[fln]

Which one is better for listening to music in headphones ( Sennheiser HD580 ) ?
Did anyone hear both cards?
Maybe another alternatives (sub-$250) for notebook and headphones?

Another question is how do these cards compare in sound quality to low-end CD players, such as Harman/Kardon HD970, Marantz CD5001...
Do these sound cards yield a lot or just a little ? Did somebody compare?

From my own experience, Marantz CD5001OSE from it's own headphone out did better job than Terratec Aureon Space soudcard. The CD player sounds just little more musical and robust, I'd say.
Hope Emu 0404 USB will be closer to that sound of CD player than Terratec. Am I right ?

 

[prescient]

In addition to the above posters question, does anyone know if the headphone amp in the 0404 could drive hd 580's?

 

[fln]

Quote:

Originally Posted by prescient /img/forum/go_quote.gif In addition to the above posters question, does anyone know if the headphone amp in the 0404 could drive hd 580's?

Which card do you consider - 0404 PCI or 0404 USB ?
As I know, 0404 PCI doesn't have headphone out, so you can't connect headphones directly to it.

0404 USB has special headphone out, and as I read it has enough power to set very high volume on HD600 headphones.

 

[tracky]

There is a review of 0404 USB here:

http://www.digit-life.com/articles2/...-0404-usb.html

This is a quote from that review:

"The built-in headphones pre-amplifier has output impedance of 22 Ohm and max. output power of 20 milliwatt. Like mic pre-amplifiers, it's A-class, so it should be enough for the majority of popular headphones (though it's still not recommended to connect those super low-Ohm ones with impedance below 22 Ohm). Note that the headphone signal is produced by the primary DAC, not a separate lower-quality one, like they do it in some interfaces.

The 0404 USB amplifier did perfectly well with both high-Ohm Sennheiser HD580 and budget low-Ohm AKG K44. We could find no evident differences, comparing it to the amplifier of Mackie BigKnob. High-quality amplifiers of both devices do not cause signal distortion. Just note the higher power potential of BigKnob."