Integrated Sound Performance
As we have already said above, Nvidia introduced High Definition Audio (Azalia) in its new solutions fro enthusiasts from nForce 500 chipset family. Let?s compare the performance of this solution with the one implemented in ATI CrossFire Xpress 3200 chipset. First of all we will look at the CPU utilization chart:
According to these results from the 3DMark03 audio-test, the new HAD solution from Nvidia loads the CPUs slightly heavier than the integrated HAD solution in CrossFire Xpress 3200.
As for the sound quality that is determined not only by the chipset parameters and driver quality but also by the vocal tract implementation on each particular mainboard model, we obtained the following results during our tests:
| ?/td> | ATI Sturgeon | ASUS M2N32-SLI Deluxe |
Frequency response (from 40Hz to 15kHz), dB: | +0.26, -0.31 | +0.11, -0.03 |
Noise level, dB (A): | -83.6 | -82.4 |
Dynamic range, dB (A): | 83.4 | 82.1 |
THD, %: | 0.0065 | 0.0048 |
IMD + Noise, %: | 0.019 | 0.021 |
Stereo crosstalk, dB: | -84.3 | -82.2 |
IMD at 10 kHz, %: | 0.021 | 0.022 |
Summing up I can conclude that both mainboards boast very high quality of the sound tract implementation.
