Hi, I'm looking for some advice on buying some 2.1 speakers and possibly a sound card. Currently I use a pair of Sennheiser PC161, however come christmas I'll be picking up a pair of either the Razer Carcharias or Sennheiser PC350, haven't decided yet. I prefer using a headset for most of my gaming as it provides the surround sound aspect required for games such as Counterstrike and Battlefield. When it comes to just playing Fifa or watching a movie I would like to switch to speakers. I'm just after a cheap set of 2.1 speakers, ideally with removable stands to wall mount. They don't need to be anything special, just worthy quality with a budget of £40. I'm also after some advice on whether or not to pick up a sound card. Currently I use the on-board from GA-880GA-UD3H. Is it worth spending any money on a dedicated sound card or will using low end speakers and the headset mentioned earlier not benefit from it? Thanks for your time.
If your running/going to run your headset directly from the sound card then i'd say a discreet soundcard would probably be worth it. I think even something like a Xonar DG/DGX (PCI/PCIe) would give noticeable upgrade over the standard Realtek audio. As for speakers, a quick nose has turned up The Microlab FC330s but they're not directly wall mountable as far as I can tell. I had a nose at the rest of Scan's range below £40 and I don't think there are any wall mountable ones available. If these are a bit too pricey, the sub £20 Logitech S220 set would be a good bet. They're quite dinky but they still get rave reviews.
Thanks for the advice, I'll make sure to get a sound card. Is there any major difference between going PCI or PCIe? Or does it just depend on whichever slot you have free? So far the speakers I've narrowed it down to are the; Creative Inspire T3130 - £34.99 Altec Lansing VS2721 2.1 - £32.87 Don't like the look of the Logitech S220.
Yeah it just depends on which slot you have free really. As for the speakers, Bit-Tech reviewed the Altec set so I think that would be worth the read and the Creative set seems to get favourable reviews overall on Amazon so it just dpeneds on which one you'd prefer really. I'd side with the Creative set personally. If you order from Amazon and your not happy with them, they should take them back with no questions asked so that would be the route I would take.
No major difference as said. But PCI is dying out, some motherboards don't have PCI slots anymore. A PCI-E card would likely last you longer.
I can backup the soundcard thing. I recently got a Creative XFi Xtreme Audio, and that blows my onboard sound (On the Crosshair IV, a board which has good onboard audio) away. I even bought myself a new headset because I thought my Plantronics 367's weren't doing it justice. I'd personally say that my soundcard is the best upgrade since my SSD. As to which one, I can only recommend something from creative- since I've only had the one card from them, albeit a low end one. See if you can't get a good deal 2nd hand.
