12/6/07 - The PC audio market is in a lot of flux right now with the upcoming changes from Windows Vista. Hardware acceleration is not directly supported but the OpenAL standard is looking to change that. The market has expanded away from Creative but they are still the biggest company. The audio role of the PC is increasing with people putting their audio collections in digital formats and hooking them up to home theater systems. With all these different capabilities in mind, here is my list for the best PC audio cards based upon my research and experience.
ASUS has a surprising product with the Xonar D2 card. It provides some of the best audio output on the market thanks to the high quality of components used on the board along with a feature rich audio processor. The board can support a variety of different audio standards including Dolby Pro Logix IIx, Dolby Digital, DTS and DTS: Neo PC. It even has the ability to support Dolby Digital Live to automatically encode a 5.1 output stream. The number of connectors is also great with mic input, line in, front, rear, side, center/subwoofer, SPD/IF input and SPD/IF output. It even has a metal shroud over the components to reduce EMF. About the only downside is that it only supports up to EAX 2.0. A great overall sound card for just about anything.
What do you get when Creative allows another company to produce a card using their X-Fi audio processor? Frankly, a card that is better than what Creative has released. They took the X-Fi cards and essentially added all the features missing that Creative should have put on the boards themselves. This includes a full set of connectors including separate mic, line-in, front, side, rear, center/sub, SPD/IF input and SPD-IF outputs. In addition, it has the ability to do Dolby Direct Live and DTS: Neo PC. So why isn't it at the top? Some of these features won't work until Creative and Auzentech get the drivers fully working to support them. Still a great alternative to Creative if you want a card that supports EAX 3.0.
Most people are purchasing dedicated sound cards for use with PC gaming. So if that is what you are intended to use the system for, the best overall value card for the purchase is the Creative X-Fi XtremeGamer 7.1. It provides a limited number of connectors including a front, rear and center/sub outputs. There is a fourth connector that can be used either as an input for line-in or mic or an output for the side channels. The card also provides support for Creative EAX 3.0 and Creative EAX HD. These are proprietary audio processing from Creative that allows for improved environmental effects on audio playback used heavily in PC games.
HT Omega is a fairly new company to the sound card market. They based their originally Claro 7.1 sound card around the CMI8788 audio processor. The Claro+ is an update to that product with the same audio processor with a few updated components for improved quality and features. It has a large number of onboard connectors including mic, line-in, front, read, side, center/subwoofer, digital optical in, digital optical out and coaxial output. Supported audio formats in hardware include Dolby Pro Logic IIx, Dolby Digital, DTS Interactive, DTS: Neo PC and Dolby Digital Live output. The biggest problem with the card is really finding them in retail channels.
Using a personal computer system with a home theater system is a growing trend. They can be used for playback of digital audio, video and DVDs. When used with a home theater system, it is generally a good idea to have it output a 5.1 audio channel for a home audio receiver to support surround sound. Many cards are now featuring the Dolby Digital Live function to encode 5.1 audio into an audio stream for an external decoder. The Montego 7.1 is one of the least expensive cards on the market to support this feature. The digital optical output can then carry that signal out to a compatible receiver. It also has a similar optical input for external sources such as a DVD player.
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