External DACs are an old habit. They were a nice upgrade 10-15+ years ago but now onboard audio is very good. Unless you have a shitty sub-$100 motherboard you should at least try your onboard audio for a day.
>but electronic interference and hiss Motherboard manufacturers have been figuring out ways to mitigate this for the last decade. Connect your onboard line-out to an amp and turn the volume up. My board has nearly zero noise.
>my motherboard can't drive my headphones That's probably true. I'm talking strictly about the D/A conversion.
Oh and if you paid more than $100 for your DAC you were robbed.
I'd agree that the days of paying for a DAC to mitigate shitty on board audio is long gone My shitty ECS board which has the most bare bones of audio implementations does just fine and is noiseless, on par or even better than a first gen Modi purchased many years ago
Asher Gonzalez
I hear noise through my headphones
Christopher Wright
I don't know much about dacs but I like to add random shit to my vista machine with its Audigy2 zs Platinum I have the creative front panel too Is there a 5.25" or 3.5" bay Dac I could add?
Hunter Edwards
>Oh and if you paid more than $100 for your DAC you were robbed. based
Alexander Price
U shud get a $300 dedicated audio card. Gaymer edition
Jose Baker
External DACs are only a waste of time because most people haven't invested in good power.
Onboard audio is only good on higher end motherboards.
Kevin Clark
guys what's a good, decently portable USB DAC? I'm tried of having to deal with my memepads buzzing
Samuel Gutierrez
>my motherboard can't drive my headphones >Unless you have a shitty sub-$100 motherboard 1st even cheap $50 have decent audio 2nd more expensive >$100 have built-in amps that goes from 300 to 600 depends on manufacturer 3rd even $50 have them, but usually range from 150-300.
>My board has nearly zero noise. My external has zero.
Colton Sanchez
Eat shit Philistine, your uncouth ears unable to appreciate superior DAC sound are a cancerous blight of foul taste
Angel Price
>My board has nearly zero noise. Its garbage, buy a normal DAC.
Isaiah Brooks
Audiophilia is a form of autism
Kevin Gutierrez
>Connect your onboard line-out to an amp Why would you do that, it ain't the 1980s.
The only thing I cared about in regards to motherboard audio from 2004 to 2014 was a SPDIF output among the connectors. That's digital and it works the same on all motherboards as long as they've got a SPDIF. The receiver I got after that has HDMI and that doesn't even require a sound card. Both SPDIF and HDMI are digital.
Sound cards are pretty my obsolete.
then connect them to the back of your PC case, it's probably a cheap case with a unshielded between the motherboard and the front audio connectors. Or connect them to your receiver if you have one. If those things aren't an option then perhaps those DAC toys are for you.
Nathan Moore
>not going off the grid with solar power + batteries