nforce 2 sound, or SB Live value sound?

[dryass]

i love my sb live... always sounded good, clear , crisp, etc... but this onboard sound got my curious

its 5.1 dolby blah blah blah, 6 speaker support... thats all nice, but does anyone know if sounds clear and good? and is there anyway to control the bass and trouble? thats one thing i always loved about my sb live.. bass and trouble control

just wondeirn' what peeps think

[Kermit]

I enabled the onboard sound on my soyo, 6.1 all that junk too... SB live 5.1 still sounds better. I put it back it.

Turn it on, take a listen. If you like it, use it. If not, don't.

One problem nathan had with his Nforce onboard audio is with EAX. It has a form of it... but all it does is put an echo to EVERTHING!! Dosen't matter where you are in the game, it echos. It's annoying as shit.

[BloodyL]

That's bass and "treble", not trouble. :rolleyes:

The digital output of the nforce2 is better than an SB Live!, on a par with the audigy1, and worse than the audigy2.

The analog output is on a par with an SB Live!, and worse than the audigy1/2.

Bass & treble can be controlled using the soundstorm application in the system tray.

[Mike1_2001]

Originally posted by BloodyL
That's bass and "treble", not trouble. :rolleyes:

The digital output of the nforce2 is better than an SB Live!, on a par with the audigy1, and worse than the audigy2.

The analog output is on a par with an SB Live!, and worse than the audigy1/2.

Bass & treble can be controlled using the soundstorm application in the system tray.

But but but it IS trouble!!!

:D :D :D

[VBlaster]

nForce 2 Soundstorm sounds pretty good on the NF7-S ver 2.0 for me. It should sound better than Live!

As for bass and treble control, you'll definitly like Soundstorm - it has equalizer controls! Much like my TBSC.

[MjSwooosh]

Soundstorm on an nForce2 board is definitely better than a Live card, and just about as good as an Audigy as well (though maybe not quite as good as the Audigy2). Sound quality is pretty subjective though.

[dryass]

Whats this soundstorm everyone is talking about? I installed the drivers from the motherboad CD and i didn't see soundstorm or any tools / proggies for the sound card... it seems it just installs the driver to get sound and thats it...

[Kermit]

You bought the MSI board right?

Chances are for what you spent, you didn't get the best onboard audi. I would PERSONALLY stick with the live.

[White_Rooque]

Originally posted by dryass
Whats this soundstorm everyone is talking about? I installed the drivers from the motherboad CD and i didn't see soundstorm or any tools / proggies for the sound card... it seems it just installs the driver to get sound and thats it...

NFORCE 2 AUDIO COMES IN 2 FLAVORS,THE UPSCALE BOARDS LIKE THE ASUS DELUXE CARRY THE SOUNDSTORM WHILE THE LESSER BOARDS HAVE THE STANDARD NFORCE AUDIO.IF YOUR CD DOSEN'T HAVE THE SOUNDSTORM DRIVERS,CHANCES ARE THE BOARD DOSEN'T HAVE THE NVIDIA SOUNDSTORM CHIP ON BOARD,CHECK YOUR MOBO MANUAL TO SEE WHAT YOU'VE GOT.

[VBlaster]

Here's how Soundstorm is like:

http://www.3dsoundsurge.com/reviews/nForce/

You should get this kind of control panel for an nForce2 Soundstrom certified mobo (I have with the NF7-S ver 2.0 - the nForce2 mobo I would recommend. It's cheap, has the full features of nForce2, and very overclockable):

http://www.3dsoundsurge.com/reviews/nForce/images/main_page.jpg

http://www.3dsoundsurge.com/reviews/nForce/images/speaker_setup.jpg

NF7-S sound system testing:

http://www.hardocp.com/article.html?art=NDA2LDM=

[dryass]

Originally posted by White_Rooque


NFORCE 2 AUDIO COMES IN 2 FLAVORS,THE UPSCALE BOARDS LIKE THE ASUS DELUXE CARRY THE SOUNDSTORM WHILE THE LESSER BOARDS HAVE THE STANDARD NFORCE AUDIO.IF YOUR CD DOSEN'T HAVE THE SOUNDSTORM DRIVERS,CHANCES ARE THE BOARD DOSEN'T HAVE THE NVIDIA SOUNDSTORM CHIP ON BOARD,CHECK YOUR MOBO MANUAL TO SEE WHAT YOU'VE GOT.

yeah i just figured that out when reading the manual.. there 2 kinds, theres the one with all the goodies to it, then theres the standard, i have the standard audio nforce

meh, no biggie, ive had this live for so long i dont know anything that sounds better in my opinion

[marianozz]

I have the good nforce2 audio, and i tell you, only reason im using the Audigy is cause of the optical input... if not for that sell its ass...

