New headphones and/or mic :: Hardware and Operating Systems

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Reddy 2017 年 3 月 26 日上午 3:23

New headphones and/or mic

My microphone recently broke and is out of warranty (a BLUE snowball) as well as the mic on my headset (a Razer Kraken 7.1 Chroma) has been broken for a while.

It's time for a new mic it seems, and maybe a new pair of headphones. The question is...which ones(s)?

I'm not sure if I want a gaming headset or just decent/really good headphones and a seperate mic. I'd prefer not to get something that requires a dedicated soundcard or amplifier, however my motherboard (MSI Z97S SLI Krait Edition) has a decent and full intergrated sound card as far as I'm aware. I'm also not looking to spend anymore than $200USD for BOTH a headset/pair of headphones AND a microphone, after tax and shipping, and would prefer my options to be reasonably cheap with the maximum amount of quality possible.

Please post your suggestions down below.

最後修改者：Reddy; 2017 年 3 月 26 日上午 3:26

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目前顯示第 31-42 則留言，共 42 則

Reddy 2017 年 3 月 27 日下午 12:09

引用自 Sandman：
引用自 Feyrom：
The biggest problem, is that this thread was created for headphones and/or microphone suggestions. If absolutely needed/required, then the soundcard, amp, or whatever would come first. I was asking for headphones and microphone suggestions. People suggested some, and i've been hesitant due to the lack of knowledge of whether or not some of them require a dedicated sound card to sound better than most.

Of course a pair of ATH-M50x's will sound good with a dedicated soundcard. The question was would they still be worth it without one.

I still don't have my answer.

Sure, they'd be worth it. Hell of a lot better than some trash gaming headset. But I highly recommend a dedicated sound solution as onboard sounds like trash to me. It's not that much more money and it's a big difference.

OP asked for recommendations, and I gave my recommendation.

"not that much more money". Here we are again, I'll ask again...where does it end? Again, my budget is only $200 total for a pair of headphones and maybe a microphone.

The ATH-M50x's are $150+

You really think a $50 (or less) soundcard or amp is better than a somewhat high end motherboards soundcard?

#31

Sticky Honeybuns 2017 年 3 月 27 日下午 2:03

引用自 Sandman：
I think it's in context. Notice I don't have a i7 because I play games. But I do have a decent i5. To me it makes no sense to buy $600 GPUs and then go with a $30 "gaming headset" that sounds like complete trash.

It's a small investment and if you like audio it's definitely worth it. I haven't met a single guy who went with a dedicated external DAC/Amp and said "Nah, I can't tell a difference between this and onboard."

Telling a difference doesn't mean it's better.

Why do you think Bose and beats are so popular? They are both crap audio companies yet they out sell their competitors in the general consumer market.

Let me be the first to tell you and I most likely have much better equipment than you, I don't find an external amp or DAC better than on board audio on gaming motherboards, assuming you don't need the amp for your headphones.

The DAC can reproduce the audio extremely accurate and you can download plenty of software to change the audio curve to your liking. Audio enthusiast prefer a system that can reproduce the entire frequency response as flat as possible to ensure accurate reproduction. This however is not what gamers want or the general population.

Hearing is also subjective. What's sounds good to me may sound bad to another person.

People have already done this but if you want to see if your audio card is performing better simply download REW and look at the frequency response. I have a calibrated Dayton Audio mic just for reasons like this.

Edit: I completely agree with you on buying crappy headsets though. Most people are just ignorant when it comes to audio equipment and think sound is just sound. But, once someone hears quality sound it's hard to deny it.

最後修改者：Sticky Honeybuns; 2017 年 3 月 27 日下午 2:05

#32

Sandman 2017 年 3 月 27 日下午 2:33

I need the headphone amp. I use my computer for games, music, and movies and shows. So I like the full audio experience and it's night and day between this external soundcard and onboard with both my old MSI Z87-G55 and my new MSI Z270 mortar.

