I was using an Asus Xonar D2 in my last PC, but ever since that died (the sound card, not the PC) I've been using onboard sound again, current one is a Realtek ALC1220, not that it matters though 99% of my listening on my modern PC goes through spdif to my receiver anyways nowadays.

I use a Chinese knock off that happens to by some sheer chance, use a actual legit CMI8738 chip on it.

The bridge chip used doesn't interfere with the OPL registers either.

I use a Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium PCIe.

Mostly because it has optical in/out, but it also seems to provide slightly clearer playback than my on-board audio.

Fiio E10K Olympus on i9 machine
Sound Blaster X-FI Titanium in a PCI Express slot using a PLX PCI Express - PCI bridge adapter board on old Xeon X5675 machine

I have a spare X-Fi Titanium I would prefer to use in the i9, but I would need another PCI bridge adapter with a PLX chip . I do not trust Asmedia ASM1083 based PCI PCI Express boards because you never know if you are going to get an an older, buggy chip rev .

EDIT : corrected typos

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2020-04-13, 17:23:

I use a Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium PCIe.

Mostly because it has optical in/out, but it also seems to provide slightly clearer playback than my on-board audio.

I use the optical out to my A/V receiver too. I use to watch live concerts from my PC to TV.
But now there is internet channels on my smart TV.

https://us.creative.com/p/sound-blaster/sound … usic-premium-hd
Sound Blaster X-Fi HD.

+ Headphone out and software volume knob I can place next to me.
+ SPDIF input.
+ Flawless sound quality to my ears (not an audiophile though).
- No 44khz support.
- Volume knob is finicky when doing large adjustments quickly.
- No support for any 5.1 virtualization for headphones (X-Fi MB3 works but not included).
- Drivers on Windows Update are bad (manufacturer drivers are good).
- Volume control scaling is bad (fixable with a script of course).

Sound Blaster ZxR.

In the most modern pc that I have, I use one, Axus Xonar 7.1

Schiit Modi USB DAC. I'm a big fan of USB DACs. When I first built this machine I couldn't use my X-fi anymore (no PCI slots) and even though you always read about onboard audio being "good enough" now, it was horribly noisy. A USB DAC fixes that and what I especially like is that it doesn't need any drivers, freeing me from Realtek crap or huge suites from Creative.

Sound Blaster X-fi Xtreme Gamer.

Just like Joseph_Joestar, I'm also using Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium PCIe. Not only is one of the last Creative cards to have optical input, it's still supported under Windows 10, but it's also the last Sound Blaster which supports soundfonts.

http://www.bredel.homepage.t-online.de/Soundf … ts-english.html

VIA VT1708B

UCyborg wrote on 2020-04-14, 16:33:

VIA VT1708B

I'll bite. On what card is that chip ?

Intel486dx33 wrote on 2020-04-13, 16:24:

I am still using the Sound Blaster Audigy 2zs
But I want to try the latest sound blaster some day.

I also use my Audigy 2 ZS - again. My computer is not the newest (AMD FX cpu), the board has still 2 pci-slots
I removed the card several years ago, when I switched to Windows 10.

But some months ago, I read somewhere, that it still works without any problem in Windows 10 (with official creative drivers), you just have to take the driver from another - newer sound card (forgot which one)
So I put it back in, and it works. It's better than the onboard sound in my opinion

Really??! I have been using the on-board audio since the Pentium III days, from AC97 to HD Audio. And, that's it. 😜 Never spend a dime on sound card anymore.

xonar dx optical out to schiit uber bifrost dac

curious for what reasons people use sound cards for digital output, the only reason I got the Xonar D2 was because my onboard sound back then did not support DTS connect.

imi wrote on 2020-04-14, 20:52:

curious for what reasons people use sound cards for digital output, the only reason I got the Xonar D2 was because my onboard sound back then did not support DTS connect.

Exactly, good question. My guess is that most people don't know that when you only use the digital out, except from some very few exceptions, it doesn't matter if you use the output of the onboard chip or that of a much more expensive card.
So that I'm not completely off topic, I use a Pro-Ject DAC because I needed a direct analog connection to a nice pair of studio monitors that lack digital input.

I'm using HT Omega Claro Halo XT sound card with swappable OP Amps (LME 49990 right now) in my main rig. And small DACs with my HTPCs for headphone listening(Audioquest Dragonfly).