[dex85]

maybe they are hesitant to use drivers that come outside of card's manufacturer; which was my case too 

  these drivers are a real deal though, Asus should pay the guy for doing their job
 
just in case you're not familiar with this and for the sake of your ears and headphones: when using ASIO you can't change the volume in Xonar Audio Center. even if you set the volume knob to 1%, it will still output 100%. i guess ASUS did this to preserve bit-perfect output. so if you are using headphone output of the card, you have to change the volume in foobar with ASIO output

 

[serious7]

Quote:

maybe they are hesitant to use drivers that come outside of card's manufacturer; which was my case too 

  these drivers are a real deal though, Asus should pay the guy for doing their job
 
just in case you're not familiar with this and for the sake of your ears and headphones: when using ASIO you can't change the volume in Xonar Audio Center. even if you set the volume knob to 1%, it will still output 100%. i guess ASUS did this to preserve bit-perfect output. so if you are using headphone output of the card, you have to change the volume in foobar with ASIO output

thanks for the heads up i shall try it today when i get back from work.

Do you have msn by any chance? It'd be so much easier to co-ordinate with these things via instant chat...
 

 

[dex85]

sorry, i'm not using any instant messanger. i used to have an ICQ account, but i don't even remember what my login and password is now. anyway, if you any questions feel free to ask. remember to uninstall the old drivers first.
 
it's 11pm here, i'm going to call it a day. i'm sure drivers will work for you too.  good luck 

 

[mrnoodle]

Try checking your DPC latency guys.
http://brainbit.wordpress.com/2010/08/08/the-case-of-dpc-latency-part-1/

 

[dex85]

my DPC latency is floating around 400us when i use foobar and bunch of other programs. occasionally it peaks at 1000us. programs says my machine should handle audio/video streaming without dropouts, so i guess i'm safe. so far i noticed just one pop with new drivers, when i started a web browser.

 

[serious7]

Quote:

my DPC latency is floating around 400us when i use foobar and bunch of other programs. occasionally it peaks at 1000us. programs says my machine should handle audio/video streaming without dropouts, so i guess i'm safe. so far i noticed just one pop with new drivers, when i started a web browser.

I haven't instaleld them yet as I didn't have time. Today though I shall

. How's the new driver's coming along?
 

 

[dex85]

great, no complaints so far 

 

[serious7]

Quote:

great, no complaints so far 

I installed the unified driers. I still get pops in Windows Media Player and in Foobar Wasapi exactly like how I got them using the official drivers. Whenever I change songs that start off strong right in the beginning or whenever i use youtube while in wasapi (because video wants to output a sound but is blocked). I'm seriously wondering now What is wrong. The pops are so painful.

help
 
Rig:
 
core i7-920
evga gtx 280
evga 3x sli-le
 
I'm using Hd 650 straight from the headphone out jack. 

 

[dex85]

did you try ASIO? try to check your DPC latency with program that mrnoodle posted. i just tried a headphone output of the card and WASAPI and i'm not experiencing any pops when changing songs. 

 

[serious7]

Quote:

did you try ASIO? try to check your DPC latency with program that mrnoodle posted. i just tried a headphone output of the card and WASAPI and i'm not experiencing any pops when changing songs. 

Have not tried ASIO as I am not sure how. DPC shows average 90 micro seconds. Absolute maximum is 390 micro seconds. changing songs still show pops. No spikes in DPC it would stay consistantly  from 76-118. Why does it not work for me

 
To be more descriptive of the pops. When I refresh a youtube video it will POP in the begining. When I change to a different youtube it will POP in the beginning. When I close the browser it will POP. If I change songs in foobar it will pop but it would not hurt as much as the pops youtube causes.All of this occurs in WASAPI. 
 
When Wasapi is not being used (windows media player) I feel pops randomly when I change songs not always. Youtube does not cause any pops. 
 
WHen not in Wasapi none of this occurs. 
 
I have tried asio and it just crashed before I was able to do anything with it. I got an error on foobar and now i cannot change the settings for asio in xonar essence program. Morevoer asio doesn't show up as an output in foobar either. 
 
Update: I have just reverted back to the official drivers and it seems to work with no pops.

no pops when changing songs no pops when going to use youtube!!!!

 
DPC now is averaging aroudn 32 micro seconds too. It seems WASAPI although is a successor to ASIO is pure and utterly crap. lol. 
 
May I know what your buffer length is and whether you have dither enabled? Also are you using 24 or 32 bit ? Also what is your latency set to? 
 
Do you receive this error by any chance?
 
