Question Sound card compatibility ?

[dankogrg]

Im building a new pc but wanna save on sound card and buy an older and used one
Will it be a problem to have them wrok on Windows 11?
because i always see most of them having updates up to Vista, XP or 8 and after that they didnt make any updates on it

 

[COLGeek]

Why add a sound card at all? The built-in audio on modern motherboards more than meet the needs of most users.

 

[gamerk316]

Why add a sound card at all? The built-in audio on modern motherboards more than meet the needs of most users.

Headphone users benefit a lot more from a dedicated sound card, especially if they have an AMP on them.

To answer the OP: I can't speak for Win11, but my Creative Sound Blaster Z works fine on Win10, and Creative has a number of newer products I'm sure are supported. I would expect most things that have a Win10 driver will run on Win11, though I'd clarify that with the OEM before a purchase regardless.

 

[kerberos_20]

Headphone users benefit a lot more from a dedicated sound card, especially if they have an AMP on them.

To answer the OP: I can't speak for Win11, but my Creative Sound Blaster Z works fine on Win10, and Creative has a number of newer products I'm sure are supported. I would expect most things that have a Win10 driver will run on Win11, though I'd clarify that with the OEM before a purchase regardless.

actualy most people who had dedicated soundcard already moved into better external solutions, coz they are better as you can move it around between devices and as a bonus, you got zero PC noise, you also dont need to to worry about drivers with them

 

[Fuad]

I have Creative Sound Blaster Z, used it on Win 10 and worked great, but since I switched to Win 11 (clean install) the driver & software install flawlessly, but sometimes the sound gets a little stressful to my ears ( I have sensitive ears and always use headphones, never had this issues with win 10), after some troubleshooting I discovered that the - Creative Sound Blaster Command - software that controls the sound card sometimes tends to change settings on its own and enable -SBX - profiles, which can cause some stressful audio frequencies.
Now my advice is, although Sound Blaster Z is -much- better that on board audio ( especially if you are using the right headphones / speakers to be able to hear the difference), it is very old now and not properly supported on Win 11.
I would suggest you either go for an external usb DAC / AMP ( like topping DX1 which is priced very nicely ) and disable your MB on board audio, or go for Creative Sound BlasterX AE-5 plus ( either option you choose should consider your audio gear / usage).

 

[geofelt]

Try onboard sound first.
If you want better, buy new; no telling why a seller wants to get rid of a card.
Lastly, sound cards are tightly interwoven with pc functions.
In the past, there have been many strange issues with sound cards.

 

[hotaru.hino]

Try onboard sound first.
If you want better, buy new; no telling why a seller wants to get rid of a card.
Lastly, sound cards are tightly interwoven with pc functions.
In the past, there have been many strange issues with sound cards.

As someone who's had a sound card in some form or another in the past two decades, the only "strange issue" I've had is the occasional freeze if mucked around with the actual hardware. But I doubt that was because of the sound card. It was probably just me touching it.

Otherwise, I haven't seen strange issues at all. And honestly you could replace "sound card" with almost any add-in thing because people are more likely to report issues than not.

To contribute to this topic though, I have a CreativeX AE-5 running on Windows 11 and it's fine. The only problem is last I checked, the drivers on Creative's site tends to be outdated, but the Sound Blaster Command app seems to pick up updates. It's a minor annoyance though.