Winter Audio Reference: On-Board, Consumer, and Pro Solutions

Audio Quality: Qualitative Analysis

For our qualitative audio analysis, we would like to stress again that listening to analog outputs on PC audio cards is a very subjective and difficult task. Digital should be used where possible, but the majority of people still run analog. And so the quality of analog output is still of the utmost importance.

-- 16-bit/44.1kHz/2-Channel Test: The Mangroves Live at Tir na Nog

This recording was done using a DigiDesign ProTools LE Digi 002 setup on a G5 at a local bar in Raleigh. Though the 1 room + 2 vox + 5 instrument mic setup (for a three piece indi/rock band) left a little to be desired, and the mix down was less than stellar, this gig makes an excellent test track. On the Gina3G and Intel solutions, it's easy to separate the noise and the music, but on the Audigy 2, the audience sounded a little smashed into the band. This problem wasn't as bad on the Audigy 4, but the crowd noise on the other cards seemed a little less muddy and thick. It's likely that any 44.1kHz audio source with a lot of high end will produce a muddled low end on Audigy cards because of the poor IMD at high frequencies. Just because we can't hear the high fequencies that are interfering doesn't mean that we can't hear the product of their interferance.

-- 24-bit/96kHz/6-Channel Test: Creative Labs Demo DVD-Audio

It was hard to decide on what media to choose, so we just pulled a track that we liked from the Creative sample disk. We went with Mannheim Steamroller - Leonardo from their American Gramaphone album. The track fits their normal eclectic style and mixes intricate rhythms with walking melodies. The synth harpsichord on drums is quite interesting. We used PowerDVD to play back the DVD-Audio on all 4 cards, and didn't have any problems. The voicing was clear all around, and try as we might, we couldn't discern one card from another. If we really cranked the volume to painful levels, we could hear some noise on the Intel solution. Unfortunately, there is no way to play DVD-Audio out over a digital connection to a receiver. This makes the analog signal quality of the card of the highest importance if DVD-Audio listening is going to be performed on the PC.

-- DVD-Video Tests: The Matrix / Dream Theatre Live at Budokan

We wanted to test a movie and a live audio performance with our DVD test. The Matrix is always fun to watch, so we just couldn't help popping that one in. And who's better live than Dream Theater? OK, so that may be totally subjective, but they at least create a lot of sound, and being a drummer, it's hard not to want to sit and listen to Mike Portnoy for multiple hours. Both The Matrix and Dream Theater Live at Budokan took full advantage of our 5.1 surround system, though we preferred listening to Dream Theatre using the higher quality headphones in stereo while watching. And so, we listened both ways on each card just to cover the bases.

And what do you know, but we just couldn't find favor with any of these cards. Each did as good of a job as the last playing back these higher quality audio streams.

The only discernable differences in our listening tests came in at 16-bit/44.1kHz on the Audigy series of cards. Tying it back to RMAA, we can point to the poor IMD performance. On a design level, some sites point out that this problem could stem from the fact that the creative DSP is locked at 16-bit/48kHz, and 44.1 is not an even multiple of 48 (as 96 and 192 are). This odd multiple resampling could be causing the issues, but that seems likely only if the DSP were enabled (some EAX/EQ/filtering turned on). In our RMAA tests and during playback, we made sure to disable these features, so this shouldn't have been a factor.

It is possible to have your favorite media player upsample your 44.1kHz media up to 48kHz, which would cause less problems than forcing a native 48kHz device to operate at 44.1kHz. Check the help files for resampling options.