[Theodore]

You would look at Asus H6 card,which is a "sister" card to the ST,making it possible to send Dolby signals to the speakers.

 

[PurpleAngel]

There is a new Asus sound card coming out called the ROG.
Native PCI-Express C-Media CM8888HD audio processor.
Analog 5.1 or 7.1 speaker support.
Looks like it's targeted towards the gamer crowd.
Also comes with a Realtek chip on it.

 

[Heimdallr]

Quote:

Did you remember to disable your onboard sound device in your BIO, and uninstall any drivers from other sound devices and cards?
 

Yes, actually it was a fresh windows install so the driver of onboard card were never installed and i disabled it in the UEFI.
I've tryied different RCA cables but it's not working very well, the worst moments are when i start a game, i get a very audible noise from both speakers, hopefully tomorrow should arrive my new headphones so i can check if it's a problem only related to the RCA output or both.
 
EDIT: i can hear the same noise also if the driver are uninstalled (i was going to try uni xonar drivers)

 

[PelPix]

You plugged in the external power supply, right?

 

[Psyside]

 
 
 
hey guys, i  just installed the card, and when i pressed the installation exe for the drivers, this is what i get, is this normal?
 

 

[PurpleAngel]

Quote:

 
Hey guys, i  just installed the card, and when i pressed the installation exe for the drivers, this is what i get, is this normal?

The card must think you do not have the internal power connection to the Essence STX hooked up.
 
 
 

 

[Psyside]

Ye i understand that, thanks for the answer, but is this normal promt? i mean did you guys get this when you where installing the card drivers?
 
Also what exe to run? i get this,
 

 

 
Which one is the correct, and thats the difference?

 

[Psyside]

Is it safe to use the line out or left right for Headphones? im using HD595, and i'm not really satisfiled with the sound quallity coming from the HP out.
 
Maybe i need time to get used to this card, i just bought it 1 day ago, installed it 2 hours ago, and im really tired, maybe this is limiting factor in my judgment of the SQ from HP out, let me know if there is alternative to HP out.

 

[stv014]

Quote:

Is it safe to use the line out or left right for Headphones? im using HD595, and i'm not really satisfiled with the sound quallity coming from the HP out.
 
Maybe i need time to get used to this card, i just bought it 1 day ago, installed it 2 hours ago, and im really tired, maybe this is limiting factor in my judgment of the SQ from HP out, let me know if there is alternative to HP out.

I have answered this in the other thread. It will not damage the card or headphones, but you will get low quality and resonant bass, and limited power.
 

 

[fufula]

Quote:

Ye i understand that, thanks for the answer, but is this normal promt? i mean did you guys get this when you where installing the card drivers?
 
Also what exe to run? i get this,
 

 

 
Which one is the correct, and thats the difference?

1. Yes, I get this during every installation. It's just a reminder, nothing to worry about.
2. Run either, doesn't make a difference. I think the one outside the Win7 dir detects what version of Windows you're running and starts the correct setup.exe from one of the subdirectories. It's redundant in case of downloaded drivers, since they come in separate packages for each version of Windows.

 

[derbigpr]

I bought this card (well, ST) today....and after 2 hours of not being able to install the drivers because I was getting the "Please plug in the Asus Xonar ST card" error, I finally managed to get the older version of driver up.
 
Anyway, I have a couple of questions.  First of all, is there any point in using ASIO plug in's in Foobar2000?  When I use the plug in,  my sound card and all settings on it go automatically to highest volume, and I cant control volume in any way, which is completely stupid for people who have no external amplifier.  But the point is....does ASIO in Foobar actually improve sound quality if I use Windows 7? I read somewhere that it makes difference only in Win XP, but in Vista and 7 there's no need to use it?
 
Also, I see that Xonar ST has 2 volume controls.  One is the main dial in interface, and other volume control is in Mixer tab in the Xonar driver interface, for left and right side.  The one in Mixer tab was at 76/76 by default, but is there any reason for that? Should I leave it at 76 or dial it to 100% and use ONLY the main volume control? Does it affect the sound quality in any way?
 
