In the PC world audio components are often overlooked. There are only so many items that your average consumer can keep track of. They know CPU, GPU Motherboard. Some will know about the power supply but really not much else. After all, Intel and others have been fighting to say the build in Audio CODEC on your average motherboard is as good as a discrete audio card so why should consumers think different? Well, if you think about it logically this does not make sense. After all, can you name one IGP (integrated graphics processor) that is as good as even a simple mid-range discrete GPU? I would not even say that the IGP on the i7 2600K is as good. So why would anyone think that an on-board audio CODEC would be better or even “just as good”? It is all marketing. We have tested multiple boards and also multiple add-in audio cards and can attest to this. Now I think I have found “the one”. The one audio card that finally brings the audiophile level expectation to the PC world. This is the Xonar Xense. It is Asus’ flagship audio card and one that has them partnered up with Sennheiser. The Xonar Xense comes complete with a pair of Sennheiser PC 350 Xense Edition headphones, a tuned audio card (complete with custom gain levels), and a head phone amplifier this is one serious piece of audio gear for your gaming or multi-media audio pleasure. So let’s put the PC 350 Xense headphones on, sit back and see what we can hear.
Performance -Audio quality is very subjective. What you like I may not. To prevent you from getting only my opinion on the audio quality, we use multiple subjects to get differing opinions on the quality of the audio produced by the Xonar Xense and PC350 headset combination. We exposed each of our subjects to the same five audio sources (Gaming, DVD-Movie, Bluray Movie, AVI, and MP3 audio). From there we asked for a rating from one to five (one being the lowest and five being the best) for how good they felt the audio was. We also asked for a single word to describe the audio produced. The words used for this were;CleanAwesomevibrantWowAmazingGeneral Performance -The Xonar Xense has some amazingly clean audio. There is simply no other way to describe it. When I was playing around with it before I started the testing I found myself hearing sounds in games that I had never heard before. This was even in games that I have played over and over (like Half Life and Half Life 2). It was extremely impressive to suddenly heat these sounds and effects. In newer games like Dead Space 2, Call of Duty Black Ops, and others the sounds really felt alive. With some headsets you can feel like the audio is confined or limited. I have had headsets that have made me feel like I have clam shells over my ears. With the Xense combo I did not feel confined to the small space of the headset. Instead the audio felt like it was coming from a much larger area. This translated to all of the audio types I tested, even the Bluray movies just felt move alive with the PC 350s than any other headset I have used. Gaming Performance -The Xonar Xense truly shines when it comes to gaming performance. As I mentioned above all of the games that I have played around with were more vibrant, there was a significant shift in audio separation. Sounds were not muddled or mixed; they were distinct and yet still a part of the whole environment. The microphone did a great job as well. Although we still had the common issue with the hard consonants (T, P, B, C etc) it was less pronounced than many other mics I have used even professional ones. My conversations over Skype, team speak, or other communication applications were not impeded by the Xense headset at all.
