The Guru of 3D managed to get a hold of an engineering sample from ASUS, their new Xonar Essence ST, not to be confused with the already available STX model.  At a glance, the card looks very similar to the STX, the differences are in the ICs on the board its self and the DAC card that was bundled with the audio card sample.  It is hard to get a handle on the performance of an audio card without hearing it for yourself, but from the praise given the ST in the preview, there is a good chance this will be a winner with those loving quality sounds.

“The PC audio market has been churning out some great new high fidelity soundcards lately. A good example here is the recent release of the new Essence STX headphone card, which stirred up the audio community and caught the attention of people who usually look for external headphone amplifiers. Some of you may know there were rumors of ASUS expanding the Essence Line-up with possibly a PCI model.

Guru3D has the prototype the engineering sample of the Essence ST in our audio lab today, and will bring you a sneak preview on it to show you what ASUS is working on inside that chocolate factory of theirs.”

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Audio Corner