Great budget soundcard?

AstroMagic

Estimable
Jan 5, 2015
19
0
4,560
The reason I ask is because I sometimes hear a random pop in my headphones during videos on youtube and not livestreams. It might be the headphones or the video but from me asking numerous times on youtube other people don't hear it. My headphones are hyperx cloud 1's. I'm looking to upgrade to some hd 598's soon anyways. My motherboard is a z97-a/3.1usb. I definitely heard the upgrade from my old hp pavilion desktop pc to my z97-a mobo built in audio card crystal 2 I think is what it's called?
 
Solution
my brother has an asus z97-a and uses the headphone out to a small speaker amplifier and does not get any popping as far as i know.

speaker pop is normally caused by..
A) poor connections
B) wiring inside the amp or output device
C) amplifier

if you have additional headphones laying around you can test if they all pop or if just the hxc does. that will tell you if its a headphone issue. you could also try the front jack vs the rear jack.

good soundcards for below $100? creative z (better amp, average dac) or the asus xonar dx (better dac, average amp). for a 1:1 quality swap the xonar dg is not bad if your onboard is acting up. its about equal to higher end onboard. another route you could go is an external dac+amp (fiio e10k or...
my brother has an asus z97-a and uses the headphone out to a small speaker amplifier and does not get any popping as far as i know.

speaker pop is normally caused by..
A) poor connections
B) wiring inside the amp or output device
C) amplifier

if you have additional headphones laying around you can test if they all pop or if just the hxc does. that will tell you if its a headphone issue. you could also try the front jack vs the rear jack.

good soundcards for below $100? creative z (better amp, average dac) or the asus xonar dx (better dac, average amp). for a 1:1 quality swap the xonar dg is not bad if your onboard is acting up. its about equal to higher end onboard. another route you could go is an external dac+amp (fiio e10k or similar) if virtual surround isnt a big deal to you.
 
Solution

AstroMagic

Estimable
Jan 5, 2015
19
0
4,560


It's the first version of the hyperx clouds so it doesn't interest me as I went for the first version and not the 2's. I will take a look at the rear jacks as I use the front ones... I will also look at the dacs you recommended me.