Could do with some advice here from all those who know about PC hardware.

I have an old PIII 700mhz desktop with 512mb RAM running Windows 2000 Professional SP4. The motherboard has onboard sound and graphics, but the onboard left channel occasionally 'crackles' (seems to be related to the hard drive being accessed).

I'm not even sure how good the onboard sound is, plus a couple of my game emulators won't recognise it so they work without sound

Anyway, what I'd like to know is:

1. Would installing a soundcard actually help free up the CPU (as the motherboard wouldn't have to use the onboard sound) and make the computer faster?
   
2. Which sound card would people recommend for the spec of my PC?

I've had a look on GreEdyBay and found a few Creative Soundblaster cards. Seems to me that perhaps the 5.1 Live version might be best for my machine, such as this?

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Creative-Labs...27QQihZ001QQcategoryZ3701QQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

Or can anyone suggest something else? I've seen a lot of 5.1 sound cards in FleaBay Hong Kong going for very little. Are they any good or best avoided?

What is important for me is for the card to have a stereo line in (mini jack is fine), a microphone line in and good quality of analogue/ digital sound processing. I will be converting some rare vinyl records and also tapes, so analogue to digital conversion quality is important too.

It also needs to be a PCI card as my PC doesn't have ISA connections.

What would people suggest?

1. yes.
2. Don't buy. People give away sound cars now. I'll see if I've a soundblaster hidden away somewhere. You got ISA or PCI?

edit: I should learn to read peoples posts fully. PCI card I'll have a hunt around for.

Hellcat said:

1. yes.
2. Don't buy. People give away sound cars now. I'll see if I've a soundblaster hidden away somewhere. You got ISA or PCI?

edit: I should learn to read peoples posts fully. PCI card I'll have a hunt around for.

Click to expand...

Cheers for the advice Hellcat

Problem is, there are so many different sound cards out there and so many different specs I'm not sure which ones would be suitable and/ or would work with my computer.

The other problem with a lot of second hand cards is that they don't come with installation/ driver disks. I had a look on the Creative website and they no longer support a lot of their old cards, so unless you had Windows XP it can be difficult to get hold of the correct drivers. At least I think that is the case?

The sound cards I was looking at ranged from about £1.99 to £6.99, so they weren't that expensive. If you have a Sound Blaster that would suit my needs and my PC Hellcat I'd be happy to pay for it.

Let me know if you find one please!

Cheers

Chas

my left channel went off completely, I was pulling my hair out wondering why, that was an onboard sound chip.

I disabled the onboard sound in the device manager, then installed a basic soundblaster type card I got of ebay for about 50p, windows xp automatically installed the drivers upon restart, been fine ever since.

levemir said:

my left channel went off completely, I was pulling my hair out wondering why, that was an onboard sound chip.

I disabled the onboard sound in the device manager, then installed a basic soundblaster type card I got of ebay for about 50p, windows xp automatically installed the drivers upon restart, been fine ever since.

Click to expand...

Problem I have is that I am running Windows 2000 Professional, which from what I gather doesn't automatically install drivers for hardware. Again, the problem with buying an old sound card is that the older models are no longer supported by the manufacturers so it's not possible to get the drivers for them.

Hopefully Hellcat will come up with an old Soundblaster that will work with my PC

I took the plunge and bought this off Ebay!

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI....MEWN:IT&viewitem=&item=280085572735&rd=1&rd=1

Seems a good spec card, and I did some research and it looks like early Soundblaster Audigys will work fine with my PIII 700 mhz PC. Is this going to be ok?

It also has the advantage in the I can add a Creative Live Drive front panel to my PC to allow a good selection of audio input devices for sound recording.

Apologies for all the posts and questions, but once I've upgraded the sound, graphics, RAM and hard drive then I've taken this old PC to maximum spec! Only other thing I can do to it is a bit of overclocking.

Now there's a thought...