Onkyo Soundcards as source

[Nenso]

There are two cards that I'm looking at right now, does anyone have any ideas or know of a review?

Onkyo SE-U55SX USB

and

the internal

ONKYO SE-200PCI, 115dB, 24bit/192kHz,

[Fungi]

ONKYOのサウンドカードは好きなんだけどU55SXは癖あるね。

明度が高く乾いた音で高音の量が過剰。

SE200はレンジ感があって癖もあまり無いように思う。

無難で落ち着いている感じ。

SE90は若干ナローになるが聞きやすい。中音とか響きが

過剰な気がするけどボーカルやピアノはなかなか良い。

Short translation: U55SX has excessive highs and is dry and bright; SE200 is more relaxed and normal.

There's a good number of reports on poor build quality on the Onkyo externals. Why not E-MU 0404 USB or something?

[Nenso]

Yea Fungi I looked into all the emu products.. I like them but I thought maybe there is something else thats good like this. I guess this wasnt that great.. but I do like the output/input plug that this one has.

[hYdrociTy]

buy one and see if you like it.

x2deweet

[xand1x]

I have an SE-90 PCI. It's not too bad as a source but if you are planning to buy any remotely high end gear I wouldn't advise using it other than as a transport via Toslink. What computer soundcards suffer from, in my experience as direct sources, is a lot of noise. You won't get the clear and distortion free background akin to high end sources. All depends on what you wan't...i'd think at the very least you would be left with an okay transport.

[dytln_02]

ONKYOのサウンドカードは好きなんだけどU55SXは癖あるね。

明度が高く乾いた音で高音の量が過剰。

SE200はレンジ感があって癖もあまり無いように思う。

無難で落ち着いている感じ。

SE90は若干ナローになるが聞きやすい。中音とか響きが

過剰な気がするけどボーカルやピアノはなかなか良い。

Short translation: U55SX has excessive highs and is dry and bright; SE200 is more relaxed and normal.

There's a good number of reports on poor build quality on the Onkyo externals. Why not E-MU 0404 USB or something?

try to change psu for U55SX it will sound warmer.

the bad thing it's use too much usb bandwith.

[Fungi]

SE-200PCI might be a good internal sound card, I've been looking around and it looks to be a solid choice. Do it and report back!

[Nenso]

I dunno guys.. it doesnt really entice me like a Emu 1616/0404 or something like an Asus Xonar D2X which I can use for games as well (I don't think the Xonar will be good for music like it claims, but it seems ok right now.)

What do you guys think.. oh yea.. this is signal 101.. since the SE-200PCI has a good digital output.. it doesnt really matter since its digital.. so it should be better if I got the internal instead of external since the digital out is technically the same.. right?