1
00:00:07,319 --> 00:00:15,040
welcome to my unboxing and first look at the ASUS Zonar Essence

2
00:00:11,679 --> 00:00:16,440
STX now I talk about sound cards a lot

3
00:00:15,040 --> 00:00:20,199
and people ask me for sound card recommendations a lot and you know

4
00:00:18,520 --> 00:00:23,800
there's sort of lower-end ones the whole Zone R line actually is just kind of

5
00:00:21,960 --> 00:00:30,000
awesome so whatever your price range is just buy a Zonar and you'll be fine um

6
00:00:26,359 --> 00:00:32,279
but this one is like the baller Zonar

7
00:00:30,000 --> 00:00:39,160
this is the Zonar with all the features that you need especially if you use

8
00:00:35,480 --> 00:00:42,120
headphones so 124 DB sound to noise

9
00:00:39,160 --> 00:00:47,120
ratio which is just ridiculous I mean remember that decb are essentially a

10
00:00:45,079 --> 00:00:52,600
doubling of of in terms of sound to noise ratio it's a doubling of quality

11
00:00:49,520 --> 00:00:54,039
every time you go up 3 DB okay so think

12
00:00:52,600 --> 00:01:00,000
remember that so when you see something that's 110 DB sound to noise ratio that

13
00:00:56,640 --> 00:01:02,640
is like many times worse than this okay

14
00:01:00,000 --> 00:01:07,720
it has swappable opamps which means you can actually customize the sound of it

15
00:01:05,600 --> 00:01:12,360
according to your liking so if you don't know what opamps are those are the uh

16
00:01:10,720 --> 00:01:16,439
the components on the board that actually do the amplification for the

17
00:01:14,360 --> 00:01:19,640
card okay so we're going to go ahead and start opening this up the reason I'm

18
00:01:18,119 --> 00:01:23,759
opening this is cuz we're using it in like an ultimate system build guide so

19
00:01:21,720 --> 00:01:27,360
if I was picking an ultimate sound card for me personally this is the one that I

20
00:01:25,920 --> 00:01:30,880
would choose let's have a look at what ASUS has to say for themselves on the

21
00:01:29,119 --> 00:01:35,399
box here anyway though so industry leading okay with basically no

22
00:01:33,479 --> 00:01:39,680
Distortion built-in headphone amp provides exceptional quality even with

23
00:01:37,119 --> 00:01:45,520
600 ohms of impedance remember guys for context a Sennheiser hd800 is 600 ohms

24
00:01:43,840 --> 00:01:49,880
of impedance so we're talking like spending well over a grand on headphones

25
00:01:48,079 --> 00:01:55,360
before you're going to run into the limits of what this can drive okay

26
00:01:53,079 --> 00:01:59,920
nickon fine gold capacitors offer great Dynamic performance it uses audio

27
00:01:57,360 --> 00:02:04,200
capacitors which are actually different from the kinds of capacitors that some

28
00:02:02,000 --> 00:02:06,840
competing products are using on sound products whether it's built into a

29
00:02:05,360 --> 00:02:10,160
motherboard or whether it's built into a sound card where they're more like

30
00:02:08,640 --> 00:02:15,760
motherboard capacitors different capacitors will affect the way the sound

31
00:02:13,560 --> 00:02:20,400
comes out of the analog signal like remember guys okay any of the music

32
00:02:18,280 --> 00:02:26,040
you're listening to is inherently digital any of the sound you listen to

33
00:02:22,840 --> 00:02:28,440
is inherently analog so the process of

34
00:02:26,040 --> 00:02:34,480
converting that digital signal to an analog sound is extremely complicated

35
00:02:31,879 --> 00:02:39,159
and depends on every aspect of the design of the card so everything from

36
00:02:36,800 --> 00:02:44,080
the processor to the Dax so that's the digital to analog converter everything

37
00:02:41,599 --> 00:02:47,840
to the do they have anything on here about the Emi shielding okay well Emi

38
00:02:45,959 --> 00:02:52,120
shielding to keep just random interference that's bouncing around