Is it possible that card is not functioning properly even though I managed to install the drivers after I failed to do so for the first 50 times?
 
I'm asking all these questions because I'm not very satisfied with my card....first, for 2 hours I was almost sure it was broken, because it wasnt detected by my PC, no matter which PCI slot or power cable I used. I even took the shield off to see whether the op-amps are properly put inside. When I took the shield off, i saw fingerprints and dust on the inside of the shield, which is....weird. Maybe a used card?  Note that I bought it as new from a official Asus retailer. 
Anyway, I installed it using old drivers (the middle ones from asus website), which again, might or might not affect the overall performance.  And lastly, I'm hearing hissing noises in certain songs when using 8 channel setup with my headphones, which I used to have turned on by default on my D2X, but now I have to switch between 8 chan and 2 chan depending on the song I play, because some of them hiss in 8 chan mode.  All songs are flac's by the way.
 
The sound quality itself seems normal, I cant say it sounds broken, although I cant say I'm very impressed either. I'd have a very hard time determining which is which if I were to do a A-B test between D2X and ST, or am I just being slightly biased against it after I cursed every single thing at the card, and almost ended up smashing it into the wall....hm...
 
NOTE:  Using it with Sennheiser HD650,  in high gain (plenty loud at 40%) ,  or with Little Dot Mk5 using RCA outputs on card....which is a failure setup.  Little Dot is WAY too silent to run HD650's properly this way. Even when putting all volumes all the way up,  I still have to dial the Mk5 all the way up to 70% to get decent volume out of my 650's.

 

[germanium]

Quote:

 
Also, I see that Xonar ST has 2 volume controls.  One is the main dial in interface, and other volume control is in Mixer tab in the Xonar driver interface, for left and right side.  The one in Mixer tab was at 76/76 by default, but is there any reason for that? Should I leave it at 76 or dial it to 100% and use ONLY the main volume control? Does it affect the sound quality in any way?
 
 

Leave it at 76% or you will pay a huge price in sound quality. This card has a limiter that activates if you push it over 76%. It is fast clamp slower release type that will the sound to suddenly drop back after drum hits then ramp back up in about .5 seconds making a real disconcerting sound.
 

 

[fufula]

This 76% setting always puzzled me. From what I've seen, it seems it's not sound card dependent; it's what Windows defaults it to. In WinXP and Win7 (I'm guessing it covers Vista as well) the volume is in no way affected by this setting when outputting through ASIO, making ASIO considerably louder (and, by extension, probably seem better sounding to some) than KS or WASAPI both of which are affected by the volume control in question. Considering the above and what you said, should sound quality when outputting through ASIO always be worse than WASAPI?

 

[derbigpr]

Quote:

This 76% setting always puzzled me. From what I've seen, it seems it's not sound card dependent; it's what Windows defaults it to. In WinXP and Win7 (I'm guessing it covers Vista as well) the volume is in no way affected by this setting when outputting through ASIO, making ASIO considerably louder (and, by extension, probably seem better sounding to some) than KS or WASAPI both of which are affected by the volume control in question. Considering the above and what you said, should sound quality when outputting through ASIO always be worse than WASAPI?

 
I have no idea, but what is weird to me is how louder the sound overall gets when I increase the mixer volume from 76% to 100%. Its really huge difference in volume. 
I dont know....i remember reading on some other forum that it does affect the sound quality, because if you leave the mixer volume too low, then you have to crank up the built in headphone amp too loud, and if you leave the mixer volume too high, you will get clipping sometimes...that doesn't seem likely to me and sounds like bull, but as I said, my card sounds so suspiciously "unimpressive" that it makes me wonder whether some of the settings are wrong.

 

[audiofreak81]

Are there any op-amps that have come out within the last year that are better than 2x LME49860?