[Glfi]

Hi all, my first post!

I have a computer with Grado SR-80 headhpones, i'm going to listen music in FLAC and at least 192kbps MP3.

Does anyone have advice should i buy M-Audio Audiophile 192 or trying to find an used Auzentech X-Meridian soundcard.

I just want to listen high quality (stereo) music from my Grado's, which of the two should i consider??

Miika

 

[joe_cool]

You may want to look for a sound card that will drive your headphones directly, that is without an extra headphone amp. I don't think the X-Meridian nor AP192 will do this very well.
I understand the EMU 0404 USB is a good device but more complicated than you need for playback only.

 

[ROBSCIX]

IIRC, the Grado SR 80's are only 32 ohm impedance so they chould be driven quite nicely form a normal soundcard. Some may want a can amplifier for other reasons but either card should have no trouble driving your SR80's. THe X-Meridian 7.1 is a very nice sounding consumer card with many features for surround and headphones. The AP card are production cards and won't have many features for headphones or speakers.
You can change the opamp in the XM though to tailor the response or improve the sound quality with a better opamp.

 

[nightfire]

Well, I've gone through a few AP/192's and I have to say... while I want to love them, I just can't. I've used them to drive my Lavry (and the S/PDIF is stable and does a good job), and in my studio. The problem is they're unreliable, and they won't honour their warranty (especially if you buy it from a 3rd party). I had to pay $40 to get a replacement from them, 2 months after I bought mine, and the replacement had an even worse problem (buzzing noise on inputs). They require firmware to be loaded on each startup, which can fail randomly and make it frustrating to use. Drivers suck.

Having said that I just bought an M-Audio Fast Track Pro (yeah yeah.. never learn), and it is excellent. So maybe they've come around. It does not require firmware each plug-in and shows up as a real USB sound card right away.

If you're just looking for a simple audio out, actually I'd recommend the Transit. Also requires firmware, but the drivers seem to be better about it. It mostly "just works" and sounds excellent, though the amp is not that strong. It's cheap though. so you could pick up an amp afterwards if it leaves you disappointed.

 

[Glfi]

Ok, i need to know which one of these will produce higher quality sound. If someone has heard both of them and could give an opinion. I have heard X-Meridian but not AP192, could get AP192 here in Finland about 160€ and that's about 230$.

 

[nightfire]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Glfi /img/forum/go_quote.gif Ok, i need to know which one of these will produce higher quality sound. If someone has heard both of them and could give an opinion. I have heard X-Meridian but not AP192, could get AP192 here in Finland about 160€ and that's about 230$.

Well, they're both presumably opamp based so you're not going to hear anything special out of either of them. Sorry.. I know that doesn't answer your question well. But I really think you'd be better off buying a cheaper, smaller sound card and an amp.

I suspect the biggest difference you'd hear at this level is with regards to resampling; the AP/192 does support direct 44.1khz out (both 1/4" and through S/PDIF) if you use ASIO (under Windows) or Linux. I don't know about the X-Meridian but I would assume it does as well. If not, however, the AP/192 would be clearly superior.

Edit: I just realized the X-Meridian is PCI. I would definitely recommend an external USB sound card over that. PCs are noisy and it's difficult to get away from that without optoisolators and external power supplies (like the AP/192 uses). So, having never heard the X-Meridian, I'd still bias in favor of the AP/192 for that reason.

Also, from a practicality standpoint, your next system might not even have standard PCI, but USB isn't going anywhere for a long time.

 

[Glfi]

Thanks for the info, i'll look into that. X-Meridian can do ASIO and 44,1Khz. X-Meridian also has better DAC's than AP192, and X-Meridian has user-swappable operational amplifiers. Not sure about OPAMPS, which one has better ones at stock.

 

[pompon]

X-Meridian do 24 bits or 32 bits asio or kernel streaming.

You will not having any noise issue with X-merdian ... don't forget to put LM4562 as opamp .. it's far better.

The only issue is the driver ... this soundcard is not in production anymore and the latest driver don't give as good sound as the beta I am using.

 

[Glfi]

Yes, i think i have made my decision now, and it's the X-Meridian. Where did you get the beta drivers?

 

[smuh]

Give the M-Audio Audiophile USB a try. Can you be found relatively cheap used and comes with a good build in amp.

 

[larryminator]

Get an Onkyo SE200PCI LTD like I did.