Asus Xonar AE Sound Board

Easily installed in an ATX PC case, albeit having to nudge it just a little beyond what felt "okay", but it still works perfectly.

I put this on a Gigabyte X670 AORUS ELITE AX WiFi board because the onboard sound card didn't have an optical out plug.I tried an exterior USB sound card I had that worked, except there was a constant cycling noise that sounded like a metronome whenever sound played. Made music suck :DThis was recognized by the OS with no problem, I did have to select the "Digital Output (S/PDIF) - XONAR SOUND CARD" option manually in the Settings > Sound > Output selection. The other option showing "Speakers - XONAR SOUND CARD" does not work.This has great sound output that is very clear, I am using a decent sound bar with a dedicated subwoofer. The sound bar has an option for a simulated 3d surround that works very well in games. Some are Linux Native, some are using Steam/Proton, and this has better sound than the same hardware on a prior mother board using the same onboard sound chipset did (it had the optical out plug).I don't have any high end headphones to tell you how well it works with; based on the range and volume available through the external speakers, I think it would be good, maybe very good.Pros:- Worked great out of the box; I did have sufficient room in the case for it.- Great sound for music and gaming.- Multiple output options, I needed the S/PDIF one.- Packaged well in the box, so it would take a heck of a whack or impact to damage in shipping, I think.Cons:- No dedicated Linux software for the sound suite. Not even a little bit. Linux users are used to this, but if I had found a comparably priced card with Linux drivers, I would not have bought this.There are good Linux sound controllers & equalizers, but if you need something quickly for a professional setup, this may not be it. So the 5 star review is relative to my experience and what I use it for. In a different environment and need, this may vary.

It was only months of light use before it delivered a trainwreck of distortion.

So I was pretty excited to try out this card, as I had read fairly good reviews about it, and hadn't actually experimented with anything other than on-board audio before.First, if you have a dual or triple fan GPU installed in the upper-most PCI-E slot (what most motherboards use as the X-16 slot a GPU is most often installed in) in a standard ATX case, you're not going to be able to utilize the X-1 slot for this card, as it almost completely blocks cooling fan flow from the GPU. A minor issue, but still kind of annoying.After using a lower X-16 slot in my motherboard for this card, and installing the proper drivers and Asus software, when using the headphone out, which has a built in Amp and can supposedly drive headphones up to 150 ohms impedance, I heard a faint crackling at lower volume from any bass driven note. As I continued to use the card, I realized this faint crackling can be heard using any of the outputs on the card. Not much in the way of troubleshooting online for this either. After removing the card and reverting to on-board audio, voila. No more crackling.When I tried to use both the front and rear outputs on the card, the card would only output to the front. No audio would be output through the "center" output either.And finally, at random times, a complete breakdown of the audio would occur, with whatever was being input by the computer, resulting in audio which sounded like a crashing noise, extremely low bitrate, and a slowing of whatever speech or music was being played, requiring a system reboot.The software wasn't too great either, with the equalizer, bass boost, and compressor settings providing no noticeable change in audio quality. If you wish to leave headphones plugged into the back of the card on windows 10, you'll need to utilize the program from Asus, as the source is not selectable in the windows task bar.Unbelievable.I've never had much luck with Asus products before (big problems with high end Asus laptops), but this one might be the nail in the coffin for me and Asus.

Asus Xonar AELets get to the point. Running Windows 10, latest available drivers and the Xonar AE delivers on Music, Movies and most importantly to me, Gaming. Provides the best Gaming Quality Sound compared to Onboard Audio.I just built the current Gaming PC that im on right now and the only component I didnt buy at the time due to limited budget was a Sound Card. Im 'okay' with onboard Audio, its decent, but it doesnt deliver the levels and ranges you need for certain applications like Gaming. RealTek Audio Chipsets have taken over as the default onboard MoBo Audio and they do indeed get better, but they also fall short in the process. You truly dont know what you are missing in Gaming Audio until you use an actual Sound Card.Sound Cards were big in the late 90's to end of 2000's. Then they just kinda faded into the shadows with some brands popping up with some variation of a Sound Controller Device. Gaming developers used to give great focus on Audio Quality as much as the Graphics Quality, but not much if at all anymore. SoundBlaster Audio was the champ of 2.1 Stereo Sound. Now we have the ASUS Xonar Series which are the PC Champs of 5.1 & 7.1 Surround Audio. I have never been disappointed with the quality of the Xonar Series of cards, much like other ASUS Products like Monitors, they have lasted the longest and continue to outlast other products. This is my 3rd ASUS Xonar Sound Card, each has been in a different Gaming PC. First was the Xonar DG, then the next was D2, now the AE. All still work, just different PCI Connections so I couldnt use either old version on my new PC. (PCI 1x, PCI, PCIe 4x).Highly Recommended Audio Card Series to invest in for Gaming.