Review and Measurements of Sound BlasterX AE-5

[Veri]

Any chance for a quick comparison to your EVGA Nu audio, @amirm ?

 

[amirm]

Any chance for a quick comparison to your EVGA Nu audio, @amirm ?

I will review that at a later date and can show the comparison then.

 

[Veri]

I will review that at a later date and can show the comparison then.

All right great =)

 

[BillG]

@amirm This is done because the power supplied via the PCIx socket is noisier than power direct from the PSU.

EDIT: If you look carefully at the PCI pins on the card itself, you should notice there are no power connections there.

Directly from Creative's product page:

Interface/Power
PCI-e bus power, +5V for Aurora lighting (requires 4-pin molex peripheral connector from PC power supply)

https://us.creative.com/p/sound-cards/sound-blasterx-ae-5

 

[audio_tony]

Interface/Power
PCI-e bus power, +5V for Aurora lighting (requires 4-pin molex peripheral connector from PC power supply)

I stand corrected.
The Asus cards *do* use the molex connector to power the audio stages.

This is probably why the AE-5 can't match older cards like the Xonar Essence for SINAD figures.

 

[maxxevv]

I stand corrected.
The Asus cards *do* use the molex connector to power the audio stages.

This is probably why the AE-5 can't match older cards like the Xonar Essence for SINAD figures.

If you look at the Spectrum Jitter and Multitone distortion graphs, which are not directly reliant on output values, the AE-5 is actually cleaner.

https://reference-audio-analyzer.pro/en/report/dac/creative-sound-blaster-ae-5-hp.php

https://reference-audio-analyzer.pro/en/report/dac/asus-stx.php

The headline THD figures for the Asus are better, but the output numbers are way, way higher on the AE-5.
@amirm 's 2V output figures here are actually closer to what the Asus output over there. The THD figures are much closer too .

 

[Tks]

Was surprised to see ADC measurements! That was a nice treat as I always imagined ADC's to be far behind DAC capabilities on the market, so it's nice to see this paint a better picture. Never seen that ADC graph with the other devices, awesome.

Man, AVR's though.. so bad as always.

A great device if you have a free PCI-E slot in the computer for $150.

 

[audio_tony]

If you look at the Spectrum Jitter and Multitone distortion graphs, which are not directly reliant on output values, the AE-5 is actually cleaner.

https://reference-audio-analyzer.pro/en/report/dac/creative-sound-blaster-ae-5-hp.php

https://reference-audio-analyzer.pro/en/report/dac/asus-stx.php

The headline THD figures for the Asus are better, but the output numbers are way, way higher on the AE-5.
@amirm 's 2V output figures here are actually closer to what the Asus output over there. The THD figures are much closer too .

I'm sorry, I should have been clearer.

I was referring to the ADC measurements, which don't look that good for the AE-5

 

[maxxevv]

I'm sorry, I should have been clearer.

I was referring to the ADC measurements, which don't look that good for the AE-5

So where are you getting the ADC measurement figures for the Xonar from ??

ADC performance doesn't directly correlate to noise from the PCI / Power input as far as I see from Amir's test results here.

 

[audio_tony]

So where are you getting the ADC measurement figures for the Xonar from ??

The Asus website. And I have an Essence STX which I use for audio measurements so I know how good it is.

 

[amirm]

I wonder how Realtek HD imbedded on an Intel motherboard compares.

They have very anemic output level. My motherboard SINAD is actually in the large DAC graph. It has a SINAD of 83 dB which is 20 dB worse than the AE-5.

 

[amirm]

Amir, did you ever test the ADC performance of the Behringer 2x4?

No I have not.

 

[Ron Texas]

It does not fit in my NUC or other similar ultra small form factor computers.

 

[BillG]

I wonder how Realtek HD imbedded on an Intel motherboard compares.

Here's an example:


http://archimago.blogspot.com/2018/05/measurements-msi-x370-sli-plus-am4.html

 

[mkawa]

It does not fit in my NUC or other similar ultra small form factor computers.

it'll fit thin itx

 

[JJB70]

PS and TotalDAC could improve their DACs enormously by just packaging one of these in a fancy box

 

[maxxevv]

PS and TotalDAC could improve their DACs enormously by just packaging one of these in a fancy box

They could do even much better by packing a Khadas Tone Board into their fancy boxes !

 

[Tom C]

Problem with Khadas is that it won’t support 8-channel...unless you buy four Tone Boards and can write your own firmware.

 

[BillG]

PS and TotalDAC could improve their DACs enormously by just packaging one of these in a fancy box

One of PS Audio's selling points for the DirectStream on its product page was that it didn't use any off-the-shelf IC DAC chip(s) - They should have...

 

[maxxevv]

Problem with Khadas is that it won’t support 8-channel...unless you buy four Tone Boards and can write your own firmware.

Neither the PS PerfectWave DirectStream nor the TotalDAC reviewed here on ASR support more than Left/Rightchannels.