DFI Lanparty Karajan Audio Module VS Audigy LS?

[Sobek]

Hey guys, I think the title pretty much explains my incoming question...

I'm curious if the Karajan Audio Module on my Lanparty SLI board is a better performer/produces higher quality audio than the Audigy LS i've been using in the past on another system.

I mainly use headphones/4.1 sorround so the audigy suits me perfectly, and has support for EAX 2.0 (or was it 3.0? can't quite remember), but i'm pretty clueless in the realm of Sound...So that's really it, would I benefit from using the Onboard (CPU usage?) or using my seperate Audigy LS (hardware sound, less CPU usage? )

Thanks.

 

[Zaphod]

Being on a separate PCB the audio module may be less susceptible to electrical noise than your average Realtek-based 'onboard' sound. Other than that it's not any different, albeit with a more than average set of connectors available.

The Audigy 2 LS (this and the Audigy 2 Value were pretty much the original Audigy rebranded for the mid-end) should be superior in features, in particular for games, and the CPU usage will be markedly lower. I’d guess that the LS would win an ‘objective’ (loopback) test of analogue audio properties as well.

 

[Sobek]

Thanks for the speedy reply.

By the way, it's an Audigy 1 LS. Nevertheless, with a bit of tweaking to the equalizer settings, this onboard is starting to sound quite nice.

I was thinking, what about EAX? I was under the impression that EAX support was restricted to Creative soundcards? In the past i've been able to 'enable' EAX with onboard sound and such, but never noticed a change I audio like I did when I enabled it on that Audigy LS. Just curious if i'll still be able to use it or not...

Thanks again

 

[BrynS]

I could be wrong, but I don't believe that Creative have licenced their EAX "standard" to other Audio manufacturers beyond Version 2.0, which pretty much any recent discrete or integrated sound card can handle.

I wouldn't be surprised if more recent discrete cards could be tweaked to handle higher versions if the licence was available -- my Game Theatre XP 5.1 (bought in 2001) has hardware EAX 2.0 support -- but given Creative's stranglehold on accelerated gaming audio and "HD effects", I can't see EAX opening up for fear of losing one of their exclusive features.