New Xonar Essence "One"

[Raja@ASUS]

Thats one of those audiophile myths... look at the RMAA noise graphs for the X-Fi Titanium HD, you would struggle to get that with most top end external dacs

http://www.guru3d.com/article/sound-...um-hd-review/6

The SNR with an external DAC is no more difficult than it is with an internal sound card. If anything the internal soundcard requires more copius attention to layout and shielding due to the high levels of emi and rfi in computer cases. Put simply if a SNR of -120db~-130db is possible in a case it is certainly possible in an external solution if attention is paid to detail

The noise transmission from the USB bus to the DAC can be broken by a transformer at the DAC USB input side (doubt ASUS have done that here, though).