Asus Xonar D2 inbound!
 

After almost 2 years of x-fi hell I finally decided to order up a Xonar, I've seen a lot of crying about it's emulated EAX but ffs any EAX is emulated in vista due to MS being idiots and removing hardware accalerated sound from the damn os!

I'll follow this up later with impressions and differences noted between the 2 cards.

Sweet! I can't wait to see what you think. Their cards are expensive, but are supposed to be da bomb.

So far I think Newegg's shipping sucks...

This thing hasn't come in yet? Seems like it was ordered last month. :rofl

Early impressions of the new card are very good, installation was a snap! I uninstalled the old card's software and rebooted and ran Ccleaner several times until it came up clean, shut the machine off and swapped cards. On boot the new card was immediately recognized and vista prompted that it wished to install software for it, I declined vista's help and installed the driver. After reboot the card worked in every way it was intended to and with a little tweaking of the EQ it sounds better than my previous x-fi by a significant margin.

The real test for me will be gaming, I'll update this post after I try it out for a while.

Nice card but damn that's expensive!

My previous x-fi cost more...

Toldya so..........:p

Game sound seems to be quite good but counterintuitive to setup after years of using x-fi cards, I am actually using no digital filters with environment set to "Room". I wouldn't have thought the environmental settings would be used at all but the room effect is actually an improvement for in game sounds, directional sound seems to be very good too despite what some have said. Some games sound completely new to me since all I have heard in certain parts were sound bugs (feedback or popping sound), so far I am giving this card a 10/10 for music and games.

Sounds like a killer card. We know how picky you are about gaming quality.

Haha! I am EXTREMELY picky when it comes to pc gaming components! This sound card is a winning addition so far though.

I TOLD YOU SO....!!!

:rofl:rofl:rofl:rofl:rofl:rofl:rofl:rofl:rofl:rofl :rofl:rofl:rofl:rofl:rofl:rofl

Like I could trust your opinion! When was the last time you actually played a game?

Well if you must ask, it has to be over a year or so, actually it was a year and 4 months now :ash1:

I play overclocking now :D

It's ok buddy, old age catches up to everyone but I'll bet you can still play checkers like a mother****er!

Whats that?:confused: Eh, what'd you say sonny boy? Speak up son, you don't say. Yes, yes, I play put my peckers on yah mother's pucker, what of it? :rofl

Oh *barf* she is built like a Hawaiin woman aka orca!

I just ordered Sennheiser's HD 595 headphones to go with the new card, if it doesn't live up to expectations....I will have to step on Supes...olives.

Ok Supes, your olives are safe as these are truly incredible headphones and the Xonar has enough power to drive them.

Thanks bro, glad u retained ur confidence in my opinion thru-out the testing phase :rolleyes:
So does this now mean that I have credibility within the community? Has my reputation increased yet? :rofl

No and No.


You never commented about the headphone choice or the use of hacked drivers to get the most out of this card either....There is a modded Xonar Essence driver that works quite well for it.


And no one likes Samoans.

sign8sign4

I've been eyeing this card myself for the REX rig, I bought the motherboard second hand, and didn't get the add on sound card with it. Sounds like a solid piece for the backup gaming rig.

I'm actually re-hooking this up to the new 24/7 rig now, what a co-inkeedink.

This is the card to use for your primary rig, the creative junker is in my backup gaming pc and every time I switch to it is more painful than the last.

Thats cool, there's a fellow on EVGA selling a used one I have my eye on. :)

I've got this card back up and running again. Can't believe the ease of installation and the instant performance. Literally music to my ears. I'm lubbin it.

ASUS Xonars are truly wonderful soundcards - a friend has a Xonar STX with the AKG K701 and the ZERO DAC (with OPA627s onboard) and it sounds like...heaven :D

I am considering getting an HDAV1.3 when I decide to make this HTPC I've been dreaming!!!!