Need a good audio solution for my PC

[HHH03]

You got lucky there... the ASMedia USB controller on that card has some rather annoying bugs that can prevent it from working altogether in a modern system (you may have read my thread). I have been wondering whether it would be possible to mod it to operate from an internal USB 2.0 header, disabling the offending chip altogether...

I tried the Xonar AE too… it was a complete failure and wouldn’t work without a CMedia driver. The Xonar SE works without any special driver. The SE has a newer ASMedia USB chip too that seems to be more compatible with my Threadripper Pro motherboard.

 

[valerianf]

To avoid any "pop" generated by the computer the best way is to use an optical spdif cable to an outside power amplifier.
It should to the job at least up to a 5.1 configuration.
In the old time there was a motherboard that was doing real time DD encoding of any sound generated in the computer: it was great!