ASUS Xonar D2X 7.1 Channels 24-bit 192KHz PCI Express x1 Interface Sound Card - Retail

It Don't Get Any Better Than This !!

Reviewed By: SlikLizrd on 1/28/2010

Tech Level: somewhat high - Ownership: 1 day to 1 week

Pros: ALMOST everything you need for a quick and easy installation and set-up -- plenty of software, and an absolutely beautiful sound card that will please the most discriminating geek who wants to see how pretty your machine's innards look -- and there's a bit of a light-show goin' on in the back, too !!
Appearance aside, this baby has the right stuff to bring out the best in every music medium -- and it does it perfectly !!

Cons: That pesky 4-pin power-supply extension SHOULD be included in the box, but it ain't in there. You will need to measure carefully, and make your own -- and be sure that you can connect your D2X to your power supply without interference with other components. Better to have wires that are a bit too long than try to make short wires do the job -- it ain't worth the risk. The D2X's 4-pin connector is pretty fragile, so TAKE YOUR TIME !!
Another con -- Newegg's price is much higher than some other competitor vendors.

Other Thoughts: I was always very pleased with the sound I got from the Creative Labs Soundblaster Audigy and their X-Fi, too --
BUT -- that was before I slipped in the ASUS D2X and cranked it to Pink Floyd's "Dark Side of the Moon" !!
Lemme tell ya somethin', my music-lovin' friends -- this sound card is absolutely magical in it's performance, and the sound quality is magnificent !!

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Feedback after a year of ownership

Reviewed By: LateToTheParty on 1/7/2010

Tech Level: somewhat high - Ownership: more than 1 year

This user purchased this item from Newegg

Pros: Sound Quality is pretty good, Linux driver is great.

Cons: Buggy windows driver, Hardware limitations.
The hardware limitation is that you cannot listen to multiple inputs.

Other Thoughts: I wrote an overly harsh review which I submitted to the cheaper version of this card in error.
I do still use this card, however I've had to cope with the limitations by also continuing to use the integrated sound card.

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Reviewed By: sdlvx on 12/28/2009

Tech Level: somewhat high - Ownership: more than 1 year

Pros: The sound quality is top notch for an internal computer soundcard. Listening to music is a great experience, upsampling channels works, and the detail and sound quality is amazing. The things you hear about the sound quality of this card being phenomenal are very true. It even sounds great with my PC166 sennheisers, which are by no means audiophile grade.

Cons: There is one giant flaw with this card, and it's that some programs, when crashing and playing audio, will continue to loop the last few hundred of milliseconds over and over if that program crashes. The only remedy is to reboot your computer or disable then reenable your sound card driver in device manager. Unfortunately, in windows 7, you have to reboot to do that.

This problem has existed for well over a year and Asus has released several drivers between then and now, and none of them have fixed the problem with the looping sound. If you're an overclocker or you're playing a game that likes to crash a lot, be prepared to have to reboot all the time with this card.

Other Thoughts: For 200 dollars, you'd expect a soundcard to not have this problem. You'd also expect Asus to fix it, but it's been well over a year since this was reported to them in their VIP forums. I would suggest looking somewhere else if you're going to be overclocking or in a situation where you'll have programs crashing.

I'd also like to point out that reboots take forever, I have an Asus P6T Deluxe, and the amount of marvel controllers on this board give you long, long boot times (I need them all enabled).

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