Help with sound card choice

[Shrive81]

Ok so pulling the trigger on a new pc for the new sim rig I am building and by no means am I knowledgeable when It comes to pc stuff. I will be running but kickers on the rig and need a dedicated sound card. Below is the computer but not sure what sound card will fit or work any help and tips on install would be greatly appreciated

Skytech
I7 9700k 8 core
500gb SSD
Z390 motherboard
Nvidia rtx 2080 ti
16gb ddr4
Windows 10

 

[Durge Driven]

Hi

I have given up on speakers and sound cards, even disable the on board audio
I use 2 sets of USB headphones one movies one gaming everything sounds great
Music I listen to on 2GB ipod,

I gather main need is for gaming or are you a audiophile as well ?
What speaker system / headphones will you run ?
Budget I gather by your build money is not a issue ?

All those things will help some better suited to answer

 

[Shrive81]

Yes I will be using mother board sound card to run headset for game sound and need a separate sound card to run butt kicker system on seat.. budge isn’t an issue but don’t need to waste money on something crazy high end just to run a butt kicker

 

[Ceolmor]

Asus Xonar DGX is a very popular sound card for Buttkickers.

 

[Shrive81]

And will that just plug right into the computer?

 

[Durge Driven]

On your build

1.
SSD get Samsung M2, I have 500GB 970-Evo very quick
I partition only 60GB for W10 home ( I run no major software ) and is 50% free space
unless you need features in W10 Pro it is waste of money IMO, better spent elsewhere

Then I partition rest of space ( 405GB) for default Steam folder and most important sims

2.
I would really get 32GB of ram from here on in if you looking at 2-3+ years between upgrades

He is some food for thought:

Moving to 4K, we see better performance for the RTX 2080 Ti when paired with 32 GB RAM again, with frame time performance boosted by as much as 7%.

NOTE: where as GTX1070 get no gains at all

Full article and remember to think 2 years from now
https://www.techspot.com/article/1770-how-much-ram-pc-gaming/

 

[Durge Driven]

And will that just plug right into the computer?

Yes download latest driver from site and manual for convenience
Go offline just in case W10 attempts to install wrong driver
Plug in furthest slot from RTX to give it room to breath
install driver
go back online

edit:
Forget the bit about pci-e1.0 slots if you read.... they are all 3.0 now obviously doh

 

[BrunoBæ]

Below is the computer but not sure what sound card will fit or work any help and tips on install would be greatly appreciated

As a dedicated high end soundcard I can only recommend the Auzen X-Fi Forte 7.1.
Its both an advanced gaming and audiophile soundcard and I have been running such a card for about 10 years.
The card uses Creatives most advanced soundprocessor X-Fi CA20K which is way better than Creatives and others newer processors.

This processor has a lot of virtual headphone features specially aimed at gaming.

You have to find the card 2nd hand, but you can find updated drivers for Win10 too.
Today this card have no competition - hehe among other things because there have been no development in soundcards after people began to believe the BS that you dont need a dedicated soundcard.
Sorry couldnt resist.

EDIT: If you decide to go for this mighty soundcard then do not (repeat: do not) use it for your Butt-thing. Because that would be a complete waste of all the good things this card can do for your ears.

 

[Shrive81]

Can you run a butt kicker off the mother board sound card and then run speakers or headset off that sound card

 

[Emery]

Buttkickers don't need the fidelity of a high-end soundcard, so any 5.1 or 7.1 will be sufficient.

If you're using telemetry to drive the buttkickers, then you'll want both motherboard & a soundcard to drive the speakers/headphones. If you're just driving the buttkickers with sound, then splitting a single sound card is sufficient (but you really, really want the telemetry source).

 

[Shrive81]

I will be using gaming headset and also some simple speakers obviously not at the same time just depends on if I’m using it at night then the buttkickers will be ran by SimVibe. With the mother board having a sound card can I run butt kickers off that and the use the high end sound card to run the speaker or headset

 

[BrunoBæ]

I will be using gaming headset and also some simple speakers obviously not at the same time just depends on if I’m using it at night then the buttkickers will be ran by SimVibe. With the mother board having a sound card can I run butt kickers off that and the use the high end sound card to run the speaker or headset

If I understand you right then you intend to use some kind of "gaming headset" for the listening audio.
I dont want to sound patronizing at all but if you dont wanna use some reasonable headphones (Im not talking about some highend audiophile HPs) then my Auzen proposal is waste of money.
On some rather simple gaming headsets you dont have a chance to hear what the Auzen can offer.
Just saying

EDIT: As example in the racing sim with the best 7.1 surround sound(IMO) Raceroom its night and day to experience what a good soundcard and headphones can do - compared to a simple headset + MB Sound.

 

[Deleted member 197115]

Can you run a butt kicker off the mother board sound card and then run speakers or headset off that sound card

Depends on the motherboard. Some like ASUS ROG onboard audio support independent audio output for back and front (HP) outputs.

