Somewhere I read that using an onboard sound processor on your motherboard is slowing down FSX game play. In fact, they were saying that using a sound card, improved frame rates with up to 100% (probably on slower systems)So I was thinking of buying a separate sound card.I don't want to spend too much money (ca. 30-40GBP or 60-80 US$, in that area).What card would be the best option, and is it true that a separate sound card can drastically improve frame rates?cheers!

Onboard sound does eat CPU power, the amount isn't great, but in some cases it has shown to give simmers an X-amount of extra in-game stutters. Newer mobos can cope ok, but still always better to have a standalone soundcard. Doesn't even have to be expensive, as it won't provide miracles either. A soundblaster Audigy series, will suffice just fine and they retail as low as $26USD.

I think there is a swings and rounabouts situation with soundcards in that whilst they relieve the processor of workload which would speed things up, they can hog bus bandwith which can slow things down, with that in mind unless you are buying a souncard because it can deliver better sound in FSX? [ I do not know if it improves sound quality or not ], it isn't worth getting a soundcard, as for soundcards delivering much higher performance in FSX, sounds like BS to me.now that would be worth getting a souncard for,http://www.answers.com/topic/downtown-songhttp://www.nocturne.fr/medias/8712177047932_recto.jpghttp://www.nocturne.fr/produit.cfm?id_produit=2857Best and Warm RegardsAdrian Wainer

As long as you buy a Audio card with an onboard audio processor chip such as the Audigy or the popular XFi-XtremeGamer Pro, the CPU overhead will be reduced as long as you disable the onbord motherboard audio in the BIOS. The increase in PCI bus usage by the add-on audio card does not noticably incerase the CPU load. Remember, FS needs CPU cycles, every bit you can throw at it. Offloading audio to the PCI bus does help but don't expect it to be some miracle cure for a poorly tweaked rig.

I would advise against anything with the label "Creative". While the X-Fi versions are certainly nice, you can get a more inexpensive solution from companies like Auzentech with better driver support and more lightweight drivers.Pat

Hi Pat,I never heard of those people before but went to their website.... looks interesting.I see they have a new X-FI card coming out soon, based on Creative's X-FI chipset.I am wondering if you have any first hand experience of their drivers? I am using Vista x64 and Creative have brought out a driver, but I wonder if these people will be able to improve on the driver or do you think it will be just a rehash of the Creative driver?I'm not so much interested is saving on the cost of hardware.. more on their ability to improve on drivers to extract better use of hardware/CPU overhead etc?Thanks,PaulEDITOne last question... I have an Audigy (1) card at the moment. Am I likely to benefit from upgrading to an X-FI or any other card?