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In Reply to: Onkyo se-200 pci soundcard posted by Frank25 on January 20, 2007 at 08:10:34:
It has too many op amps! How do they ever use 3 per channel? I hope they aren't duals! I have an X-Meridian and it uses just one stage per channel. There are two big things to like about the card: nice, big, low ESR power supply capacitors, and film caps as bypasses and in the low pass output filters. My card has neither, like most. The Onkyo looks interesting to modify... and use since the driver control panel is in Japanese. Why is it that this card and the Prodigy 7.1 HiFi both aimed at stereo quality and both not marketed in North America?
Follow Ups:
Yea I donno why the three opamps, but they must be there for a reason, I dont think they would go through the trouble of doing a seperate dac just for 2channel and then mess it up with a bunch of opamps for no reaason?
I think all the filtering on the stereo channels are their VLSC, Vector Linear Shaping Circuitry(TM) and the op amps are NE5532s, yes, three duals per channel. The other channels go through fewer amp stages, but also ceramic filter capacitors. Look around the net, there are pictures showing the SMT op amps on the back.I like the power supply caps on the board and film caps. I don't see voltage regulators for the op amps, so they probably run off the +/- 12v from the PCI connector. Not RC filtered like some cards, but generous C filtering. Should have good modification potential - replace the op amps, rework the filter, and DC couple it. The board holes look plated through and rework won't be the most fun.
A freind of mine has the previous vesion, the se-150. We did a small test comparing a few under $200 sound cards. We used my PC which is as follows
DFI lanparty
AMD 4200x2
2gig OCZ gold ddr
76gig WD Raptor system drive
300gig Seagate storage drive
Samsung 18x dvd-rw drive
ATI AIW800xl passively cooled
Silverstone Zues 650w psu(modded w/quiet fan+baffle)
Coolermaster Centurion caseThe PC is modded to be nearly silent, and runs XP pro SP2. We used Foobar2000 for playback using KS and SRC set to 44.1 to keep everything equal for all soundcards. This wasnt really a sceintific test, it was more just for fun and curiosity. The cards tested were.
1. Azutech Xmerdian
2. Emu 1212m
3. Creative Xfi X-music
4. Onkyo se150
5. Maudio Audiophile 24/192While all of the cards sounded reasonably good, there were two that definitly stood above the rest and they are the Emu1212m and the Onkyo. Next was the Maudio, with the Auzentech and Xfi not far behind. Now this wasnt really surprising to me. The three cards that make high quality 2channel sound a priority were the best of the group and the more surround sound oreinted cards came in at the bottom of the pack. Im not going to get into how each card sounded as i am a horrible writer:) But if your interested Ill be happy to answer any questions.
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