[Ghostdivision]

I am no audiophile by any stretch of the imagination however i have a good selection of flac on my pc, i either listen to it through spdif to my denon 3311 avr, or i use headphones quite often.
 
I am not willing to spend alot, so I purchased an X-fi forte, it works perfectly (i had auzentech fix the buzzing). But recently a freind asked how much i spent on it, and I told him 130, and he said for that price why didnt you get an audinst mx-1 usb external dac, and i said I assumed they were hundreds of dollars, i had only looked at nuforce maybe a year or two ago. 
 
So my question basically is im looking at headphones in the 80 dollar range, and was looking at maybe buying an audist MX-1, Im just curious if this is a good idea, or Im wasting my money if im not an audiophile, my hearing is excellent but i never have compared dacs.
 
I realize this is a tough question to answer, I would just appreciate some input.

 

[Snag1e]

I would spend the extra $130 + the initial $80 all on the headphones, and keep using the X-FI if I was you. You will get more bang for the buck that way IMO.

 

[Head Injury]

Soundcards are no worse than external DACs in most cases. They won't all have powerful amps, but you don't need as much power for most headphones as everyone wants to think.
 
At least 90% of your sound comes from the headphones. Most competent DACs will sound the same, most competent amps will sound the same if they're a good match for the headphones. Spend the majority of your budget on headphones.

 

[Ghostdivision]

Thank you very much for your replies.
 
I use the forte only for headphones and spdif output bitstreaming to my avr which should make no difference when bitstreaming.

But here is what he said about the headphones but it has left me confused.

"Who is a potential buyer of this card? Although the Auzen X-Fi Forte 7.1 does not look like an indisputable leader in terms of quality in its price sector ($150 if purchased from the Auzentech website), it might entice you with the numerous advantages over opponents, the most important of which is the top-quality headphones amplifier. Moreover, if your system case connectors comply with the HDA standard, the card enables the appropriate driver mode and turns off the line outputs automatically as soon as you plug your headphones in. Coupled with the full-featured audio processor X-Fi, this makes the Auzen Forte a perfect choice for gamers and a worthy opponent to the Creative X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Edition.

As for music reproduction, you can correct it to your own taste by replacing the opamp with one of the adapters offered by Auzentech or with an LM6172."



First he says its a top quality headphone amp, but then he says you should repleace the opamp? Isnt that the same thing?

 

[Ghostdivision]

I am also looking at a bit better headphones now based on advice the 

Audio-Technica ATH-M50 I dont know if I would have any problems with these and the forte headphone output?

 

[Snag1e]

The M50s are good headphones for the price, and they are easily driven. They would work great from the fortes headphone jack. =]