PCI Sound card for P4 system

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robotsmani

Journeyman
I want to buy a pci sound card for my P4 dualcore system. Seems that the onboard sound is not working.
Here is the config
MB: ECS P4M800Pro v1.0A
CPU: P4 Dual core
RAM: Transcend 1GB 533
OS: Windows 7

i want to buy a cheaper card as this system is for more experiments and it is going to use by my 3year old kid to run the pre school interactive DVDs.

So i saw there are zebronics and intex is having cheaper 5.1 cards within Rs300.Also i saw some USB sound cards for rs100 in ebay.
Suggest me a good one within this price range. Apart from zebronics and intex, is there any? Is it worth buying the USB one?

Thanks,
Mani
 
patkim

patkim

Cyborg Agent
Before you go for separate sound card, do double check and confirm that onboard sound has given up. Sometimes it just might be due to dust accumulation in the sockets, loose or damaged plugs or may be accidental alteration of the soundcard properties in control panel or even corrupt drivers.


I am not too sure about USB sound cards, however you can always go for PCI card like Intex etc which is cheaper and can be available for < 300 Rs and is fairly fine for basic sound quality. Also since kid is going to use, better to avoid USB card (it could be fiddled with) and go for PCI internal card which remains intact inside the cabinet.
 
topgear

topgear

Super Moderator
Staff member
don't get cheap sound cards - I 've used two of them and all of them has poor sound quality and given up just after 1 year of use - you better get Creative Sound Blaster Audigy Value around ~1.5k - this may sound a bit pricey but it's good investment anyway - it has decent sound quality and should last for many years ;-)
 
OP
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robotsmani

Journeyman
Thanks guys...

My mobo is 5years old one and recently i connected to my wide monitor and display is not supporting the wide monitor and i saw the mobo manufacturer is giving BIOS update for this Wide support. So i updated the BIOS and the display started working fine.

Then i installed Windows7 on this machine and checked the sound is not working. i am sure before the bios update, it was working. Also i thought it may be with the win7 is not supporting the sound. I searched the net and found the drivers for windows7 and installed. All the drivers are installing properly and device manager it is showing correct and i am getting the speaker icon. But there is not sound in the speaker. I tried with different speaker/headphone but no luck.

So i decided the sound card is corrupted as i updated the PSU for the Mother board(previously it was using some local PSU). Now it is using the 4year old Antec PSU+Cabinet.

Is there any workaround to check the sound chip in the motherboard? Anybody faced similer kind of issue?


I don't want to spend too much money on the sound card as this machine going to be used for electronics experiments. i need a normal sound quality for this.

i found on the net there is some creative SB 5.1 is around rs950 and it may be cheaper in SP road.

Is it a good one? Still it is pricy....Is there any external sound cards are available?

NOTE: This is my secondary system and i have the primary machine. config is in my signature :)
 
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pimpom

Cyborg Agent
It just so happens that a friend asked me to test one of those ~100/- USB sound cards yesterday. It worked at the first plug in and the sound quality is quite OK considering the price. I'm pretty sure it will be good enough for your stated purpose. The only uncertain factor is reliability which, of course, I can't judge since I haven't used it before.

Have you checked to see if your on-board sound device is enabled in BIOS?
 
patkim

patkim

Cyborg Agent
BTW my SB Audigy value is not recognized by Win7 despite updating the drivers. It works fine in Xp. I have dual boot.

Moreover I was disappointed with the kind of poor support provided when I faced tech issues with this card. The chosen line-in option resets to mic-in as recording device everytime I start windows. The tech support team of manufacturer kept on giving textbook responses and were reluctant to provide solution claiming that this is older model for them to enhance the software now!!

I am not too sure what would be the electronic experiments you wish to do. However if you have requirements to record from various sources like microphone and line-in devices like electronic musical instruments or portable audio players, suggest that you avoid cards that have single line/mic port with auto sensing. Better go for cards that have separate input ports.
 
OP
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robotsmani

Journeyman
i tried installing windows xp. no luck. still no sound. Is it really worth buying 1k to 1.5k sound card for old pc and hi fi sound which i don't want.

zebronics vs intex which is good. other than this two is anyother make sound cards with rs300?
 
OP
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robotsmani

Journeyman
Bought the Creative sound blaster 5.1 VX - rs900+tax. working excellent.

i agree that, buying a quality product is good as it will long run and buying cheaper quality product double your expenses and also a pain when its fail.

Also bought the "Enter USB Audio Controller" for rs120 as i don't have the front panel audio port. Wow...it is working excellent too....i am not saying it is very good sound quality, but i am getting 2 channel effect nicely.

Buying cheaper product is not advisable at the same time if it is very cheap...you can buy and experiment. If it works you are lucky, otherwise think that you had a bad meal in a bad hotel and forget it.(i am lucky i got a good meal...:)))

Thanks guys for all your advice...i will post some pic soon....
 
topgear

topgear

Super Moderator
Staff member
robotsmani said:
Bought the Creative sound blaster 5.1 VX - rs900+tax. working excellent.

i agree that, buying a quality product is good as it will long run and buying cheaper quality product double your expenses and also a pain when its fail.

Also bought the "Enter USB Audio Controller" for rs120 as i don't have the front panel audio port. Wow...it is working excellent too....i am not saying it is very good sound quality, but i am getting 2 channel effect nicely.

Buying cheaper product is not advisable at the same time if it is very cheap...you can buy and experiment. If it works you are lucky, otherwise think that you had a bad meal in a bad hotel and forget it.(i am lucky i got a good meal...:)))

Thanks guys for all your advice...i will post some pic soon....
Click to expand...

congrats ! even I've a a Enter USB Sound Dongle - I bought it 2 years back ;-)
 
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