Sound Cards and front panel sound

[DREDIOCK]

Ok.
Does anyone know of a soundcard that has a connection for the front panel sound wire that doesnt cost an arm and a leg?

OR an adapter that will work?

I cant beleive how few I can find.
With most machines having front panel sound jacks for a few years now
How is it that the card manufacturers dropped the ball on this one for so long?

[Reschke]

Maximum PC magazine reviewed two in a recent magazine and both were pretty good. I will have to find the article when I get home tonight.

[Fulmar]

I know for the Sound Blaster you could buy an adapter, but the only place I found it was $20.  But I had also found some steps to make your own, but it didn't look pretty on how to make it.

[Krusty]

Most recent cards don't seem to have front panel connectors. The only ones I've seen lately have been motherboard onboard chipsets.

Creative Labs apparently doesn't like to do that with their cards. The XiFi and some others rely instead on a 5" bay insert for I/O connections. Very annoying if you ask me!

There is a series of pins on my Audigy but they are too large and unlabeled. They won't work with the front panel plug. However, my motherboard has them built in and works just fine with onboard sound. I wish sound cards would all allow the front-panel plugs. It would be SO much more convenient.

[Getback]

Great question Dred. I've wondered about that too. I've wondered if you run it through the MB will the card carry it?

[DREDIOCK]

I know for the Sound Blaster you could buy an adapter, but the only place I found it was $20.  But I had also found some steps to make your own, but it didn't look pretty on how to make it.

Got a link for thee adapter?

Now that I've run it a few days and am satisfied with it to date
Im in the proccess of transfering things over to my new build. Info from other hard drives.
I know machines run more efficiant if you use cards as opposed to on board stuff.
So Im changing that over too.
Disabled onboard ethernet in favor of my Lynksys

I was planning on using my old card "Soundblaster Live 5.1"
then realised there the front panel connector didnt fit anywhere.
So I was like Ok I'll just get a new card.

The only friggen ones I can find that support front panel sound cost $80 on up.

Sorry but Im not spending almost $100 or more on a sound card.

So I figured I'd look around for an adapter.
The only things I could find were home made.
Screw dat. Like you said. it aint pretty.

I just dont understnd how with all the machines out there with front panel jacks.
How the sound card companies could not make  cards that support it.
Seems to me to be a no brainer.

[llama]

If you have a genuine Creative Labs Sound Blaster of recent vintage, than one of these cables will do the trick:

http://www.x-tap.com/

http://www.performance-pcs.com/catalog/index.php?main_page=advanced_search_result&search_in_description=1&keyword=audigy

These work for sure with Audigy LS and Aidigy 2 ZS cards, as I am using them now, and should work on the X-Fi. They need the white connector on the top of the card.

They could be cheaper, but I'd spend more than 15 minutes soldering and shrinkwrapping, not to mention time wasted sourcing the connector, so I consider it worth it.

-Llama

[Krusty]

Many thanks, Llama! A most helpful find!

[drdeathx]

Ok... Here's a great sound cards/ head phones calle Turtle Beach. The unit plugs into your usb. No need for a sound card and it runs up to 7.1 surround sound The earforce 1,3,4 runs from $50 to $200 respectfully. I own a set they are incredible.


http://www.turtlebeach.com/


check the link. I think most computer superstores carry them. I bought mine at Fry's

[Krusty]

USB headphones rely on CPU cycles and are a bit of a system drain. Skuzzy's made a couple of comments about them, maybe a search will yield what he's said before. (I can't recall off the top of my head -- wasn't interested because I don't have any USB 'phones)

[drdeathx]

Depending on system yes but mine can handle easily and the 7.1 surround is great. Just wanted to give a shout.

[Fulmar]

http://www.performance-pcs.com/catalog/index.php?main_page=advanced_search_result&search_in_description=1&keyword=audigy

Yup, I was unsuccessful in googling to find this link.  That's the one I came across a couple months ago when I was thinking about my front audio connector...

[TequilaChaser]

If you have a genuine Creative Labs Sound Blaster of recent vintage, than one of these cables will do the trick:

http://www.x-tap.com/

http://www.performance-pcs.com/catalog/index.php?main_page=advanced_search_result&search_in_description=1&keyword=audigy

These work for sure with Audigy LS and Aidigy 2 ZS cards, as I am using them now, and should work on the X-Fi. They need the white connector on the top of the card.

They could be cheaper, but I'd spend more than 15 minutes soldering and shrinkwrapping, not to mention time wasted sourcing the connector, so I consider it worth it.

-Llama

very very grateful , Llama, thank you for the links, Sir

[Skuzzy]

USB sound devices use up far more CPU time than an onboard sound chip would.  The USB bus is an interrupt happy bus which was never really designed for high bandwidth data usage.  Sounds are high bandwidth.

If nothing else is going on, then the USB bus is fine to use in that manner, but for something like a game, it really is not an appropriate use of the hardware.


Turtle Beach used to make good sound cards.  They no longer design sound cards and simply bundle up cards made by others with their logo on them.  They usually use a low end sound device.  Basically, they should be considered a commodity item for low end systems.

For the best performance, a good PCI, or PCI-E sound card will normally reduce the load on the CPU far more than any other sound device solution.

[llama]

I reviewed Surround-Sound Headphones last year for CPU Magazine. Half were USB-powered, which means they use a USB soundcard device that then pipes audio directly into headphones.

I noted CPU utilization of the audio subsystem when doing the full 5.1 channel thing, and can report on the following:

The vast majority of USB Audio devices use a codec and hardware platform made by C-Media, which is cheap and about 2 or 3 years old. CPU Utilization is between 10%-13%.

The Turtle Beach Ear-Force uses a newer, better sounding, and more efficient C-Media audio adapter, which uses between 6% - 10%. I would assume the other Turtle Beach units are using this newer adapter.

Onboard Audio chips consumed between 5%-10%, as do sound cards that don't do the "heavy lifting" themselves (such as the Audigy LS and some SBLive's).

Sound cards that can offload processing to its own Audio Processing Unit (like a Sound Blaster Audigy 1 or 2  - but not the LS models - the X-Fi, and some SB-Lives) dragged down the CPU to between 1% and 3% usage.

Qualitatively, AH was totally playable with all the headphones and tested sound cards. Yes, the framerates were slower when using the USB adapter, but it wasn't spikey or warpy - just generally slower.

If you have a rocket-ship of a computer and can spare around 10% of your framerate, USB audio devices worked fine for me. If you have a marginal system, they will make it more marginal.

I myself use an Audigy 2 ZS on my main gaming rig. FYI.

-Llama