[terry_1234]

Hi All,


I have a Windows7 Media Centre which runs my movies/TV/music. I recently upgraded the sound card from the onboard Realtek AC'97 to a Asus Xonar D2 in an effort to improve sound quality, in particular with music. This hasn't made much difference to be honest, and I know the Xonar D2 has a good reputation for sound quality, which has lead me to think the Gigaworks S750 are actually the problem (I even setup the sound card and speakers in another PC and got exactly the same quality). Any ideas how I can improve this or more likely, what's a good amp and speakers to purchase to replace the gigaworks ?


Thanks


Terry

 

[GreenEyez]

Any modern AV receiver and somewhat decent pair of speakers can outperform the plastic crap from Creative or Logitech.


What`s your budget for the receiver/speakers? Receivers range from low end models like the Denon 1312 up to 5.000$ models like the Denon 4312

 

[terry_1234]

Hi,


Around $1000-$1500. I had a Denon stereo a few years, that was a nice piece of equipment.

 

[balky]



Quote:
Originally Posted by terry_1234 /forum/post/20845582


Hi All,


I have a Windows7 Media Centre which runs my movies/TV/music. I recently upgraded the sound card from the onboard Realtek AC'97 to a Asus Xonar D2 in an effort to improve sound quality, in particular with music. This hasn't made much difference to be honest, and I know the Xonar D2 has a good reputation for sound quality, which has lead me to think the Gigaworks S750 are actually the problem (I even setup the sound card and speakers in another PC and got exactly the same quality). Any ideas how I can improve this or more likely, what's a good amp and speakers to purchase to replace the gigaworks ?


Thanks


Terry

The reason why you're not hearing any difference is most likely due to windows crappy audio system...


I use ASIO to bypass the windows audio system.


I have windows media player working with ASIO as well.


First you have to download and install ASIO4ALL from
http://www.asio4all.com/


After that you need to download and install the ASIO plugin for windows media player from
http://sourceforge.net/projects/asiowmpplg/


To make this work flawlessly, you need to have the onboard sound card (for example) enabled and selected as the default in windows.

In the ASIO4ALL configuration, you will disable your onboard audio and enable you ASUS XONAR card which should be connected to your AVR or speakers...


You will be amazed at the quality of audio using ASIO...


In my setup, I use the E-MU0404 PCI audio card which comes bundle with the DSPPatchmix application... Audio has never been so good on my system...

I use mediamonkey and windows media player, both work well with ASIO...


Some others use kernel streaming, but I didn't bother researching how to do that since the ASIO setup met my expectations...


Good luck...

 

[GreenEyez]

Or WASAPI, if you player supports it. Same result as ASIO (bypassing the Windows audio mixer). But still, don`t expect miracles, getting a bitperfect reproduction of the sound on the source level won`t change the fact that the speakers are crap

.


As for recomendations for audio hardware, you`re better of posting in the dedicated forums, but here`s a quick recommendation :



Denon 1912 AV Receiver

Polk Audio TSi400/300 for the front speakers

Polk Audio TSi100 surrounds

Polk Audio CS10

Subwoofer of your choice (i`m clueless in this department)


Should sum up to 1500$ i think

 

[balky]



Quote:
Originally Posted by GreenEyez /forum/post/20848615


Or WASAPI, if you player supports it. Same result as ASIO (bypassing the Windows audio mixer). But still, don`t expect miracles, getting a bitperfect reproduction of the sound on the source level won`t change the fact that the speakers are crap

.


As for recomendations for audio hardware, you`re better of posting in the dedicated forums, but here`s a quick recommendation :



Denon 1912 AV Receiver

Polk Audio TSi400/300 for the front speakers

Polk Audio TSi100 surrounds

Polk Audio CS10

Subwoofer of your choice (i`m clueless in this department)


Should sum up to 1500$ i think

Correct... if your using crap speakers, you definitely won't hear much...


I use these http://www.m-audio.com/products/en_u...phileBX5a.html for listening to music...


They are plugged directly into the output jacks on the emu-0404 sound card...


I have a completely separate 7.1 setup with a pioneer VSX-32 for the home theater...