ASUS XONAR SE 5.1 Channel 192kHz/24-bit Hi-Res 116dB SNR PCIe Gaming Sound Card with Windows 10 compatibility

I was a bit skeptical about modern sound cards, but I got this for an HTPC to check it out (it comes with a small form factor bracket that's easy enough to install). At first, I only tried the digital optical TOSLINK port, which did sound better, but only marginally. My advice is to stick to analog if possible, the effect is much more apparent, even to my relatively insensitive ears. Audio is much richer sounding than without it and will definitely improve a home audio system!Linux support is acceptable, I couldn't get the front panel header to work, but that might just be my HTPC distro or a configuration error on my end.

Fast shipping, this sound card has a nice price and sound to it, work's good on my AI server.

The sound was a great step up from the MB soundcard. I highly reccoment a DAC for best sound performance. Unfortunately, the sound will drop out for a split second every few songs. Im no expert, but it seems like a driver proble.

Works great for my amplifier that's hooked up to my speakers. Sounds FANTASTIC and super easy to setup.

Man, I am amazed at the crisp, clean and rich sound that is produced by this card. Unbelievable! It's like I am listening to music and playing games for the first time! I'm hearing things that I never knew existed in games that I play daily. The Xonar headphone driver is adjustable up to 300 Ohm and, believe me, it is loud. I have used FxSound to boost my audio for a few years but, frankly, with the sound pushed through the Xonar's headphone jack, it is just too loud. I don't need it, anymore. I NEVER thought I'd say that! The ASUS Xonar is THAT good! 9.5/10 with only con being there are TOO MANY choices to customize your listening experience in the Xonar's software bundle...it's not really a con, though. The card installed the first attempt...I followed a previous user's advice to uninstall ALL sound drivers that appeared in Windows 10 x64* before I installed the Xonar drivers. No problems.*That included Microsoft and Nvidia drivers...they all re-installed automatically after I restarted my PC.

When I bought this, the product description did NOT say Windows 11 compatibility. Surprise surprise! I finally installed it with the Win 10 drivers and it worked well for a while but has now decided that it's just going to sit there. The lights are on but nobody's home. I have been very happy with Asus mobos in the past but this product is coming up a little short.ASUS has been promising Windows 11 drivers for going on a year now, and finally they came through.But the card was always dodgy. About every other time I logged onto my PC the system would register no card. I checked to make sure the card was well seated in its slot, uninstalled/reinstalled the drivers, and disabled the onboard video and it worked for a while but now when I wake the computer from sleeping, the card is not registered. If I reboot, the card is re identified and seem to work.ANOTHER EDIT: Now it just cuts out and doesn't deliver sound. If I reboot, it works. I have to do this several times a day.ANOTHER EDIT: I finally gave up on it and got a Sound Blaster, and Migod, the sound is so much better. I didn't know what I was missing. Now I have a crappy card that I can't throw away and can't recycle. That's life in the future, I guess.Overall, I call this junk. Don't waste your money. And that's my final word on it.

Effective and small, used to add Optical / SPDIF output to my Asus Z790-A Wifi based build. Asus removed/neglected to add the Optical / SPDIF output to that motherboard. Easy addition. Added drivers from Asus Support even thought the Sound Cards was recognized right away.

I had a problem with my Asus Tuff 570 where the onboard sound wasn't working. After nearly two weeks of troubleshooting via suggestions from Asus' forums, hunting down all kinds of drivers and riding that merry-go-round of installing/wiping/testing I was about to yank the mobo out and send it back. After looking at all the hoops I'd have to jump through to do so, I figured I'd try buying a basic sound card to fix my issue.At $40, the issue was resolved for less than the price of shipping and hassle of no pc for 2-4 weeks.The card produces pretty good on my 2.1 system, and while I own good speakers, they're definitely not audiophile level performance. I can say that my speakers sounded better with the soundcard, than using the onboard realtek sound from my previous build. Bass was good, mid and high range were clearer without a tininess I used to deal with using the onboard.Installation was about as easy as it could possibly get. I literally just plugged it in, turned on the PC and Windows knew immediately what was going on, I didn't even have to install the drivers I downloaded. I did a wipe/reinstall anyway, as the downloaded version was newer however I didn't notice any difference in capabilities. Prior to purchase, I had read several of the 2/3 star reviews and was braced for potential problems with Windows, but I personally didn't run into any of the issues mentioned. It *might* be because my board is a Asus board, but I can't say with any confidence.Sadly, I did notice a drop in quality when I retrieved my 5.1 speakers from storage and wanted to see what they sound like. The 5.1 are pretty good quality, better than my 2.1, but I wanted less clutter on my desktop hence I went to 2.1. Anyway, the sound suffered a bit with the 5.1, while the bass was even better than before, the mid and high range were a less so. I was watching the Witcher series, and there is a lot of screeching in various scenes, it quickly proved too shrill and unpleasant through those speakers. When I ran some music through the 5.1, I noticed violins sounded very off and again, a bit shrill. Plugged the 2.1 back in and that wasn't the case.All in all, for what I needed a soundcard for, and at this price, it's a solid 3. If this goes out on me, I won't feel cheated and I didn't have any aggravations installing it unlike others have. Lets hope my luck holds.