Hello,
I have been using this card close to two years. I game with it 99% of the time and then listen to music with it the other 1% haha. I was wondering if upgrading the amps as mentioned above will make the sound better? I have this card paired with AKG Q701 headphone. I am wanting a tighter bass. I did the mod on the headphones by removing the sticker inside the cans. Would I notice a difference by upgrading the op amps? Also if so how many do I need and I am assuming they are solder only or are they removable without solder?
Did you disable the motherboard's on-board audio, in the BIOS, when you installed the Essence STX card?
Have you tried the Unified Xonar Drivers?
http://maxedtech.com/asus-xonar-unified-drivers/
The STX comes with 3 dual channel op-amps in 3 slots.
The stock op-amps are just pushed into the slots, no soldering needed
Two JRC2114 op-amps in the I/V (DIP-8) slots, which are used for the headphones and line-outputs (RCA jacks)
One LM4562 op-amp in the buffer (DIP-8) slot, which is used for line-output (RCA) only.
So all three op-amps are used when the STX is set for line-output (speaker) and just the two I/V are used when the STX is set for headphone output.
Replacing the two JRC2114 with two LME49720NA ($4 each?) is one of the cheaper way for trying to improve audio quality.
Not sure what op-amps can be used to improve the bass
Some op-amps are dual channel (DIP-8) and some are single channel (SOIC).
The JCR2114, LM4652, LME4920NA are all dual channel op-amps
So to use the SOIC op-amps, two SOIC op-amps need to be soldered to a Dual SOIC to DIP-8 adapter.
Once the two single channel op-amps are soldered onto the adapter, the adapter can be just pushed into the slots on the STX.
You might consider replacing the AKG Q701, with the (Massdrop) AKG K7XX headphones, for more (better?) bass.