[silence]

Would like to buy a new portable cd-player but found out that even more expensive players like the panasonic 580 has a annoying hiss when playing music very low (as I normally do).

Will a headphone amp like the total airhead/airhead remove this hiss? When using the headphone out from my home cdplayer (onkyo 7222) I can get totally silence in the silent passages of my cds - this seems impossible on the portable players I have been listening to.

Will a headphone amp be able to remove the hiss from the output of my pc soundcard too?

My alternative is to buy another Onkyo to use at work.

... until then waiting in silence

 

[r4z0r]

Don't mean to disappoint you, but from experience, headphone amps will only make the hiss even more audible.. Bear in mind that the purpose of an amp is to increase the original source's strength, so everthing including the hiss will become louder when you listen through an amp.

 

[Audio-Me]

Answer to your 1 + 2 = 0, no.
Maybe your portables were just more revealing than the onkyo? Take into consideration that the hiss is actually part of the recording, this is true in many old recordings. In this cause "veiled" is a good thing. Either that or the pcdp has messed up analog stage.

 

[Joe Bloggs]

If your pcdp has a line out, try plugging in the phones to the line out to see if it hisses--if not, an external amp may be able to give you 'silent' output

 

[silence]

Thanks for the advices.

Just put a Terratec DMX Xfire 1024 in the computer - how there is absolutely now hiss in the headphones ... so maybe it´s time to get a pair of Etys and an amp... The sound of the Xfire is the best I have heard from my computer yet though too "clean and cold" to my taste - strings sound hard... but this might be due to my cheap headphones - Koss the plug which keeps out the background noise but absolutely isnt high-end

 

[NotoriousBIG_PJ]

Hey silence I'm getting my own dmx xfire 1024 today or tomorrow. What other cards can you compare it to soundwise? I'm upgrading from soundblaster live value, so hopefully I'm in for a treat

Biggie.

 

[Satori]

I haven't heard the Terratac but it is based on the same chip as the Fortissimo II (the CS 4624)which I have heard. Definately better sounding than the SB Live stuff. I would recommend its big brother (the CS 4630) found in the Game Theater XP, Santa Cruz and Sonic Fury.

The sound quality is very good, not quite as good as my old Acoustic Edge but Philips has never really come up with good drivers for it. Anyway, the Game Theater with the Blue Breakout box is pretty handy. RCA connectors for line out, 1/4" headphone and mic jacks, Toslink and SPDIF Digital in and Out, and supposed 6.1 sound with the newest drivers. I can't verify the last part though. I only have 2 2.1 sets hooked up to it.

 

[silence]

Only comparison is my old SB 1024 live card and the onboard AC97 chip (probably can´t be worse).
The sound is much better than my old SB (which worked fine on my old pentium III machine but made my new athlon machine with VIA 133A chipset crash every half hour).

The Terratec Xfire is half price (50$) of the santa cruz/ sonicfury in Denmark...

 

[pedxing]

Getting a good sound card is important. Creative is notorious for cracks, break-ups, and hissing. Their drivers are kinda buggy and cannot get the audio streaming correctly. The hiss is from cheap parts or bad designs or both. These annoyances can actually damage speakers because they create unnatural motor movements with the speaker drivers and diaphragm.

There was a big debate about hiss and removing hiss in a previous thread over a month ago. I doubt most people understood what was being discussed (ie: using neural nets and approximation analysis techniques to remove hiss). If you crank up the volume of the CD player and the hiss increases, you will need a filter to get rid of it. I have no idea where you can get a filter to do that. Your best bet is to find a better source.

However, if the hiss is constant no matter how loud you crank up the volume, you can actually mitigate the problem with a heaphone amp (this sounds ironic and oxymoron). Basically, you are using the amp to attenuate the signal. First, crank up the volume of the source really loud so the signal-to-noise ratio is high - getting more music than fuzz. Then use the headphone amp to attenuate the signal so you won't blow your ear drums. You will also gain the fidelity benefits of the headphone amp.

 

[Audio-Me]

For some insights on much better sound cards than the crap that creative labs puts out, check out my pc sound guide. http://head-fi.com/forums/showthread...hlight=HiFi+PC

 

[NotoriousBIG_PJ]

So seeing as I live in Canada, and the Turtle Beach Santa Cruz is cheaper here, I should have gotten that instead? Does it really matter which one I own? I will basically be using it for games out of crappy speakers, and using the headphone out to listen to new music before burning (creative hurts my ears grrrr).

Biggie.

 

[silence]

I have no idea what the Santa cruz sounds like. After playing a little with the EQ and 3D effects on the control panel of the Xfire I´m now fully satisfied with what I got for my money... I cant get my headphones off again - it´s a new situation. Next step will be better headphones and an amp which will also enjoy me at home

 

[xerx]

Santa Cruz probably give you the best sound you ever hear from a mid level consumer soundcard.

Just for a comparison, I think the Santa Cruz sound pretty flat when its played without the EQ, while Live sound to me is more to the dull side.