[jlo mein]

So i was flipping through a local computer paper and it shows an ad of Aopen's new like of motherboards: with tube audio sound cards.

???? is this a gimmick? it only has one tube on the board, and its an onboard audio enhancement as well (not stand alone). They claim that they use Cardas and Kimber cables to "further improve the refined sound".

I am very doubtful that this is actually an "audiofile grade motherboard"...some of the things that point to this:

-only 1 tube
-has a ring of gimmicky blue LED's around the tube to look at
-this is not a sound card, but onboard audio
-Aopen isn't exactly a high end computer part manufacturer

is my intuition decieving me?

EDIT: i totally meant to post this in the lounge forum, and i thought i did, but for some reason its in the headphone forum...

 

[radrd]

Looks pretty crappy to me:
http://www.neoseeker.com/Hardware/Pr...e/reviews.html

From the Digit Life review:

The motherboard with the tube hasn't passed the tests with the Sennheiser HD600 headphones. In spite of the dedicated 1/4" connector for the headphones the output stage is probably unable to playback without reloading. The sound cracked at any volume level.

I'll pass.

Then again, from the Active Hardware review...

Music is reproduced with crystal clear quality, and with a level of detail that made my eyes moist as I was brought back the days of my very first vacuum-tube based amps some 30 years ago. While that probably betrays my age, I'm not ashamed to say that my experience with all things electronic stretches back as far as times when the vacuum-tube reigned supreme.

Though I prefer to keep my motherboard moisture free.

I'm inclined to believe Digit Life, and I wouldn't buy this mobo anyway. I prefer having all of my PCI slots and listening to music through a source other than my pc, but that's just me.

 

[Flasken]

'nuff said

 

[bioxeed]

garbage in, garbage out

while the tube amp on it might be half decent it's just some AC'97 codec on there.. not exactly a high quality source that..

 

[bangraman]

So how does one overclock a tube, exactly? Bigger heaters? More fans?

 

[wallijonn]

guess i'll make some money selling tube retainer clips