[holden4th]

OK, I've disabled my onboard sound card, and now have direct digital streaming from my PC thanks to my USB DAC and kernel streaming but something must be driving the audio. I know that I have Nvidia HD drivers installed (HD Audio WHQL 1.00.00.59) and heard some less than positive things about them but is it them that are doing the work? If not what is and how do I find out? If so should I update them?
 
I'm running W7 64bit and the mobo is an American Megatrends AMIBIOS with an Intel i7 chip. The onboard sound is the ubiquitous Realtek HD so I can't understand why I've also got the Nvidia HD drivers installed. I'm trying to update my knowledge in this area so all thoughts would be appreciated - please treat me as an ignorant newbie (which I probably am).

 

[ProcessJunkie]

I'm no brainy in this stuff, but i think that the sound card continues to transport the audio to the DAC, the only thing that changes is that the DAC bypasses the sound processing of the sound card, delivering a bit perfect source, instead of the jittery stuff from the onboard card.

 

 

[Hexidecimal]

I'm not a DAC wizard, but if you disable the onboard sound, and you have no sound card, the DAC is driving the sound directly. If something is disabled on PC end, it does nothing. Period. The DAC does obviously have a digital to analog processor, but it must also have some kind of audio processor if it will take audio direct from USB to an output like your Headphones.
 
You can check under System Properties > Device Manager under Sound & Audio Processors. If you see your DAC listed there, the DAC is processing the audio.

 

[Willakan]

The USB DAC will act as a complete sound interface. Nothing is "driving" the audio - don't worry about Nvidia's HD Audio drivers - they are, in this case, completely irrelevant. Your USB DAC and Windows are doing all the work.

 

[holden4th]

Quote:

The USB DAC will act as a complete sound interface. Nothing is "driving" the audio - don't worry about Nvidia's HD Audio drivers - they are, in this case, completely irrelevant. Your USB DAC and Windows are doing all the work.

Thank you for your replies, very helpful to know this.. Just a question, what is Windows 'role' in all of this and can it affect the sound I get through my DAC?
 

 

[Hexidecimal]

Windows only role would be dictating how the device drives audio. There are a couple ways to do it depending on the software you use and what your DAC supports. There's DirectStream, ASIO or WASAPI. It all depends on how you have your player set, and what your DAC supports. Most will tell you WASAPI gets the truest audio and least interference because it disables all other sound sources except the player you're pushing music from.
 
I personally use DirectStream because I do other things while listening to music that sometimes require sound.

 

[holden4th]

I'm using kernel streaming via J.River Media center 16 (what a great piece of software) - is this the same as direct stream?
 
Also, is this the only way that Windows dictates how my uDAC2 drives the audio? Now when you say 'drives' (we are talking about drivers?) the uDAC2 has no specific drivers so they must use generic Windows drivers or am I wrong here? Also is there only one driver that is a generic WIndows driver or do I have a choice here? I will be getting a Fiio E7 to partner the E9 very soon (like the next few days) and I am hoping that the E7 will not need its own drivers to make it work properly.

 

[Hexidecimal]

I was using drive as a term to describe how Windows it producing audio from your source files. Nothing to do with drivers, though if you are using a generic windows driver, I would check with the manufacturer of your DAC to see if there is a specific driver/software package for your device. I know my Creative X-Fi can technically work with the WDM drivers Microsoft provides, but the software that Creative supplies allows full control of how the hardware drives the music. You should always use the manufacturers drivers for any device.

 

[Willakan]

The uDAC and Fiio products use generic USB Audio drivers and are designed to do so, unless I am much mistaken.

 

[Roller]

Quote:

The uDAC and Fiio products use generic USB Audio drivers and are designed to do so, unless I am much mistaken.

More like they use generic OS drivers for lack of proprietary ones. But it works for them.

 

[Roseval]

Part of the USB standard is audio.
There is class 1 allowing up to 24/96.
This is supported by native mode drivers on Win, OSX and Linux
Class 2 allows for higher resolutions.
It is supported by native mode drivers on recent OSX and Linux