[babypsycho]

I currently own a DacMagic and im running Prelude as source output into DacMagic
 
 
I am planning to upgrade my Prelude to Xonar ST. Will that be an improvement to my music or will they be the same? Anyone tested this?

 

[Amatsu]

Why aren't you using the DacMagic as a source? Isn't it good?

 

[babypsycho]

I tried it via usb and it's not as good as Prelude optical out to DacMagic. From what I read up, they say the usb on the DacMagic is not good as well.

 

[Amatsu]

But if you're using the digital out from the soundcard, you're not really using the soundcard at all, you'd need to go analog for that, but then the DacMagic would be useless. If your motherboard has a digital out, use that instead and sell the soundcard, otherwise I see no point in changing the soundcard if you are using the DacMagic.

 

[babypsycho]

Cool. Thanks for your input.
I just thought that soundcard does 24bit instead of mobo's 16bit. Do they not matter since DacMagic upsamples them to 24/192?

 

[Amatsu]

Well, the 24bit/192 output may be one of the few advantage of the soundcard, but whether you want to spend 100$+ just for that it's up to you since most people say there's no difference at all between 16 and 24 bits and most of the songs are 44khz anyway. Another option is selling the DacMagic and stick with a soundcard, but if you have other systems like consoles, dvd players...the multiple inputs on the DacMagic are very handy.

 

[babypsycho]

By the way, am I connecting Dac the right way? I'm running optical out from my soundcard into the Dac and optical into a receiver. Should I be using analog in instead?

 

[Amatsu]

If you are using a receiver to amplify the headphones or speakers, you should use the analog out from the DacMagic to the analog in of the receiver. If you use the optical out from the DacMagic, it will be the receiver that decodes the final signal not the DacMagic.

 

[babypsycho]

Just tested this and they don't make a big enough difference for me to hear. Does that means I'm doing something wrong?