7.1 STX II Sound Card, Home Theater

[xavatarhax]

Hey guys, hope you're all doing well.

So, I have a little question. I am using an Asus Xonar STX II 7.1 in my PC and I want to set up a home theater in my room. Now I could just go ahead and buy a set of a 5.1 speaker system, but considering the fact that my PC's sound card will be better than anything a cheap sound system will come with, I was thinking of connecting the speakers directly to my sound card for better quality.

And that's where the problem lies. I don't exactly know how to do that, or if it is even possible. If so, is it the most efficient solution? Maybe a 5.1 system could be connected to my sound card to improve its quality. Maybe getting a receiver is more efficient after all. I really don't know. Do you guys have a good solution to this problem? I am on a rather low budget right now, so I would like to spend no more than 100-150€ on my speakers. I'm sure that's sufficient for a decent sound system in combination with my sound card.

Any suggestions for good speakers etc. at a low budget are much appreciated.

Thanks for your help in advance!

 

[getochkn]

You would still need an amp or receiver anyways because the sound card doesn't amplify anything beyond headphone level. Then comes the problem of a PC decoding surround sound movies and streams like youtube properly. There is a lot of copyright crap involved and getting things and codecs to work with media players can be a pain.

Have a AVR, audio video receiver, will allow you to plug the GPU output via HDMI to it, do all the proper surround stuff and output the video to your TV.

That is the best idea situation for a HTPC.