XFi vs onboard w/ Win7

[najiro]

wow! that really sounds complicated. searching for sources of music in FLAC format.. I can only find a few.. hmmmmm.. and those would have larger file capacities as well right? No wonder audiophiles would really have huge HDD capacities @__@ I only have a 1 TB hard drive. It's already cramped with games and videos LOL. Also, audio in FLAC format wouldn't be played in android phones right? Before this discussion I honestly thought MP4 is the best audio format available. Hmmmm.. need to learn more about this, really interesting Any tips about converting audio to that format?

[PP Mguire]

wow! that really sounds complicated. searching for sources of music in FLAC format.. I can only find a few.. hmmmmm.. and those would have larger file capacities as well right? No wonder audiophiles would really have huge HDD capacities @__@ I only have a 1 TB hard drive. It's already cramped with games and videos LOL. Also, audio in FLAC format wouldn't be played in android phones right? Before this discussion I honestly thought MP4 is the best audio format available. Hmmmm.. need to learn more about this, really interesting Any tips about converting audio to that format?

I used to have over 300GB worth of music and I dropped that down to somewhere in toe 40GB range, all FLAC. Yea, FLAC audio is huge being around a gig or so per CD.
I believe Android started supporting FLAC for Honeycomb. So if you have an ICS phone you should be able to use a FLAC playing app. I wouldn't waste phone space on FLAC though.
You have to rip your CDs directly using a program like exact audio. I don't know of any music downloading place that offers FLAC due to size and compatibility.

[najiro]

I used to have over 300GB worth of music and I dropped that down to somewhere in toe 40GB range, all FLAC. Yea, FLAC audio is huge being around a gig or so per CD.
I believe Android started supporting FLAC for Honeycomb. So if you have an ICS phone you should be able to use a FLAC playing app. I wouldn't waste phone space on FLAC though.
You have to rip your CDs directly using a program like exact audio. I don't know of any music downloading place that offers FLAC due to size and compatibility.

hmmm.. my android does have a relatively large storage (32GB class 10 microsd). But it's still using a Froyo. (version 2.2.1) I'm a noob when it comes to android phones.. can I upgrade this OS to something better? I have no idea... My phone is a motorola XT 720 milestone. This topic kinda got derailed LOL. Sorry about that. But we are still talking about audio in general LOL :D

[PP Mguire]

You have to root your phone, make a backup with CWM, and then flash the rom.

Take your phone model and google it with ics at the end.

[ryandigweed]

Yeah, might be old, but I actually find it interesting. I am running a ASUS Xonar Xense card right now, which is not supported on Windows 8, but there are people out there that modified the drivers to add support to Windows 8. Since ASUS discontinued the card, they don't have Windows 8 support for it. Sucks, but what can you do. :/Either way, I feel a difference in music when playing it through the Xonar instead of just the Realtek onboard audio. Could be because I'm using high-end headphones that need more power to get good quality and high-volume music out of them. This is where i find audio cards helpful. Otherwise unless you have good speakers you won't see the difference in quality.If you're on a budget, by all means stay with the onboard audio. It's not bad, and I use it on many systems that don't have a dedicated audio card, but for my ultimate entertainment and gaming system I still use a dedicated audio card. Few advantages is that you start hearing sounds that were previously unheard due to the limitations of the number of sounds the audio card can play at the same time, and the noise-to-audio dbA. Sometimes the crisper content can get lost due to a lower noise-to-audio ratio.I'd like to hear other's opinions on this. I might upgrade to an even better audio card for my future builds, that have native Windows 8 support, but I don't think that will happen anytime soon.

I've got two Sony Hifi-s. So i guess I won't be seing any quality What kinda sounds can you hear in with the card that you couldn't normally hear? Just asking, coz many people love their Music in FLAC. they usually have some High end audio home theatre by Onkyo or something to enjoy the kick. Also would like to mention that im using the RCA jacks for the Hifi, would it be better if i used the Optical Wire for the hifi? :S

[najiro]

You have to root your phone, make a backup with CWM, and then flash the rom.

Take your phone model and google it with ics at the end.

hmm okay will try... what are the possible consequences if the flash fail?? O__O

[PP Mguire]

I've got two Sony Hifi-s. So i guess I won't be seing any quality What kinda sounds can you hear in with the card that you couldn't normally hear? Just asking, coz many people love their Music in FLAC. they usually have some High end audio home theatre by Onkyo or something to enjoy the kick. Also would like to mention that im using the RCA jacks for the Hifi, would it be better if i used the Optical Wire for the hifi? :S

Shouldn't be any extra sounds like I explained to Najiro. In games there are "voices" which if the setting is upped your card processes more sounds at once. To explain this further, in BF2 under Windows XP and an X-Fi card when set to ultra you can hear extra things because they are actually being processed instead of left alone. These days everything is software accelerated and onboard supports 128+ voices so there isn't anything missed. The only difference would be frequency response which is purely quality. Think of a 32band EQ like this one, when you have lower frequency response on lower end audio products (mainly speakers) take the lowest and highest few sliders and turn them all the way down. You now can't hear those frequencies due to lower end products. Not exactly what happens but that is the gist. The difference between onboard and sound cards now is DACs and amps. A DAC is digital to analog converter which higher quality will send better frequency and SNR to your high end speakers. That kind of answers your ending question. If by RCA you mean these then you are sending an analog signal to probably an analog setup. If so, the onboard DACs will be the defining factor of the quality of sound coming out of your board. If your Sony setup is digital then you are converting digital to analog at the board then analog to digital at your receiver. This also loses quality greatly. Depends entirely on the setup whether this is perceived and can be heard or not though. Honestly though, if you have optical on both ends go ahead and use it, even though there probably wont be that much of a difference.

hmm okay will try... what are the possible consequences if the flash fail?? O__O

Research a ton first before trying it and make sure you are completely confident in what you are doing. There aren't many consequences of a soft brick if you are using CWM Recovery. You can either reflash using Odin or recover your stock rom through the recovery. Before doing this make sure you put your recovery and everything else on an SD card.

[ryandigweed]

OK thanks. I got an old optical cable which was lying with my spare parts without a cover. I hope the optical contacts aren't damaged.

Otherwise ill have to get a new one..my Sony hi fi does have a digital port behind so that does mean its digital right? And my speakers are on the floor. So they aren't so clear anyway

[PP Mguire]

Depends on the circuitry and what happens after the signal hits the port and before it reaches the amp. Some older receivers have older amps and use low quality DACs to convert the signal digital rendering everything useless anyways.