I meant the headphone amps I was looking at don't have digital inputs only rca in, so I was wondering if an optical or SPDIF to rca cable would transmit the digital DSP/surround from the sound card to the DAC/amp or whether it had to be a pure digital link between the two... I was thinking of more a toslink to rca cable if they exist as not a lot of sound cards have coaxial output...
First off, optical
is SPDIF, the other being RCA 75ohm coaxial.
Second, there is no such thing as an SPDIF to RCA analogue cable. It needs to have a DAC chip at least somewhere in that path to change it back to analogue, plus an SPDIF receiver chip to receive the signal and hand it over to the DAC. It's not like USB receiver chips like the PCM270x series that have a 16bit/44.1khz DAC built in.
You're going to have a to use a DAC anyway, so you might as well get a good DAC or a DAC-HPamp. Or just get a soundcard with a decent analog FL-FR line output (ie one of the speaker outputs, the other two being RL-RR and Center-Sub) so you can hook up a 3.5mm to RCA cable.
If you are using the the soundcard purely for the DSP does that necessarily mean you have to get the cheapest card? Obviously the cards all have various DSP features and software and I would assume you would want to buy the sort of DSP qualities you are looking for... Obviously if you are planning to send the digital out from the soundcard to a separate DAC/HP amp then I can understand you don't need a card with the highest quality DAC and headphone amplifier etc, but perhaps other qualities are important for the digital signal you sending to the DAC, like DSP features, software control and I am not certain but maybe capacitors and other board components affect the digital signal being sent...
No, you do
not absolutely have to use the cheapest card. But the reason I'm going for the cheapest card is because the DSP features don't really differ much. You can look into the Xonar U3 and compare its DSP features vs the Strix Soar and they'd have basically the same features, and in my case I only really use virtual surround and related tuning like room size simulator settings for it. The Soar uses a newer virtual surround program but isolate everything else on each, ie, use SPDIF optical output, and it's hard to tell the difference. You might as well spend the price difference on the DAC and HPamp or DAC-HPamp.
On that basis would a card like the Soundblaster Z be overkill for pairing with a DAC/HP amp? It has some of the best gaming DSP features compared to lower SB cards but also (from what I've read) has a decent DAC and HP amp that may be wasteful bypassing with a separate DAC/amp? If the DSP features are good enough I would happy to eventually bypass to a more premium DAC/amp and at least I would have a decent soundcard until a premium DAC/Hp amp was viable? Thoughts?
Cards below the Soundblaster Z don't appear to have quite the same level of DSP features and some of the lower priced ones are external which might look odd paired to a DAC/amp... Another option was the SB Audigy RX but from what I have read use quite old tech. Another option is something like Asus Strix Soar but most people still prefer Soundblaster...
Well if you're so convinced they're better and can pony up the dough for the soundcard plus a DAC-HPamp or DAC and HPamp, then no problem. I'm just going for the cheaper cards so you can redirect the funds to the downstream components. Otherwise, just use the 3.5mm analogue FL-FR output on the SBZ or whatever card direct to an amp instead of trying to look for things that don't exist (like a cable that works as a DAC) or getting a cheap DAC. Just double check to make sure that headphone virtual surround audio can be sent out of that port.
Cards below the Soundblaster Z don't appear to have quite the same level of DSP features and some of the lower priced ones are external which might look odd paired to a DAC/amp... Another option was the SB Audigy RX but from what I have read use quite old tech. Another option is something like Asus Strix Soar but most people still prefer Soundblaster...
