Roccat Kave xtd 5.1 digital or analog?

[spacebrainer]

I've been looking to buy a real 5.1 surround headset to replace my old one (Zalman ZM-RS6F 5.1).
I want to buy the 'roccat kave xtd 5.1' but I discovered there are two verions: the digital version and the analog version. The digital comes with an external sound card which has a lot of really nice features like the ability to pair your phone with bluetooth, muting the microphone, ... Now the analog doesn't have this external sound card and is meant to be used if you already have a soundcard in your pc. Therefor it is about 70€ cheaper.

I do not have a dedicated soundcard in my pc but I have a decent motherboard (asus Z87-A) that supports up to 7.1 surround and I've been told it's good for audio. Since I'm buying a real 5.1 headset I do not care about sound quality, just the positional audio. In other words, I'm not going to listen music with it, I'm just going to use it for gaming.

So do you think I could save 70€ and buy the analog version without buying an extra sound card but just by using the soundcard in my motherboard or would I have a better surround sound exprience when I buy the digital version?

Tell me what you think!

Thank you in advance

 

[basroil]

. Since I'm buying a real 5.1 headset I do not care about sound quality, just the positional audio. In other words, I'm not going to listen music with it, I'm just going to use it for gaming.

No such thing as a "real 5.1 headset", you have just two ears and both are listening to independent sounds. ALL headphones by the nature of being headphones are two channel, though they can virtualize sound by mixing left and right channels and adding a bit of lag to each to simulate how sounds would if you had dependent audio sources like speakers in a room. Most games actually do virtualization in-engine too, and it works very well.

Regardless of what nonsense you have read online at gaming sites, you are 100% better off with good headphones than with "5.1/7.1 gamer" ones. Since you are already looking at ~$170 headsets, check out the http/www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1062932-REG/sennheiser_506080_g4me_one_headset_black.html as well.

 

[spacebrainer]

Thanks for your reply basroil,

The thing is, I own a 'real 5.1' headset right now and I want a new one. I've read a lot online and descided to buy the HyperX cloud 2's since they get great reviews and they are virtual 7.1. I say virtual when I mean just one speaker in each earcup. I am aware 'real surround' isn't a thing in headsets but it's just a way for me to refer to headsets with more than one speaker in each earcup.
I descided to return the HyperX cloud 2. When I compared the accuracy of the positional audio of the virtual 7.1 cloud's to the real 5.1 headset I had before, I found the real 5.1 was way more accurate. I even got a friend and my dad to test it without telling them which one I think is best and all of them said the real 5.1 was more accurate. Positional audio is very important for me since I like to play competitive games like counter strike.

So I'm sorry but you can't convince me to buy something else than a 'real' 5.1 or 7.1 headset and since the 7.1's are way to expensive I figured the roccat kave xtd 5.1 are the best 5.1's out there. So my real question is, do you think I need a dedicated sound card to go with that headset or is the on board soundcard of my asus Z87-A just fine.

 

[basroil]

So my real question is, do you think I need a dedicated sound card to go with that headset or is the on board soundcard of my asus Z87-A just fine.

That's like asking if you need to buy premium unleaded or only plus for a pinto... Anything on the market will be better than those headphones can handle, so don't bother spending a single extra cent on improving quality ("positional").


And for everything else you said, the root cause is poor configuration parameters on your end. If you don't configure the 5.1 system properly, you'll have just as bad of "positional audio" as before. Like with anything else, configuration should be your first step.

 

[makkem]

. Since I'm buying a real 5.1 headset I do not care about sound quality, just the positional audio. In other words, I'm not going to listen music with it, I'm just going to use it for gaming.

No such thing as a "real 5.1 headset", you have just two ears and both are listening to independent sounds. ALL headphones by the nature of being headphones are two channel, though they can virtualize sound by mixing left and right channels and adding a bit of lag to each to simulate how sounds would if you had dependent audio sources like speakers in a room. Most games actually do virtualization in-engine too, and it works very well.

Regardless of what nonsense you have read online at gaming sites, you are 100% better off with good headphones than with "5.1/7.1 gamer" ones. Since you are already looking at ~$170 headsets, check out the http/www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1062932-REG/sennheiser_506080_g4me_one_headset_black.html as well.

Actually the Roccat Kave analogue headphones have three drivers in each earcup and plug into the souncard with three 3.5mm TRS plugs and are true 6 channel .

 

[basroil]

Actually the Roccat Kave analogue headphones have three drivers in each earcup and plug into the souncard with three 3.5mm TRS plugs and are true 6 channel .

Seems you also don't get the point. Because these are headphones, you effectively have only two channels, since you have two ears being "driven" independently rather than together. Here's a rundown on how positioning works in the human body (and triangulation systems):
Lets assume a sound is produced to your left, at a certain distance away.
1) The sound first hits your left ear with strength A
2) Time t after that, the same sound hits your right ear at strength B
3) Using the distance between your ears and t* speed of sound (which is also distance), you can "easily" calculate a bearing , though it will be a circle on a sphere since you can only calculate one of the variables
4) A bearing alone is useful, but incomplete without how far something is, which can be determined by the strength of A compared to B, since sound works on the inverse power law like most types of energy.

With that, you have have positional audio that tells you how far something is in addition to how far left or right. Headphone virtualization uses transfer functions to introduce these delays and mixes the right power balance into the left and right, so even though there are two channels, there is far more information in those two channels than you actually thought.

Why "5.1" audio is actually WORSE for that deals with how 5.1 audio works in speakers vs headphones. In speakers, you actually produce sounds at a certain, constant distance, with speakers in center, left, right, and usually two in back offset from the center. Your computer, when playing a game, will output the information to one or more of those speakers, but because they produce sound heard by both ears, you will usually only generate sound from one side (unless calibrated otherwise). When you send that data to a headphone, suddenly a sound on your left will only come out of the left, and you LOSE positional and distance information because now anything on the left side will only come from the left, and you can't calculate how far left or right it was from that latency.

(note this is for simulated sounds, true sounds are affected by your body, and those tiny changes give you the third variable so you know where the sound is. )