How to Buy the Best Computer Sound Card

By lordkhomar | 0 Comments | Rating: 0 | |

Today's off the shelf computer systems often skimp on the computer sound card inside of it. Most new computer buyers look at ram, processor speed, hard drive size and the video card quality, but almost never on the quality of the computer sound card installed. This is unfortunate since most computer users today listen to music through their PC and/or play games.

Lets go through the features of the typical computer sound card

These are the important features on a computer sound card, in no particular order..

• Db rating: in a nutshell this is how loud the computer sound card can go
• S/N ratio: This is the signal to noise ratio, or how much of the sound you hear is actually noise. The higher S/N rating the better the computer sound card is. If you listen to music with loud and soft passages, the S/N rating is critical to you. For you gamers, this is a must.
• THD: Total Harmonic Distortion, simply put this is how accurately the sound is produced compared to the input. The less distortion, or THD the computer sound card has, the more accurately you'll hear what the artist intended you to hear.
• Frequency range: This is how high and low the computer sound card can go. An important stat for music.

I just want a new computer sound card, what features should I be looking at??

Different stats are more important in different situations.

• If you listen to loud rock music the S/N ratio may not mean much to you, but the Db rating sure does.
• For classical music the frequency range and THD may be more important to you.
• Strictly for gaming, well maybe the Db rating doesn't mean anything, but the S/N rating will be more important.

So you see, choose the computer sound card based on your needs, not by the pretty graphics on the box.

Anything else important when choosing a computer sound card?

Yep, there sure is. Make sure the computer sound card you're interested in is compatable with many different sound formats, called APIs. Some games may require DirectSound3D, make sure the computer sound card can use this. EAX is another popular format.

You should also make sure the computer sound card can use your current speaker setup or you may have to buy new speakers too.

How much does a great computer sound card cost?

Here's an example of a top notch computer sound card available on Amazon.

That depends on the features as well as if it's on sale or not. I suggest reading sound card reviews on such sites as ConsumerSearch and ConsumerReports. They have unbiased sound card reviews written by users just like yourself. You will also find many useful links right here on this page to help you find the best computer sound card too.

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A typical computer sound card