Today's games like Unreal Tournament, Quake3: Arena, and Messiah will push your system to the limits. If you don't have the fastest CPU available, CPU usage comes into account when giving you the most realistic sound experience possible. Many audio cards today are very powerful and off-load a lot of the CPU intensive audio conversion to the soundcard itself. Even then, a certain amount of CPU usage is there. Ranges in usage can vary from less than 1% to nearly 15% of the CPU power. PCI cards or motherboard solutions usually keep the usage in the 1% to 7% range, which is acceptable.
The bundle of a soundcard is a determining factor also. Lower end cards tend to have fewer games and applications, and rely on the consumer for driver updates. The midrange cards tend to come with one or two full games, a few demos and sometimes can be well worth the twenty-five or so more dollars.
The box is the best source for information about the soundcard in question. It provides the specifications of the soundcard, and what features it has. When looking at the box, it is important to read the side panels, because that is where the good information is located. Things that are listed on the side panel include the frequency range, the Signal to Noise ratio, what API it supports, the connectors that are on the soundcard, and other useful items. Looking at those numbers, you want to make sure of a few items:
The Signal to Noise should be above 93dB. This is a good number to start out with, because while it is not the highest, it provides a clean sound.
The THD should be less than 0.1%.
A3D or EAX support
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