For audiophile quality external USB devices are better than audio cards.

 

[BrunoBæ]

For audiophile quality external USB devices are better than audio cards.

Im behaving myself here so I dont call this BS.
And I dont want to use much time argumenting against such a complete untrue comment.
Just say that you as example cannot fine a socalled USB "soundcard" with so high Dynamic Range and so low Distortion as example the best Auzen, Creative and Asus cards.
Conserning features its 2 different worlds.
Hehe just check a picture with a USB sound stick against a real soundcard.

a PCI or PCI-E sound card would most likely give better sound quality with less CPU utilization than USB, not to mention it helps prevent having another "thing" hanging off your computer.
In general, USB sound devices should only be used when necessary like in a laptop or computer w/o an available expansion slot.

internal PCI and PCI-E cards can get more power from the bus than standard USB 2, or 3.
More power = bigger processor(in good sound cards).
A USB device will take more CPU cycles. A USB 2 sound card could be bandwidth constrained, but a USB 3 sound card would not have bandwidth issues.
Again, the promise of USB 3 proves thwarted
--fabricators prove glacially slow to adopt USB 3--forcibly, they still insist that you stick with USB 2.
(USB 2 really isn't very good with media--it's best intended for relatively simple input devices such as mice and keyboards
--USB 2 dongle devices are pretty simple too, though. Sound should prove satisfactory, if limited, for your purposes here.)
https://superuser.com/questions/1034732/pci-sound-card-vs-usb-sound-card.

 

[RasmusP]

Just to chime in:
PCI(-E) advantages: lower latency, higher bandwidth, adding ports directly to the standard PC back/front-plates
USB advantages: Can be plugged into different PCs or Laptops, lower risk of magnetic fields interfering

The internals of both can be identical. Quality etc all depends on what the actual internal are.
I have both for recording stuff. PCI-E card got some very low but detectable base noise on microphones when gain is a bit higher and also some very slight base noise on the headphones.
The USB one (both from ESI btw) doesn't have any base noise but the latency can become a pain when recording.

/bashing of either closed

 

[BrunoBæ]

Review: 8 Best soundcards overall.
I dont see many USB sticks in this review.

Searching in the specs for different USB soundsticks its close to impossible to find figures for noise/distortion.
I wonder why?

 

[Deleted member 197115]

Who said anything about sticks?
I have been in computer audio hobby for quite long time, no internal card on the market can compete with external DAC with its own dedicated PSU and isolated circutry.
My current choices are Auralic Vega and Yulong Sabre DA8, the latter is more budgetary friendly and also sports passable headphone amp, great for someone looking for one box solution.
Async USB receivers are really good nowadays, inferior isochronous usb audio is mostly over and not used by most manufacturers.
And you are not looking for reviews on such devices in computer magazines.
But I am afraid it's completely different level and perhaps an overkill for Turtle Beach headset/mp3 users.

 

[David Faraday]

This has gotten out of hand....the OP just wants something to run his tactile.

Question, how many kickers are you planning to run? Thats how many channels you will need. For kickers there's no need whatsoever for high end sound. For example I run 2 kickers off a cheap 2 channel external soundcard with no problems whatsoever. Don't bother with simvibe, get simhub software instead, its donationware and is much more flexible than simvibe. It can also run kickers from multiple soundcards if you ever need to add more.

 

[Shrive81]

This has gotten out of hand....the OP just wants something to run his tactile.

Question, how many kickers are you planning to run? Thats how many channels you will need. For kickers there's no need whatsoever for high end sound. For example I run 2 kickers off a cheap 2 channel external soundcard with no problems whatsoever. Don't bother with simvibe, get simhub software instead, its donationware and is much more flexible than simvibe. It can also run kickers from multiple soundcards if you ever need to add more.

LOL thanks for keeping it on track

So my current setup is this computer:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07KDM7YWQ/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o00__o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
'
I will be running these kickers:
https://thebuttkicker.com/buttkicker-individual-seat-control-system-bka-130-c-2-mini-lfe/

I would most of the time be using headset for sound but also might mount so simple easy speakers for when guests are watching but those I will just run off the same system as the headset


attached to the base of my seat on a Seat N1 chassis

Jest need to know what I should buy and what one should run off what aka kickers off mother board sound card or off sound card I will purchase..

thanks

 

[David Faraday]

So you're just running 2 kickers then? Thats simple, all you need is a stereo output, a channel for each kicker. If I were you I would just use a USB stick/card and use your onboard sound for headphones and speakers (I do exactly the same as you are suggesting, split the output and choose between speakers or headphones). Connect the left and right output from the USB soundcard to L & R input on your buttkicker amp.

For example, I use this:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/UGREEN-Ext...id=1550532773&sr=8-13&keywords=usb+sound+card

Download simhub software and install, it already has profiles for most games but is also very configurable to individual needs. You can also use it to run dashboards and a ton of other stuff.....

https://www.racedepartment.com/threads/simhub-diy-sim-racing-dash.121578/