 
An error occured while querying "Xonar Essence STX bit-perfect ASIO driver (beta)" driver. Please stop ASIO playback and shut down any other software using ASIO.
Additional info: Initializing ASIO driver failed
 

 

[serious7]

bump

 

[mrnoodle]

 
Quote:

 
May I know what your buffer length is and whether you have dither enabled? Also are you using 24 or 32 bit ? Also what is your latency set to? 
 

http://wiki.hydrogenaudio.org/index.php?title=Foobar2000redirect:A9038870-DC08-431D-8C91-3B4E41D2436D
 
Oxygen HD chip is internally 32 bit but it's not actually implemented in sound card as DAC/ADC chips are limited to 24 bit.
You'll not encounter 32 bit audio so I don't see any reason to set it at 32.
I think Dither has to do with playing high bit width file in lower bit width. If you set it to 24 bit, you won't need to worry about dithering
since highest you'll encounter is 24 bit audio. I think playing low bit width audio at higher bid width is just stuffing it with zeros so It won't
actually change the value as it represent amplitude of audio wave.

 

[dex85]

i don't know why you can't get ASIO working. i get that message with official drivers only when there are other sources of sound playing prior to foobar's start. with unified drivers i don't get that message anymore and i can start foobar and play a song while there is a youtube video going on. youtube's sound will stop after i hit the play in foobar. try to update your ASIO plugin in foobar and make sure there are no sources of sound present when you start foobar.

 

[serious7]

Quote:

i don't know why you can't get ASIO working. i get that message with official drivers only when there are other sources of sound playing prior to foobar's start. with unified drivers i don't get that message anymore and i can start foobar and play a song while there is a youtube video going on. youtube's sound will stop after i hit the play in foobar. try to update your ASIO plugin in foobar and make sure there are no sources of sound present when you start foobar.

It works perfectly.

No pops whatsoever. I am using official drivers now and using ASIO and it works perfect. What is your buffer length value? ALso, have you customized foobar? I would like some help customizing it and I've been searching around google all night and was not able to customize it in any way successfuly

. 

 

[germanium]

 
Quote:

Hey
 
I'm just going to list my issues in a list to help speed responses and to stay on topic. 
 
 
1. When I press pause and then play I hear a loud pop and it is very discomforting to my ears.
2. When I change  analog out from something like headphone to speaker or vice versa I hear a click from the sound card itself. It freaked me out the first time it happened and it happens every time. Is that normal?
3. I use Hd 650 straight from the asus xonar essence stx headphone output. Should I use High Gain or Extra High Gain? I have seen two threads related to this information. On the xonar essence stx tweaks page it says to put extra high gain for HD 650. On another thread, people said to put it on just High Gain. I am afraid of damaging my headphones because the control panel says it will cause over driving. What is over driving? Will it damage my headphones? What is the most ideal safe setting for me? Please enlighten me.

I tried to search over driving on Google and the only hits I get is "is it save to drive wearing headphones" it seems to neglect the word "over"......
4. This is my very first setup and I am VERY pleased with it. I have left HF on and disabled everything else and have been only using High Gain ( would use Extra High gain if someone can confirm it is safe for my headphones). What other options should I do change in the audio center to improve quality and performance? What other pieces of software should I use in conjuction with xonar audio center? I currently am using only windows media player. Have not tried Foobar yet. 
 
5. I see people complaining about Wasabi and Asio or something. What are they and are they useful for me?
 

1. this first one may be due to the program you are using. I don't get that with windows media player but do with J River media center.
 
2. That click & pop is perfectly normal from these cards
 
3. High volume on low impedance phones with gain setting at its highest can damage the phones. Volume may even be sufficient to damage high impedance phones if left at high vomlume levels too long & may even damage your hearing if played at those volumes for any length of time. Many people here assume that the actual gain of the amp is being altered by the way. This is simply not true, the gain of the amp is fixed in hardware to +12db relative to the line out. The only thing that the gain selector does is limits the max volume by dropping the highest 1-3 bits digitally. Note that the 0db gain in the gain adjustment is actually 6db softer than the gain of the line out The only matching gain available from the headphone amp is through the front panel line out which incidently actually uses the headphone amp. I can tell by measuring the D.C. offset as well as there being no solinoid swiching sounds when switching through the various front panel gain settings or swiching from front panel headphone to front panel line out.
 
 4. it is safe as long as you use reasonable volume levels that are safe for your hearing. Your settings seem good. I would not however use the bit perfect ASIO drivers if using the internal headphone amp to power your phones as any program that uses these drivers  I.E. Foobar, J. River Media Center & such you will not have any volume control available & if headphone amp is set to the highest gain, I can just see it now, poof goes you headphones.
 
5. If just using Windows Media Player they are of no use. If using Foobar or J. River Media Center they do work. Wasapi prevents other programs from interfereing with the listener experience & some feel it offers better sound. It also retains the ability to control the volume. Bit perfect ASIO drivers ensure no alteration of the bits being sent to the soundcards DACs but disables any on board or software volume controls so you will need an external analog volume control to use this driver feature. Do not use the bit perfect ASIO drivers if using the on board headphone amp to power your phones directly as you will have no volume control.