingie you bought at Best Buy.

Which is I think the point of the original poster.

 

[cotdt]

Quote:

Originally Posted by joe_cool /img/forum/go_quote.gif In reference to the linked thread, I think silicon carbide is a hard material used to cut steel and glass. How you could ply enough layers of abrasive cloth or paper to make an 8mm panel is not clear. Neither is it clear how this would provide electrostatic or electromagnetic shielding. But it would probably cost enough to buy a good sound card to replace the game-blaster or xi-fidelity thingie you bought at Best Buy. Which is I think the point of the original poster.

There are other materials that work besides silicon carbide. It's called ERS Paper and Partsconnexion sells it. I don't know how it works either, but both hearing tests and measurements show that it does.

 

[Daroid]

Your main problem isn't that it is inside the case. It's a part of it, but nearly waste of time trying to correct a bad hi-fi interface.
The PCI bus features common ground with the rest of the bus, which is a big problem. The power supply isn't steady directly from the pci bus either, so it is coupled capacitively as a minimum on all pci cards.

An ideal solution would be an external case with it's own linear power supply.
Another issue: You can't run long lenghts of wire going fom the pci slot. Delay is too high and depends on where the wires are posotioned in the air. You will at least need to buffer all connections, and then again i'm not sure what will happen to the pci controller if you use the pci bus with an external supply.

Since your motherboard is cheap, you should try this mod with a cheap soundcard first if you want to do this mod. Keep a fire extinguisher nearby

 

[dytln_02]

I have hear mod EMU 0404 from chips member with elna cerafine caps , it's better than using stock caps....(no bright sound using elna cerafine caps, but it's still lack of soul)
after he change op-amp with THS4032 , he satisfied with his modification.
check lowyat forum , for modification using external psu for EMU 0404

 

[Gatticus]

Quote:

Originally Posted by 450 /img/forum/go_quote.gif Alright... I've heard all this talk about how the PC case is really noisy and not a good environment for a soundcard. So I thought... Why can't I just desolder the pins on the mobo and then get lots of wires and mount it a wood chassis along with some dampening stuff. I have an EMU 0404. This is on an older computer when the mobo is essentially worth $15 so I'm willing to risk it. If it helps my music listening I'm all for it.

Wouldn't it be easier to just get an EMU 0404 USB to achieve the same thing?