Are sound cards still needed today?

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ptrthgr8

ptrthgr8

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Oct 17, 2014
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Hi, all.

I'm in the process of upgrading my ~5 year old machine and I'm going from an ASUS Rampage III Extreme to an ASRock Fatal1ty Gaming Z170 K4. My current build with the ASUS mobo also incorporates an X-Fi Ti Fatal1ty sound card. Is the audio capability of the new ASRock mobo as good or better than the Fatal1ty sound card? Or would I be better off using that sound card in the new build (or just buying a new one anyhow)?

I don't do any music editing/production and only use the sound on the machine for gaming and occasionally listening to music, if that makes any difference.

Thanks!
 
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The Logitech G930 USB should appear to your computer as it's own sound device so it wouldn't use your sound card if you had one.

You won't be hearing the difference in a sound card or your on-board with the Genius speakers.

Realtek audio codec chips are really quite capable these days. I wouldn't worry about the DTS Connect or 7.1 HD as you're clearly not using them. However, it does mean that you have the option to upgrade the equipment outside of your machine in the future if you would like to, for even better sound, and you still wouldn't need an extra add-in-board soundcard.
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lifespill

lifespill

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Oct 25, 2015
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Cheap sound cards are just left from the past when audio cards were not common as a intergrated mobo future.In general a good audio card will have higher volume sound in some situations and a little bit better audio quality of course this quality need good speakers to be heard,also other more professional cards have jack support for pluging electric guitars keyboards etc.So if you are not into audio-music editing as you said,the built in will be perfect for music listening.
 
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bigpinkdragon286

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Oct 3, 2012
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Unless you're doing something that you specifically need the feature set of the Creative Labs card for, the on-board sounds should be more than sufficient. Also, if you run digital audio from the computer to an amp, you're effectively bypassing the biggest differentiator for sound cards which is their DAC circuitry.

As sizzling mentioned, if you plan to plug a high quality set of headphones directly into your sound card's output, you may be able to tell a difference, but it's going to be very subjective.
 
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ptrthgr8

ptrthgr8

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Oct 17, 2014
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Right on, thanks for the great feedback everyone. Right now I'm using only the Genius SW-G2.1 speaker set plugged into the card's jack when listening/playing when not using headphones and the Logitech G930 USB set when playing online and needing to be able to chat with friends, etc. I'm definitely not an audiophile, so I'll just give the ASRock Fatal1ty Gaming Z170 K4's audio chipset a chance. The info indicates this mobo has "7.1 CH HD Audio (Realtek ALC1150 Audio Codec), Supports Purity Sound™ 3 & DTS Connect." I'm not entirely certain what all that means, but 7.1 HD audio sounds like it's better than what I'm running right now with the sound card.

Thanks again, everyone!
 
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bigpinkdragon286

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Oct 3, 2012
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The Logitech G930 USB should appear to your computer as it's own sound device so it wouldn't use your sound card if you had one.

You won't be hearing the difference in a sound card or your on-board with the Genius speakers.

Realtek audio codec chips are really quite capable these days. I wouldn't worry about the DTS Connect or 7.1 HD as you're clearly not using them. However, it does mean that you have the option to upgrade the equipment outside of your machine in the future if you would like to, for even better sound, and you still wouldn't need an extra add-in-board soundcard.
 
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