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Decoding Quality: PC Soundcard or Receiver?

490 views 7 replies 3 participants last post by  nightcabbage 
#1 ·
I have 2 audio setups in 2 difference rooms:


I have a PC I use mostly for gaming (including legacy EAX games) and MP3/streaming audio listening. I believe I'll also start using the PC for listening to uncompressed HD audio and Blu-Ray playback soon (though it's primary use will still probably be gaming and non-HD music listening.) I will use this PC in both rooms, connected to both audio setups, depending what I'm doing. Yes, that means lugging back and forth! But don't worry about that...

Currently I have a Creative Soundlbaster X-Fi sound card, and I connect it to the receivers using 3 analog connectors (3.5mm stereo to RCA, outputting all 5.1 channels). I'm thinking about upgrading to either a Creative Soundblaster Z or ZxR card. Which one I chose and how I hook up is why I'm creating this thread.

Should I use the Soundblaster with it's DACs and onboard components to decode and continue to connect to my receivers using my analog connectors, thus having the receivers just act as amps... OR should I output my PC's audio using the optical out to the receiver (which uses Dolby Digital Live encoding that keeps important multichannel PC gaming related items like EAX and soundcard goodies like Crystalizer) and let the receiver decode? Which is going to give me better quality and a better experience?

Things I'm considering when trying to figure this out:

  • The Sound Blaster Z's specs have a 116dB Signal-to-Noise Ratio. The Sound Blaster ZxR's specs have a Signal-to-Noise Ratio of 124dB. Will that make any difference in audio quality if I'm using the sound card to decode and outputting through analog, or will the difference between those 2 cards be negligible? (If those specs matter, there are even better options available.)
  • Compared to the Sound Blaster's specs, from what I can tell on my receivers, they have SNRs closer to 100dB. Does that mean it will have inferior digital to analog processing, and that I should rely on the sound card? (or is this an apples to oranges comparison because the receiver is amping?)
  • I know with receivers, you can only receive uncompressed HD audio from Blu-Rays through HDMI, not optical. Optical inputs accepts DD and DTS codecs found on DVDs and Blu-Rays, but none of the HD codecs. So because of this limitation, would using the Z's or ZxR's optical out to allow the receiver to decode the DDL mean I would actually lose the ability to play audio with complete uncompressed high fidelity? Wikipedia says DDL supports 5.1-channels at 16-bit/48 kHz Dolby Digital format at 640 kbit/s. (DTS Connect is roughly the same specs.) Compared to a HD format like Dolby TrueHD which supports 24-bit, 96 kHz audio channels at up to 18 Mbit/s (over 14 channels if necessary). That seems like a shame because the soundcard itself can support the 24-bit/96kHz audio (and in fact can actually support 192kHz in stereo), but it then can't seem to export that quality using an optical out and live encoding. But will any of this actually matter?

All these things considered, it almost seems like I should let the sound card do the decoding and just have the receivers AMP. However... that just seems so odd to me. How could a $90-$200 sound card option provide a superior experience to a $400-$800 receiver (unless all that extra price in the receiver is because of the AMPing, connections, and other hardware)? I obviously lack knowledge and would welcome a good schooling and solid opinion on the matter.

Many thanks!
 
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#3 · (Edited)
If you read the post, you'll see my main question was basically which device should I use to decode given the fact that I'm concerned about quality and my use cases above. I also ask a bunch of other questions related to that, mostly in the form of assumptions that I'm looking for confirmations on. Hope that clarifies for you. If it doesn't, I'm not sure how else to redefine.

I just realized this isn't the right section of the forum for this... when I saw "in a box" I assumed it was referring to PC builds. Now I realize it's for lower end consumer grade all-in-ones.
 
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