#33

Aliquis Freedom & Ethnopluralism 2017 年 3 月 28 日上午 2:02

引用自 Sandman：
引用自 Sticky Honeybuns：

You are absolutely wrong. The audio caps and amps built in to motherboards nowadays are just as good as most sound cards. I have two sound cards and use high end audio equipment. I removed my sound cards because the on board audio is plenty and sound cards have driver issues from time to time. I use exclusively Sennheiser headphones and won't use anything else.

Some cards do have built in analog filters but most still use digital filtering via their proprietary software.

You are literally paying for software when buying a sound card and not the hardware since it isn't better than your on board typically.

Plus it's digital as well so as long as your source is clean you can modify the signal to your hearts extent through digital filtering. You can even easily clean up a digital signal through filtering as well.

Gigabyte is even making boards now specifically designed for audio enthusiast. Although, I bought one and it had crazy driver issues and ended up returning it.

OP, if you want quality sound and don't want to waste your money on crap I would recommend only looking at headphones, not headsets. My personal favorite is Sennheiser and they are the best in the biz. There are other great headphones out there as well too. For a mic, just buy a cheap clip on mic for 10 bucks. I keep mine clipped to my keyboard and it works great.

Never seen a board that outperformed a good external DAC/Amp. I can sit here and go a A/B split test on sound quality and volume levels by using onboard and switching to my soundcard which is a new MSI Z270 board.

What's the good external DAC + Amp then?
A $200+ piece?
Assuming the same sound pressure how large is the difference?
ALC 897? 1220? With claimed for 600 ohm head-phone amplifier?

引用自 Sandman：
Try running Attila with ultra unit size on a 3570k and lemme know how it goes.

The i5 3570K isn't even bad.
If one didn't already owned one but have made a larger upgrade from something older or got a new PC of course one can have a new build.

最後修改者：Aliquis Freedom & Ethnopluralism; 2017 年 3 月 28 日上午 2:05

#34

Revelene 2017 年 3 月 28 日上午 2:15

I understand the stance on external DAC and amps... But if his budget is only $200, then he'd benefit a lot more by using the whole budget on the headphones and a mic, and using the onboard audio.

I'd say he should spend a good $150 on a decent pair of headphones and then get a desktop mic/mod mic/boom pro/etc. Or spend $190ish on headphones and then get a Zalman clip on mic for less than $10.

Besides.. He could always upgrade to a good quality DAC/amp later.

最後修改者：Revelene; 2017 年 3 月 28 日上午 2:15

#35

Reddy 2017 年 3 月 28 日上午 2:16

引用自 Revelene：
I understand the stance on external DAC and amps... But if his budget is only $200, then he'd benefit a lot more by using the while budget on the headphones and a mic, and using the onboard audio.

I'd say he should spend a good $150 on a decent pair of headphones and then get a desktop mic/mod mic/boom pro/etc. Or spend $190ish on headphones and then get a Zalman clip on mic for less than $10.

Besides.. He could always upgrade to a good quality DAC/amp later.

This guy is smart.

#36

Aliquis Freedom & Ethnopluralism 2017 年 3 月 28 日上午 2:16

引用自 Feyrom：
Yeah, I'm sure you need a kaby lake processor for BF1, got the supposed system you have just for that one game, and absolutely need to play with every single setting on ultra in every game you play.

What's your problem? He obviously got what he have. Nothing wrong with having it for BF1 either.

My friend have a i7 6700K, 16 GB 3000 MHz DDR4, GTX 1080, 250 GB EVO 950 Pro, 34" 21:9 PG348Q monitor, Logitech G910 keyboard, G900 mouse, G933 headset and just play Battlefield 1 too. Occasionally.

Told him to get a computer or rather the PS4 before but he got an Xbox One then and haven't used that since August which I guess is when he got the GTX 1080.

At-least before the latest Nvidia drivers which claim to improve DX12 performance he couldn't get a 100+ FPS frame-rate even with DX11 which ran better than DX12. In Division I think it sat in the 70s or so but GPU limited there.

I'm not sure my friend even launches his game once a week. I don't know what the price of the system is but it should be like $3000? I have no idea how many hours he may have in BF1. Maybe it's over 30? .. ;D

I may have spent close to half that on Steam games and I have a potato PC instead ..

