Asus Xonar Essence STX soundcard...

[dfwallace]

Considering buying this soundcard...

I listen to a lot of music on my PC, and play quite a few PC games with my son as well. We currently have a Creative X-Fi 'Music' card. I have M-Audio AV40's for comp speakers, and sometimes use my inexpensive USB Logitech headset for gaming.

If I get the above soundcard, would I have to use different headphones with a seperate mic to game with? Or, will the usb headset automatically utilize the features of the soundcard? (Have to use headset if wife home when we are gaming...)

Sorry for the 'beginner' question....

Thanks for any help...

[ShyguyXPC]

Most USB headsets Don't use a Sound card at all, so you should still be able to use it, They either use the CPU to process the sound, or they have some sort of small Onboard USB Sound Chip to process the audio, not quite what a Dedicated or even typical onboard (motherboard) audio chip can process though...

anyways, you'll still be able to use the Headset, although it probably won't use the Sound card for any processing.

Otherwise an inexpensive surround sound, or stereo headset that plugs into the sound card doesn't cost much these days.

Newegg.com - TekNmotion TM-YB100A 3.5mm Connector Circumaural Black Yapster Universal Gaming Headset

I have a pair of these I use on occasion, not the greatest, but the sound beats my Sony Circa-mural Studio phones by a bit.

These: Newegg.com - SONY - Studio Monitor Series Headphones (MDR-V150)

the mic is nice, comes in handy for Teamspeak when online, my old Logitech headsets sucked and always had background sound from the mics picking up in all directions, plus the sound quality seemed to suck, once I got this the sound on TS from my voice according to others sounded so much clear, and louder.

Picked those phones up at a local Computer renaissance in the parts bin used for less than $10.

Though I usually just set the headset on the desk and use the mic only on my pair using the Home theater setup for my audio, even that far away from my face, the mic still does a much better job than the old Logitechs did while practically sucking on the mic, even with audio coming from the speakers and not drowning out my voice when talking on TS.

[dfwallace]

So, if I DON'T want to use my inexpensive Logitech usb headset, I can take my vg stereo headset from downstairs, and plug that into the new soundcard. I would then have to get a mic that has a jack that I could plug it into the back of the soundcard as well? And then that setup would be fine for gaming and using TeamSpeak?

[ShyguyXPC]

yep, should work, if you don't want to use your USB headset.

couldn't hurt to try it out, you'll probably have to set it up or tweak it in the Windows and Teamspeak settings to use the Headset and Mic for outputs, but its not that hard really.