USB Sound Card

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neilneil

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Aug 7, 2014
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Hi am thinking of buying the ASUS Xonar U7 for the sole purpose of listening to youtube music via an external amp and speakers i.e not via headphones.
I currently connect the amp to the headphone jack of the laptop.
My question is will the U7 give me better sound quality by connecting the amp to the U7's inputs and secondly will the U7 pump out more volume in comparison to having the laptop's audio set at 100%.

thanks
 
Solution
photonboy
http://www.hardwarecanucks.com/forum/hardware-canucks-reviews/66186-asus-xonar-u7-7-1-usb-sound-card-review-6.html

Other:
1) The quality heavily depends on the quality of the SOURCE material and SPEAKERS as mentioned.

2) VOLUME:
Impossible to answer from here. Your volume issue might easily be that your amplifier or speakers are too weak though if they are working with another input that is likely not be your issue. It's also important to note that pushing an amplifier (including laptop) or speakers outside their nominal working rage can cause signal distortion.

My M-Audio AV40 desktop speakers are really, really loud and clear when i attach them to a laptop output. At 50% volume from my dad's laptop even his crappy $10 speakers at...
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photonboy

photonboy

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Jun 20, 2006
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http://www.hardwarecanucks.com/forum/hardware-canucks-reviews/66186-asus-xonar-u7-7-1-usb-sound-card-review-6.html

Other:
1) The quality heavily depends on the quality of the SOURCE material and SPEAKERS as mentioned.

2) VOLUME:
Impossible to answer from here. Your volume issue might easily be that your amplifier or speakers are too weak though if they are working with another input that is likely not be your issue. It's also important to note that pushing an amplifier (including laptop) or speakers outside their nominal working rage can cause signal distortion.

My M-Audio AV40 desktop speakers are really, really loud and clear when i attach them to a laptop output. At 50% volume from my dad's laptop even his crappy $10 speakers at 80% volume are more than loud enough (though the quality sucks).

3) You also need to ensure that the laptop output is setup properly. For example, the HEADPHONE setting may be a lot lower than the stereo setting though I haven't tested this much. You MAY even be on a Surround setting. Possibly there's even an issue with how you have it connected as an INPUT device. Often it's a 3.5mm to RCA cable input as an AUXILIARY input but that varies.

SUMMARY:
I think the ASUS Xonar U7 is an excellent device, however I think you probably have another issue somewhere that you need to sort out and it may even solve your problem.

Using the HALF SPLIT method, it's either a problem going INTO your external speaker setup, or a problem coming OUT of your laptop. In my opinion there is a problem.
 
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Solution
hang-the-9

hang-the-9

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Mar 25, 2010
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First, YouTube music is not good enough quality to warrant an external amp or a good sound card.

If you don't have the speakers and amp yet, I would second the above M-Audio speaker suggestion. They are very good for music (unless you want to shake the house with bass), better than just about any smaller speaker and for sure one of the best in that price range. Either the 30 or 40 series are good. You don't have to worry about a good soundcard unless you are listening to high quality audio (MP3 in 192 bits or higher for example).
 
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neilneil

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Hi and thank you both for your replies.

I already have the amp and speakers and the sound quality and volume are ok however would the U7 not improve sound clarity with it's high SNR (compared to a laptop) despite the poor YOUTUBE source quality?
Also with the volume issue was just wondering if the U7 would avoid the need to boost up the amp volume to compensate for the lack of boost from the laptop?

regards, the advice is appreciated.
 
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thee_prisoner

thee_prisoner

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If your laptop audio is severely lacking, I bet 94% of people can't tell the difference between 90 SNR(guessing on the laptop SNR) and 114 SNR. If you feel the need to buy an external sound card, this one(Creative USB) would be cheaper and about as good. The sound card will give you more EQ options and extra.

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B0044DEDCA

And to repeat what "Photon" said it just could be your settings/configuration. Also it would help to know what laptop you are using because their maybe some free software to help boost the signal(volume) from your laptop.

 
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neilneil

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Aug 7, 2014
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4,510


 
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neilneil

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Aug 7, 2014
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hi and thanks for the advice. The laptop I use is an ACER Aspire A5-571, so if there's anything I can do to improve what it puts out I'd love to know.

regards
 
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hang-the-9

hang-the-9

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Mar 25, 2010
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You will not be able to tell the difference between the onboard audio and a sound card with YouTube, or any compressed audio that is under CD quality, which is about 192k for MP3 files. The laptop may have a bad sound card or maybe just a noisy or poorly shielded jack, in which case an external sound card would help. If you don't care spending the money to try it, try it. I've used several very good speakers with my computers, all have onboard sound, and the biggest difference in the sound quality between them and regular stereos has been the speakers used. Good speakers and amp/preamp = good sound.

The low sound that you may have to the amp also depends on what input you use on the amp. There are Line In and also specialized inputs like for Phono. You'd want to use the Line In ports on the amp and a Line Out on the computer for best results.
 
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