Re: Dell XPS 8940 - Should I Connect External Sound Card
Originally Posted by
Omah
->
Has anyone utilised an external sound card on a PC ..... ?
In 40-odd years of building my own, never.
What
exactly are you trying to achieve?
I ask because the card you're thinking of is (being honest) a bit extravagant if you've not got a decent 5.1 sound system as a minimum (the card handles up to 7.1) and I mean as in receiver and speakers, not some sort of soundbar or PC speakers.
The Realtek ALC 3861 is a dell-specific soundchip which is used in some of Dell's Inspiron and Alienware Area-51 systems too, from what I've been reading.
There have been a few less-than complimentary reports regarding it's inadequacies.
Your system has the following PCIE expansion ports:
One PCIe x16
One PCIe x1
One PCIe x4
Personally I would fit a PCIE soundcard and save yourself a few bob - it's very easy to do & if you haven't done it before there are plenty YouTube videos showing you how.
But it is very straightforward to do yourself.
Which one you might want depends upon your needs (hence my asking exactly what you want to achieve with your sound card) but for example a similarly-capable PCIE card such as the highly-regarded Asus Xonar SE 5.1 with headphone amp is available for around £40 at places like overclockers.co.uk plus delivery.
That's well under half the price for very similar results at your speakers.
(FYI the Soundblaster Audigy RX 7.1 with headphone amp is £40 on Amazon too.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Creative-So...8150831&sr=8-4 )
If you're just looking for better quality audio & don't need a dedicated headphone output there's the "old faithful" Creative Sound Blaster 5.1 from just over £20 on Amazon.
But it does depend upon what you need from your soundcard.
HTH.
* On my own system when I need "oomph" the sound is via HDMI to my amplifier.