Soundcards Slow down gaming performance??

[xtremsabu]

Yes i was wondering about soundcards. Yes lets saying you got a fast cpu and a top of the line videocard and lots of memory. But you got a average sound card. Would the sound card actucally effect your gaming performance speed wise or would the games just not sound as good? If it does affect speed how much does it affect?

[Bonehead]

You have to see the speed-difference in when you go from low quality to high quality sound in games. For example: whith my old isa SB AWE 64 going from low to high quality sound in QuakeII cost me 0.7 fps and with my SB!Live (both with an EMU chip) the difference is 0.3 fps. Conclusion? The difference is too small, although on more advanched games like Unreal going from 22Khz to 44Khz sound quality the different fps impact between the SB64 and SB!Live in fps can be more of a difference than with QuakeII. Also the more advanched EMU chip of the SB!Live makes the sound more 3D with EAX without much of a performance hit. Stick with a SB!Live or MX300.