[White_Rooque]

Originally posted by dryass


yeah i just figured that out when reading the manual.. there 2 kinds, theres the one with all the goodies to it, then theres the standard, i have the standard audio nforce

meh, no biggie, ive had this live for so long i dont know anything that sounds better in my opinion

yep...jus keep ur sb live in there,should be fine

[Priceless_Dabson!~]

Games gave bad feedback and craped out with on board sound!
NEVER NEVER AGAIN!!!!!!!!


SBAudigy all the way!

[Mike1_2001]

Originally posted by Priceless_Dabson!~
Games gave bad feedback and craped out with on board sound!
NEVER NEVER AGAIN!!!!!!!!


SBAudigy all the way!

Sperm~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ all the way!!! :evil:

:D :D :D

[BloodyL]

Vblaster: Are you a surgie or did you just find that site in a search?

Dryass: The 3dsoundsurge review will tell you all you need to know! :)

[Apoch003]

I with Dabby, but for a different reason.

Onboard sound usually shares IRQ with AGP, and generally, the onboard sound also uses more cpu cycles.

[mellotron]

Originally posted by Apoch003
I with Dabby, but for a different reason.

Onboard sound usually shares IRQ with AGP, and generally, the onboard sound also uses more cpu cycles.

well irq sharing hasn't been a real problem in a long time... anyways most soundcards share IRQs with the AGP. I know my SB Live! does.
secondly the soundstorm onboard systems from what i've seen actually use less cycles than the audigy or live.

[Apoch003]

Originally posted by Evil_Messiah


well irq sharing hasn't been a real problem in a long time... anyways most soundcards share IRQs with the AGP. I know my SB Live! does.
secondly the soundstorm onboard systems from what i've seen actually use less cycles than the audigy or live.

That's nice to hear! :)

Got a link to prove it? I'm sure we'd all be interested.

[mellotron]

CPU utilization benchmark - hits 3.2% once, but usually stays below 2% - This is on the Abit NF7-S... on the ASUS A7N8X cpu util was somewhat higher.

http://www.hardocp.com/image.html?image=MTA0MDA1MDk0NDFNN0V3VVBIME9fM18xX 2wuZ2lm
http://www.hardocp.com/image.html?image=MTAzODgwNzQxM0JMRTFxUnViZTJfNV8xX 2wuZ2lm

Audio - Subjective Listening

Listening to the first track on Vanessa Mae's The Violin Player, Tocatta and Fugue in D minor, will bring out the best and worst in a sound chipset, as the track is filled with orchestral drums, woodwinds, and strings, as well as the electronic beats of techno music. Add to it the strong lead of an electric violin, and you have a song that will sound beautiful on good hardware and absolutely flat on anything less. Using Sony digital reference headphones and a pure .wav rip of the track straight from CD, there's no losing any of the quality of the recording.

In this subjective test, the reviewer's ears are put to the test as much as the motherboard, as they are straining to hear the slightest imperfection in sound. I was never able to hear a pop, crackle, hiss, or buzz that indicates interference from another subsystem on the board; nor were there any cut out frequencies within audible range.

from 3dsoundsurge
With the nForce I feel that NVIDIA has given consumers the most attractive alternative to buying a PCI sound card for hard-core gaming, but just as with any other integrated system it of course takes a full motherboard change and all that can potentially go along with that (e.g. potentially new memory and CPU) to get at what the nForce APU has to offer.

The marquee DICE feature works just as promised opening up the world of multichannel gaming to those with Dolby Digital 5.1 systems that lack 6 channel analog inputs and it also offers a Pro Logic encoding (like Creative used to offer via the Live) for those with older multichannel systems that lack Dolby Digital decoding.

It offers excellent support for DirectSound, DS3D (all with plenty of 3D channels), I3DL2, EAX and EAX2 along with native OpenAL support. Most noteworthy and somewhat surprising given our expectation of a stock Sensaura reverb engine, the reverb quality while not quite as consistent as the Live or Audigy, is clearly the overall best of all Creative’s competitors and a clear plus of gaming on the nForce. What is lacking is support for EAX Advanced HD. While EAX Advanced HD titles can be written with a fall-back to EAX 2, only the Audigy series from Creative currently take full advantage of aural aspects of EAX Advanced HD titles.

