2. pc-audio
  3. 1079514088

External sound device vs PCI soundcard

Hi all

I’m still feeling my way around the area of PC audio, so please don’t shoot me if I’m way off track.

After reading through many of the post on this site is seems the general consensus is that doing a D-A conversion inside to PC case degrades sound quality to much due to electrical interference.

One way I thought of getting past this problem was to use an external sound device like the M-audio Sonic Theater, USB. If the sensitive DAC process was kept away from the PC, wouldn’t the output signal be relatively good.

Any thought or experience with external sound devices vs. internal soundcard would be greatly welcome.

Cheers.
xs1

Showing 1 response by audioengr

audioengr
3,282 posts
 
The optimum solution will be a high-quality DAC, such as a Benchmark with a USB interface installed, or an outboard USB-to-S/PDIF coax converter. Installing the USB interface inside the DAC is better, but the outboard converter can be quite excellent as well. Far better than the best transport on the market.

Steve N.
Empirical Audio
Manufacturer
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