New PC Sound Card, internal or external?

[Puffin]

I would firstly say that I have no experience of these things or if what I am about to say is complete twaddle.

My son gave me a computer that he got from his employer. I use it to stream Spotify to a Dac using USB out. The Dac tells me that I am getting 48kHz from the PC. The PC came with no disc drive and there does not appear to be a sound card in there as I cannot see any evidence of it e.g the 3.5mm coloured jack sockets etc

If I wanted to get or upsample to say 192kHz could I do this with either an internal or external sound card? A lot of the external SCs seem to be for professional use only or the £5.99 plastic 5.1 thingys sold on ebay.

[CageyH]

If you are using USB out, a sound card will not help.

Can you post a bit more detail about the PC?
With the USB cable connected, you need to go to the sound settings of the connection, and change the sample rate.
This will allow you to increase the sample rate to 192kHz.

[CageyH]

See https://www.thewindowsclub.com/how-to-change-sample-rate-windows-11

[Kember]

I’d go external as you can then move the DAC from computer to computer over time.

For cost effective solutions, take a look at a Topping D10s or one of the ifi iDSD DACs. Both can be found second hand for less than £100 and, sometimes, for around £50.

Both are fully hires compatible and should future proof you for a decade.

[CageyH]

From what I understand, the OP already has a DAC, and is just using the USB out on the motherboard.

[Lawrence001]

Spotify will probably be limited to 48 does windows have a native upsampler built in that can change it?

[Puffin]

I should have given some info about the Dac that I would like to get the best out of.

It is an ifi Zen Dac V2 that has the following spec:-

USB 3.0 B input 44.1/48/88.2/96/192/352.8/384khz

2.8/3.1/5.6/6.2/12/4 Mhz DSD

353/384khz DX2 MQA

From what I have read so far from the comments would I be right to assume that I would need an upsampler in any gadget/sound card as Spotify is limited to 48khz?

I have a Behringer Ultramatch that upsamples to 96khz but has no USB connectivity. The internal Dac in it (AKM) is pretty good to my ears and I have run it from the PC using a hacked toy (ebay plastic 5.1 sound card jobbie) that I modded from an Elektor Magazine article some years ago.

Well, if the above is any help........

[CageyH]

Spotify is not limited to 48kHz.
The limit is on the windows setting. The link I have posted this shows you how to fix that, without spending any money.

[Puffin]

Spotify is not limited to 48kHz.
The limit is on the windows setting. The link I have posted this shows you how to fix that, without spending any money.

Hi Kevin, thanks for the link. I will have a go at it tomorrow and report back.

[CageyH]

48kHz is the default setting in windows. You should be able to up it to 192KHz, so then Spotify becomes the limiting factor.

[Puffin]

Hi Kevin,

I have had a great couple of hours playing with some of the sample rates available now. Such a simple thing to do and as you say FREE!

I have sampled so far 24 bit 352.8/ 24 - 192/ 24 - 96khz. When using the 352.8 it started playing up and said that it could not play any of the tracks I had selected. To my ears the 24/96 seems the cleanest.

Something I don't understand is that the sampling rate light on the Zen suggests that I am getting DSD 64/128 which clearly cannot be right?

[CageyH]

If you have not installed WASAPI or AIO drivers, then Windows may default to DSD.
If it sounds good, I would not worry about it.

[Puffin]

Having spent a few hours attempting to educate myself about streaming etc I have found some interesting info which I assume is correct.

I found the details on the PC as to what Windows says is what is happening to my stream from Spotify :-

Preferred ASIO
Format 2 ch 32 bits, sample rate 384khz,
Input latency 4400 samples 11.67ms
Output latency 5184 samples 13.50ms

On another forum I have been told that Windows will resample to whatever you ask it to. ASIO will output a bit perfect stream at the same rate as your source.

Does this sound right? My head hurts a bit :scratch:

Incidentally I have found that 24/192khz sounds best to me and the DAC says that it is receiving DSD?

[CageyH]

I think Windows outputs DSD by default, so it sounds correct.