I can understand someone spending most of their time in BF1 and just having older games from bundles because they don't really buy much games but who still have a good computer because they want a good computer to play games on. Don't have to have lots of or the latest games for that.

引用自 Sandman：
I think it's in context. Notice I don't have a i7 because I play games. But I do have a decent i5. To me it makes no sense to buy $600 GPUs and then go with a $30 "gaming headset" that sounds like complete trash.

It's a small investment and if you like audio it's definitely worth it. I haven't met a single guy who went with a dedicated external DAC/Amp and said "Nah, I can't tell a difference between this and onboard."

I would be interested in trying before spending the money.
One thing I've got against external sound is the extra processing power .. But then again; potato PC .. :D .. one day it will likely not matter much (I've ran stuff like OpenSUSE from USB memory stick too and that wasn't the best experience either.)

As for microphones I have a what in the US would be $5 headset which sound craptastic but I used wear it around my neck and use the microphone of that. It's not good by any means but it sounds better than many others who use microphones in CS ..

引用自 Feyrom：
Of course a pair of ATH-M50x's will sound good with a dedicated soundcard. The question was would they still be worth it without one.

I still don't have my answer.

http://lmgtfy.com/?q=ATH-M50x+need+an+amp

"The M50x is 38ohms with an efficiency of 99dB/mW. They are reasonably easy to drive from most portable devices and the volume will satisfy you unless you listen very loudly. You will most likely not need an amplifier unless your source has a pretty poor amplifier."

For instance.

引用自 Feyrom：
You really think a $50 (or less) soundcard or amp is better than a somewhat high end motherboards soundcard?

I think for the mod-mic they recommended some external soundcard but maybe mostly just to get it out of the case rather than get higher quality components.
I don't know how much of an improvement and how much of a problem new motherboards designed to have good sound have with that vs older ones.
I know my ~2010 era Macbook Pro had pretty horrible sound output and I also think the Athlon64 3000+ motherboard whatever that was sounded much worse than the SB Audigy 2.

引用自 Sticky Honeybuns：
引用自 Sandman：
I think it's in context. Notice I don't have a i7 because I play games. But I do have a decent i5. To me it makes no sense to buy $600 GPUs and then go with a $30 "gaming headset" that sounds like complete trash.

It's a small investment and if you like audio it's definitely worth it. I haven't met a single guy who went with a dedicated external DAC/Amp and said "Nah, I can't tell a difference between this and onboard."

Telling a difference doesn't mean it's better.

Why do you think Bose and beats are so popular? They are both crap audio companies yet they out sell their competitors in the general consumer market.

Let me be the first to tell you and I most likely have much better equipment than you, I don't find an external amp or DAC better than on board audio on gaming motherboards, assuming you don't need the amp for your headphones.

The DAC can reproduce the audio extremely accurate and you can download plenty of software to change the audio curve to your liking. Audio enthusiast prefer a system that can reproduce the entire frequency response as flat as possible to ensure accurate reproduction. This however is not what gamers want or the general population.

Hearing is also subjective. What's sounds good to me may sound bad to another person.

People have already done this but if you want to see if your audio card is performing better simply download REW and look at the frequency response. I have a calibrated Dayton Audio mic just for reasons like this.

Edit: I completely agree with you on buying crappy headsets though. Most people are just ignorant when it comes to audio equipment and think sound is just sound. But, once someone hears quality sound it's hard to deny it.

How much do the $10-80 FIIO amp improve things?

引用自 Sandman：
I need the headphone amp. I use my computer for games, music, and movies and shows. So I like the full audio experience and it's night and day between this external soundcard and onboard with both my old MSI Z87-G55 and my new MSI Z270 mortar.

Personally since I had a laptop before I wanted something external because of how horrible that was.
I could also had seen a usage for it with portable MP3 players later smartphones and possibly in this day too. I assume something like a tablet or smartphone have worse audio output than a desktop computer in general. The DAC in the ALC 1220 is most likely beyond enough, as for how much noise is introduced before an external AMP if one used that I don't know.

引用自 Revelene：
I understand the stance on external DAC and amps... But if his budget is only $200, then he'd benefit a lot more by using the whole budget on the headphones and a mic, and using the onboard audio.

