| >16 bit enough It is so believed (although there's a lack of supporting evidence, and knowledge that human hearing has excellent dynamic range), but only as long as the mastering work was well done. 24bit allows for much less destructive human error and is very welcome. Much more so than absurdly high sample rates (96KHz, reproducing sounds up to 48KHz as per Niquist), which are of dubious value. >my sennheiser hd600s are 300Ω At some frequencies. At some others, it's more like 600Ω. Impedance is seldom stable across the frequency range in headphones. Amplifier design should account for this and still provide enough power[0]. Output impedance of headphone jacks should be low enough (1:10 is commonly cited, which means <2Ω in practice as 20-30Ω headphones are very common) relative to the low end of the headphone impedance range, in order to prevent the impairment of frequency response. >Not -all- onboard cards suck of course But most do. The design of audio circuitry in motherboards doesn't get that much attention. None of my motherboards have good sound. Flaws vary. Some are lowpassed (greedy anti-aliasing filter). Some are noisy. Most have excessive output impedance (typically more than 6Ω, and at times higher than 15Ω). None can output enough power[0] for hd600 (my favourite pair). [0]: https://nwavguy.blogspot.com/2011/09/more-power.html |