Two-speaker, headphone and four-speaker 3D audio from Sensaura’s engine is simply outstanding with both the two speaker and headphone modes arguably being the current top of the market. Six channel gaming support using the NVIDIA implementation of the Sensaura MultiDrive 5.1 engine is also excellent.

Pure sound quality, particularly on the analog outputs, is atypically difficult to generalize because of vendors ability to use a variety of different codecs with the nForce APU. What we can say is the quality of the reference system using the aforementioned Sigmatel codecs is very good. While it’s not quite at the level offered by the Cirrus Logic 4630 products such as the Santa Cruz or Creative’s Audigy 2, it’s more than good enough to satisfy the majority of casual listeners.

Also some more game benchmarks... looking at the charts its scores are very respectable... always within +/-2% if not leading.
http://www.3dsoundsurge.com/reviews/nForce/nForce-p9.html

Also here are some quantitative quality tests...
http://www.3dsoundsurge.com/reviews/nForce/nForce-p5.html

The only weak part of the sound card as it seems is the dolby digital encoding. the sound levels curve off at 17kHz+, however this was done by dolby labs as to conserve bandwidth while trying to keep the quality of the sound lossless, you wont notice the effect unless listening to music with lots of high frequencies.

I'm probably gonna be getting an nForce2 or nForce3 system by the end of the year so I am looking forward to the good things from nVidia (gasp, i can't believe i said that!)

[Apoch003]

Excellent! Thanks Steve.

Yeah, I've been reluctant to say it... but Nvidia can make one hell of a chipset. My nforce2 board (Epox 8rda+) roxors.

[mellotron]

hehe np. internet sleuthing is fun... especially when i have to write an exam in 7 hours... i should get some sleep. lol...

good night.

[VBlaster]

Originally posted by BloodyL
Vblaster: Are you a surgie or did you just find that site in a search?

Dryass: The 3dsoundsurge review will tell you all you need to know! :)

I have been with 3DSoundsurge since the Vortex days :)

Sigh, seems like quite a few have not read the reviews I've linked (3DSoundsurge and HardOCP), with their baggage over onboard sound.

[Rainbow]

Onboard sound generally uses a shit load of cpu cycles compared to a seperate card. Dunno about The nforce series though.

[melchy]

The Soundstorm is the best of the onboard solutions and is very much on par with Audigy 1. The only problem being is that some boards suffer from the "Crackling" problem in some games. I eventually got fed up with the crackling and bought a Sonic Xplosion, which is a great card. Felt like a change from the usual creative stuff.

[VBlaster]

You're right. The Soundstorm is about Audigy's standard. However, how clean it sounds is dependent on the circuitry around the mobo. The Abit NF7-S ver 2 is pretty good in this aspect, but I won't say it's all the same for others.

[melchy]

I've got an early revision Epox N-Force 2 board and the sound clackling is definately a problem. I do believe that it was fixed on later revisions. There is a reason why NVidia are constantly updating the NForce 2 sound drivers, in order to fix the problem. There was a new NVidia Soundstorm driver about every month on Windows Update for a while.

[marianozz]

Im have the NF7-S 2.0, and im telling you, im only keeping the audigy in there cause its a platinum and im using the front panel....


sound was just as good (if not better), i had no cracklin whatsoever the time i tried it...

[VBlaster]

Originally posted by melchy
I've got an early revision Epox N-Force 2 board and the sound clackling is definately a problem. I do believe that it was fixed on later revisions. There is a reason why NVidia are constantly updating the NForce 2 sound drivers, in order to fix the problem. There was a new NVidia Soundstorm driver about every month on Windows Update for a while.

It's usually not so much the drivers, but the circuitry used around the mobo that affects the Soundstorm setup. Most users of the NF7-S ver 2 are very happy with the sound from the get go (even with earlier drivers).

[Priceless_Dabson!~]

Originally posted by Apoch003
I with Dabby, but for a different reason.

Onboard sound usually shares IRQ with AGP, and generally, the onboard sound also uses more cpu cycles. Thank you .......It's nothing but trouble..............Trouble trouble ............!!