What kind of audio device should I get to eliminate static/crackling?

BravelySam

Commendable
Apr 30, 2016
48
0
1,540
My motherboard, the GA-Z170XP-SLI seems to have some really bad onboard audio, it's really distracting. I wanna get some kind of external device to process the sound instead, but I'm confused about the difference between sound cards and DACs. Would an external DAC eliminate this problem? Or would I still hear static since my onboard sound chip would still be sending stuff through the DAC?

Is there something I'm getting wrong here? I'd like a thorough explanation of this topic. What should I purchase?