How to get best audio quality with foobar, effects or anything else? Options

[JackBlack9]

Hi, I hope this is the right section.
I've got a notebook with a creative soundblaster audigy 2 NX (usb) and 2.0 Edifier R1600plus.
I'm trying to reach the best audio quality with foobar. Can you help me?
I've installed asio4all and then also foobar bassexciter to add windows media player trubass and wow effects on foobar but I don't know how to configurate them.
I want to take out the max from my speaker.
Thank you!

This post has been edited by JackBlack9: Jan 28 2012, 16:53

[Kohlrabi]

JackBlack9 welcome to our nice, little community

If you got the impression that I treated you badly, I'm sorry for that. On the web you will find many sources of misinformation about ASIO and WASAPI and other alternative output methods, so I tend to debunk those myths very strongly. Also my concise style of writing might lend itself to the impression of being in a bad mood, but I just try to keep needless banter to a minimum.

A general point to keep in mind is that PC based digital audio reproduction is very, very good nowadays. Most audio solutions you find on motherboards today are good enough to reproduce Audio CD-grade digital audio perfectly. Software players themselves (should?) only use the facilities provided by the audio drivers, so you should get "perfect" audio right out of the box. What's left to you is how to alter the audio to pronounce certain parts. For example if you have speakers with a non-flat frequency response you might want to add an equalizer to your DSP chain. There are nearly endless possibilities how to alter the sound you get, but whether it "improves" is completely up to your perception.

I won't and can't (because my knowledge is very limited) go into more detail about DSP, please take a look around the forum to find answers to your questions.

[pawelq]

Most audio solutions you find on motherboards today are good enough to reproduce Audio CD-grade digital audio perfectly.

I recommend a lot of caution here. Maybe audio solutions (actual audio chips) are great, but computer/mobo designers/manufacturers still screw up analog output shielding. I have a pretty new desktop computer at work, and the amount of electronic noise in the front line-out/headphone jack in unacceptable, the rear one is tad better, but still not what I would expect from a 2011 machine from a major manufacturer.

[RavenGT]

I recommend a lot of caution here. Maybe audio solutions (actual audio chips) are great, but computer/mobo designers/manufacturers still screw up analog output shielding. I have a pretty new desktop computer at work, and the amount of electronic noise in the front line-out/headphone jack in unacceptable, the rear one is tad better, but still not what I would expect from a 2011 machine from a major manufacturer.

This is very true. Generally people think dedicated sound cards are a waste of money, but in reality the motherboard's audio come with static noise and it just drives me nuts. Even though good audio quality is subjective, it's still a good idea to ensure a raw, unhindered audio quality. To me, this means getting a dedicated sound card and setting Foobar's output to Kernel Stream/WASAPI. ASIO, as others have mentioned, is not particularly stable.