I am relative new to this subject and would like some advice on choosing the right equipment.
Currently, I have a Yamaha RX-V671 receiver outputs to 7+2 Klipsch speakers and RW-12D sub. What would be the best way to connect the audio aspect of a HTPC to this setup?
1. EXISTING / nVidia GTX 580 HDMI audio out -> Receiver
2. PURCHASE / Asus Xonar Essence STX S/PDIF -> Receiver
3. PURCHASE / Dedicated HD 7.1 sound card -> Receiver
My library is mostly *.flac and bluray movies (PowerDVD 11). Although I do play games occasionally.
It is my understanding that when playing Bluray disc, PowerDVD software take care the HD audio decoding and GTX 580 stream uncompressed PCM to receiver, the receiver then output signal to speakers without further processing. If this is true, what advantage does a dedicated HD 7.1 sound card has over GTX 580 when playing bluray?
In STX's case, the audio gets compressed into AC3 5.1 in real-time and then send to receiver. So the audio quality gets degraded especially if the source is True HD 7.1.
Aside from headphone amp, the only advantage STX over GTX580 is its DAC when output music through RCA out. Does this offer better sound than receiver's DAC?
Bottom line is that I am not sure if I should invest in an Asus Xonar STX or a dedicated sound card, will I see any improvement as far as bluray or flac?
Many thanks in advance
