Hi,
Maybe not terrible but clinical, dry, hard and edgy making me headhache.
My Realtek on board chip sounds smoother, sweeter. Perhaps not so detailed but at least listenable.
Is this sound card supposed to sound like this? I'm guessing it shouldn't and maybe the culprit is a 4 m wire (analog front out) that I have between the Xonar and my preamplifier. Is my Xonar oscillating because of this big cable?
Please, can anyone help me figuring out what's wrong and what should I do?
Many thanks.
Maybe not terrible but clinical, dry, hard and edgy making me headhache.
My Realtek on board chip sounds smoother, sweeter. Perhaps not so detailed but at least listenable.
Is this sound card supposed to sound like this? I'm guessing it shouldn't and maybe the culprit is a 4 m wire (analog front out) that I have between the Xonar and my preamplifier. Is my Xonar oscillating because of this big cable?
Please, can anyone help me figuring out what's wrong and what should I do?
Many thanks.
Paulo,
1. Try changing the long cable.
2. Also check if you have bass management on (in the Xonar control interface) - it might be cutting out low frequencies to your speakers
3. Also check if you have any of the special environments/effects on
1. Try changing the long cable.
2. Also check if you have bass management on (in the Xonar control interface) - it might be cutting out low frequencies to your speakers
3. Also check if you have any of the special environments/effects on
Thanks for the input Zman,
I'm using ASIO driver so no effects present. The cable can't be any shorter, unfortunately. I migh try to put the pc closer to the amp but only for a short time to see if there's a change.
One thing I'm thinking it could be is the pc power supply, maybe it doesn't regulate well. The problem is finding what it is.
I'm using ASIO driver so no effects present. The cable can't be any shorter, unfortunately. I migh try to put the pc closer to the amp but only for a short time to see if there's a change.
One thing I'm thinking it could be is the pc power supply, maybe it doesn't regulate well. The problem is finding what it is.
Now it's playing wonderfully!!!
Why?
I just took the board out of the pci-express slot, disconnected the auxiliary power cable and reinstaled the card. Same slot, same cable. Then I moved the long cable. What did happen? Bad contact of the card? Cable better positioned?
I need to know why it's good now so it doesn't happen again. Could a bad contact of the card with the slot do this?Could be the moving of the cable? Does anyone has a clue?
This is all very strange! I really need an explanation!
Why?
I just took the board out of the pci-express slot, disconnected the auxiliary power cable and reinstaled the card. Same slot, same cable. Then I moved the long cable. What did happen? Bad contact of the card? Cable better positioned?
I need to know why it's good now so it doesn't happen again. Could a bad contact of the card with the slot do this?Could be the moving of the cable? Does anyone has a clue?
This is all very strange! I really need an explanation!
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Could have been a poor connection. I have 3.5mm cables which never fit correctly in a given jack, simply due to the way they were built. Other times it was from a dirty jack, which was cured by twirling a q-tip around inside the jack.
What do you mean by "auxiliary" power cable?
What do you mean by "auxiliary" power cable?
Paulo, the card will not work without that cable.
It is used to power the whole card and has a 8V regulator for the analog section, plus it is also used to power the relays. The 5V line in unterminated, only the 12V cable is used. It would probably not be possible to get anything except very poor and low quality sound out of the card. Frankly I am surprised if it works without the connection at all.
The Xonar is not a great unit, but it's *much* better than onboard. I had measured one sample of the card using my E-Mu 1212m for ADC, and it compared very well against onboard sound - IIRC -10dB or more in terms of HD and around -30dB IMD. Note the specs on the box are for CS4398 alone and the card does not actually provide that level of performance 🙂 but still factor of 3x to 10x better than onboard audio (which was about -50dB IMD and -80dB THD).
FWIW My DX just stopped working totally yesterday after I had to move it around for a new installation, I had to remove every cable, clean it properly and reconnect it. I have the card itself on a flexible extender, and mounted on a half-height bracket because the extender does not allow the card to sit in the slot when a full-length bracket is connected. In addition, the card's aux power connector was missing, so I soldered a male Molex connector from a Y-cable to make the aux power connection.... That cabling must be 10x worse than yours, but the card still works just fine.
It is used to power the whole card and has a 8V regulator for the analog section, plus it is also used to power the relays. The 5V line in unterminated, only the 12V cable is used. It would probably not be possible to get anything except very poor and low quality sound out of the card. Frankly I am surprised if it works without the connection at all.
The Xonar is not a great unit, but it's *much* better than onboard. I had measured one sample of the card using my E-Mu 1212m for ADC, and it compared very well against onboard sound - IIRC -10dB or more in terms of HD and around -30dB IMD. Note the specs on the box are for CS4398 alone and the card does not actually provide that level of performance 🙂 but still factor of 3x to 10x better than onboard audio (which was about -50dB IMD and -80dB THD).
FWIW My DX just stopped working totally yesterday after I had to move it around for a new installation, I had to remove every cable, clean it properly and reconnect it. I have the card itself on a flexible extender, and mounted on a half-height bracket because the extender does not allow the card to sit in the slot when a full-length bracket is connected. In addition, the card's aux power connector was missing, so I soldered a male Molex connector from a Y-cable to make the aux power connection.... That cabling must be 10x worse than yours, but the card still works just fine.
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Normally it should not be possible to connect the power cable the wrong way. But looking at various building instructions it seems like there is an exception for this card. 
It could have been the issue that it were connected wrongly but I doubt it. If you did so anyway it´s more likely that the soundcard won´t even work in the first place regardless whether it took any damage or not.
A broken connection, probably in the cable, is the most possible reason in my opinion. I had several cable which behaved very strangely, sometimes working, sometimes creating noise or manipulating the sound drastically. Now you said that you´ve moved the cable. Move it again and see whether you still get the problem.
If not then it could also be caused by a bad connection in the pci slot on your mainboard.
It could have been the issue that it were connected wrongly but I doubt it. If you did so anyway it´s more likely that the soundcard won´t even work in the first place regardless whether it took any damage or not.
A broken connection, probably in the cable, is the most possible reason in my opinion. I had several cable which behaved very strangely, sometimes working, sometimes creating noise or manipulating the sound drastically. Now you said that you´ve moved the cable. Move it again and see whether you still get the problem.
If not then it could also be caused by a bad connection in the pci slot on your mainboard.
I have the same card and to me the sound quality is exactly as described - not good compared to built-in sound card or an external DAC I also use. I have tried reseating the card, using different cables, nothing improves. Sending it back.
Unfortunately it's to lake for me to return the card. is there any way to find the faulty part and could I repair it by my self?
Hi
I found the card to be quite good .I am using uni driversUNi Xonar Drivers official page.
What drivers are you using ?
Regards
Somak
I found the card to be quite good .I am using uni driversUNi Xonar Drivers official page.
What drivers are you using ?
Regards
Somak
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