39
00:02:49,720 --> 00:02:57,440
inside your PC from from affecting any part of that process to the uh to the op

40
00:02:55,800 --> 00:03:01,120
amps as well everything affects the process so okay moving right along

41
00:02:59,159 --> 00:03:04,920
perfectly Shield Emi free okay there it is uh customize your sound card

42
00:03:02,800 --> 00:03:08,480
effortlessly with swappable app opam sockets you can just buy them online

43
00:03:06,319 --> 00:03:11,319
it's not a big deal uh okay in terms of driver features they'll be digital live

44
00:03:09,879 --> 00:03:16,400
D be headphone D be virtual speaker they'll be Pro logic 2 direct sound 3D

45
00:03:13,920 --> 00:03:20,720
vocal effect smart volume acoustic Echo oh acoustic Echo cancellation that's

46
00:03:17,799 --> 00:03:24,159
kind of neat okay and let's go ahead and check out the card itself so they have

47
00:03:22,519 --> 00:03:30,680
like an awesome picture of the card which we'll use to help us through the

48
00:03:27,480 --> 00:03:35,480
process oh yeah so guys if you if you

49
00:03:30,680 --> 00:03:37,319
don't know I'm running um an ASUS uh s

50
00:03:35,480 --> 00:03:41,680
what am I running I'm running a Zonar zent which is a similar card to this one

51
00:03:40,040 --> 00:03:46,879
but actually not quite as good if I was going to pick my ultimate sound card

52
00:03:44,040 --> 00:03:51,480
this one would be it so in terms of IO you've got stereo outputs so front right

53
00:03:49,560 --> 00:03:56,200
front left this is if you're using an external amplifier so for for Amplified

54
00:03:54,480 --> 00:04:00,400
speakers or something like that then you've got your amped headphone jack

55
00:03:58,120 --> 00:04:06,360
your line in and your spit this is your digital out so this is a headphone

56
00:04:03,360 --> 00:04:09,680
lovers sound card this is not for you

57
00:04:06,360 --> 00:04:11,519
know 7.1 or you know whatever sort of

58
00:04:09,680 --> 00:04:16,359
things that people think are fancy this is for audio files who are interested in

59
00:04:13,959 --> 00:04:20,799
stereo speakers high quality output to stereo speakers or high quality output

60
00:04:18,639 --> 00:04:23,560
to headphones it does have front panel Jacks so you can still plug in your

61
00:04:22,240 --> 00:04:27,400
front panel headphone jack and microphone Jack but honestly guys if

62
00:04:25,600 --> 00:04:32,320
you're not using these ports you're doing it wrong with a sound card like

63
00:04:29,320 --> 00:04:34,479
this has a dedicated Molex power adapter

64
00:04:32,320 --> 00:04:38,759
or connector rather and that is because this card actually does draw some power

65
00:04:37,000 --> 00:04:42,240
in order to deliver that Punchy sound at a moment's notice it also has some very

66
00:04:40,560 --> 00:04:46,720
large caps going on which is going to help with that as well you can see that

67
00:04:44,320 --> 00:04:50,440
while this sort of shield on here this Emi Shield looks like it has gaps in it

68
00:04:48,520 --> 00:04:54,120
there's only very small gaps so from the inside of the case there's almost no way

69
00:04:52,680 --> 00:04:58,639
for any kind of interference to get in there you can see it's actually blocked there's a copper piece that's right in

70
00:04:57,280 --> 00:05:03,880
there that makes it so that nothing can really sort of get in there it uses PCI

71
00:05:01,199 --> 00:05:08,520
or rather PCI Express 1X connectivity remember guys that can be plugged into

72
00:05:06,000 --> 00:05:15,720
any PCI Express slot whether it's 1X 4X 8X or 16x PCI E1 pcie2 pcie3 all of

73
00:05:13,880 --> 00:05:19,600
those standards are are basically interchangeable for the purposes of

74
00:05:17,160 --> 00:05:23,280
something like a sound card here's an adapter so you can take those analog