I'd say he should spend a good $150 on a decent pair of headphones and then get a desktop mic/mod mic/boom pro/etc. Or spend $190ish on headphones and then get a Zalman clip on mic for less than $10.

Besides.. He could always upgrade to a good quality DAC/amp later.

I've owned two of the Zalman microphones and wouldn't recommend them (I think noisy and cable easily break.)

For the $50 and below there's the Behringer C-1U (or buy a new Blue device), old Mod Mic 4 omni-directional and SONY ECM-CS3 or a used Zoom H1 for instance depending on how they will be used and what needs one have there. Røde SmartLav+ and VideoMic too also alternatives? But as said depending on needs. For a headset I think the Mod Mic and maybe the lavalier microphones make the most sense. For better audio-quality the Behringer but do one want that one in the face all the time? Stuff like a shotgun video mic, lavalier or portable sound recorder could be useful for other usage-cases too if one are into that, there also exist microphones which can be connected to say an Android smartphone, tablet or Apple device and use that as a portable recorder or soundcard + recorder for the PC.

Depends on if it's gaming, commenting events, interviews, atmosphere.. There could of course be a chance one would want to use the microphone for multiple purposes.

最後修改者：Aliquis Freedom & Ethnopluralism; 2017 年 3 月 28 日上午 2:48

#37

Revelene 2017 年 3 月 28 日上午 4:49

引用自 Etnopluralism / Aliquis：
I've owned two of the Zalman microphones and wouldn't recommend them (I think noisy and cable easily break.)

Yeah, it is hard to recommend because they are cheaply made. But, on the other hand, they are also cheap cost wise.

It also takes a bit more tweaking than normal to get them to not sound bad.

I can definitely see why you wouldn't want to recommend it.

#38

Aliquis Freedom & Ethnopluralism 2017 年 3 月 28 日上午 5:01

引用自 Revelene：
引用自 Etnopluralism / Aliquis：
I've owned two of the Zalman microphones and wouldn't recommend them (I think noisy and cable easily break.)

Yeah, it is hard to recommend because they are cheaply made. But, on the other hand, they are also cheap cost wise.

It also takes a bit more tweaking than normal to get them to not sound bad.

I can definitely see why you wouldn't want to recommend it.

最後修改者：Aliquis Freedom & Ethnopluralism; 2017 年 3 月 28 日上午 5:05

#39

Sandman 2017 年 3 月 28 日上午 9:17

引用自 Etnopluralism / Aliquis：
引用自 Sandman：

Never seen a board that outperformed a good external DAC/Amp. I can sit here and go a A/B split test on sound quality and volume levels by using onboard and switching to my soundcard which is a new MSI Z270 board.
What's the good external DAC + Amp then?
A $200+ piece?
Assuming the same sound pressure how large is the difference?
ALC 897? 1220? With claimed for 600 ohm head-phone amplifier?
引用自 Sandman：
Try running Attila with ultra unit size on a 3570k and lemme know how it goes.
The i5 3570K isn't even bad.
If one didn't already owned one but have made a larger upgrade from something older or got a new PC of course one can have a new build.

I have the Asus Xonar U7 external card. It's a great investment and not too expensive.

#40

Aliquis Freedom & Ethnopluralism 2017 年 3 月 28 日下午 12:13

引用自 Sandman：
I have the Asus Xonar U7 external card.

I have no idea how it is but bunch of people whine about it here:
https://www.prisjakt.nu/produkt.php?o=1859682

#41

Sandman 2017 年 3 月 28 日下午 2:16

引用自 Etnopluralism / Aliquis：
引用自 Sandman：
I have the Asus Xonar U7 external card.
I have no idea how it is but bunch of people whine about it here:
https://www.prisjakt.nu/produkt.php?o=1859682

Sorry I can't read whatever that language is. Check Amazon reviews and ask people in the forums. I love mine. One caveat is that if you have a crap "gaming" headset it may not make a difference. But with decent headphones it's great. I like it a lot better than the FiiO external DAC.

#42

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所有討論 > Steam 討論區 > Hardware and Operating Systems > 主題細節

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