Question Will an Asus Xonar SE 5.1 (116db) be better than an on board Realtek ALC898 ??

Saad Kasu

Reputable
May 4, 2015
26
0
4,540
Hi, i have a Gigabyte Z87-ud5th Motherboard it's around 4 years old, the on board sound card is a Realtek ALC898. I have recently purchased the Hyper X Cloud Alpha and when there is no music playing in the headphones i hear STATIC NOISE, i can confirm that it's not an issue with the headphones cause i use them with my laptop and they work fine . I was wondering if buying a Sound Card like the Xonar SE would eliminate the Static and also does a Xonar SE produce better sound compared to my on board sound card, if not what are my other options??
 

Lutfij

Titan
Moderator
Before you've decided on spending for a discrete sound card, have you thought about troubleshooting your system first to see if maybe the OS(if Windows 10) is causing issues for the audio? Realtek driven audio has had a tough time ever since Windows 10 came to be.

Mind sharing your full system's specs like so:
CPU:
Motherboard:
Ram:
SSD/HDD:
GPU:
PSU:
Chassis:
OS:

Often times, the static noise can also come from dirty power to and from your PSU. On other occasions, it's also possible that the front panel is defective(if that's what you're plugged into).