75
00:05:21,479 --> 00:05:28,080
outputs and you can run them to just sort of a regular stereo Jack okay

76
00:05:25,759 --> 00:05:33,479
here's an adapter for this so you can run uh smaller jack headphones or

77
00:05:30,680 --> 00:05:38,759
microphone off of this all right and then there is a oh awesome I actually

78
00:05:36,600 --> 00:05:42,080
didn't realize this but this coax Jack right here is actually Optical as well

79
00:05:40,440 --> 00:05:46,520
so you just use the included adapter and you can get an uh you can do optical

80
00:05:44,199 --> 00:05:52,440
audio out from there too all right included documentation audio Precision

81
00:05:48,720 --> 00:05:54,479
test report your individual sound card

82
00:05:52,440 --> 00:05:59,039
was actually tested and this was printed out from your sound card so this will

83
00:05:56,880 --> 00:06:04,400
give you the full characteristics of your card this card that's in the Box as

84
00:06:02,039 --> 00:06:07,639
opposed to being some kind of generic you know how a lot of high-end products

85
00:06:06,280 --> 00:06:13,319
come with like a certificate of performance or something like that that

86
00:06:09,440 --> 00:06:15,240
actually has no basis on this thing this

87
00:06:13,319 --> 00:06:18,880
physical object that's in the Box not how it works with an Essence STX this is

88
00:06:17,120 --> 00:06:23,639
a serious sound card all right we got a thing about the

89
00:06:21,919 --> 00:06:28,160
philosophy of something in a picture of the card okay that I'm less interested

90
00:06:25,199 --> 00:06:31,720
in moving right along we've got uh ASUS's driver disc don't use this

91
00:06:30,199 --> 00:06:36,680
download the latest off Theus website they're excellent also there's a third

92
00:06:33,199 --> 00:06:38,160
party um Universal driver for Zonar

93
00:06:36,680 --> 00:06:41,880
cards that actually has a couple of extra features so that's kind of cool

94
00:06:39,800 --> 00:06:46,120
here's a sticker that you could put on something okay uh here's a quick start

95
00:06:44,160 --> 00:06:49,880
guide here's a wow there's there's a lot of documentation here slick there's

96
00:06:47,680 --> 00:06:52,400
another quick start guide I told you there's two quick start guides are these

97
00:06:51,240 --> 00:06:56,280
the same thing oh no they have different part numbers on them okay and then

98
00:06:54,520 --> 00:07:00,720
there's uh like another poster they have two posters included

99
00:06:59,080 --> 00:07:06,400
yep okay all right

100
00:07:03,039 --> 00:07:09,000
cool um I think that pretty much covers

101
00:07:06,400 --> 00:07:13,520
it so if you're looking for a sound card recommendation my general recommendation

102
00:07:11,360 --> 00:07:18,759
is some kind of Zonar card if you're looking for a specific recommendation I

103
00:07:16,039 --> 00:07:22,759
would take this one personally um I'm more of a headphone guy I don't use

104
00:07:20,319 --> 00:07:26,840
surround so that's that's the context of that recommendation from me but uh let's

105
00:07:25,000 --> 00:07:30,720
just see if we're missing anything here hyper grounding circuitry design okay oh

106
00:07:29,560 --> 00:07:36,800
I don't know if I mentioned but it uses a bur Brown PCM 1792 a digital analog

107
00:07:34,080 --> 00:07:41,560
converter so that's part of achieving that 124 DB single noise ratio this one

108
00:07:39,400 --> 00:07:46,919
can do even better than that swappable op amps perfectly sealed analog output

109
00:07:44,680 --> 00:07:52,319
path with all that shielding and all of that good stuff and I think that pretty

110
00:07:50,120 --> 00:07:56,240
much covers it thank you for checking out my unboxing and first look at the

111
00:07:53,680 --> 00:07:58,919
Zonar Essence STX from ASUS don't forget to subscribe to L's Tech tips for more

112
00:07:57,560 --> 00:08:01,440
unboxings reviews and other computer videos