I am glad after gigabyte now asrock trying to improve onboard sound, they've realized the pure weakness of it and they do whatever possible to surpass the bad past of it...But I doubt it...Even some old creatives X-FIs are superior : /

Seems like alot of manufacturers are starting to go this route.

"115dB SNR DAC, the highest in the industry" - Lolwut? I suppose they mean the highest for an integrated sound card? 120-124dB SNR is seemingly the standard for high end sound cards. It's nice that companies are starting to invest a little more into integrated sound, but Realtek's stuff has always been a whole lot of meh and I don't expect much more from this despite the op amps. If any of you actually care about sound I highly recommend buying a discrete card.

"115dB SNR DAC, the highest in the industry" - Lolwut? I suppose they mean the highest for an integrated sound card? 120-124dB SNR is seemingly the standard for high end sound cards. It's nice that companies are starting to invest a little more into integrated sound, but Realtek's stuff has always been a whole lot of meh and I don't expect much more from this despite the op amps. If any of you actually care about sound I highly recommend buying a discrete card.

Realtek has made a lot of improvements in their audio chips over the last 10 years. That said, it's rather sad that you have to look back 10 years to realize the improvements they've made....however, simply recommending that people buy a discrete sound card, doesn't really help them with improving their audio experience. There are just as many discrete sound cards on the market that produce horrid sound, as there are motherboards using Realtek and VIA audio chipsets. You need to be a good bit more specific in recommend discrete sound cards....and a bit more blunt. Buy either an Asus Xonar sound card, Creative X-Fi Titanium HD or Creative Z series sound card if you want to improve your audio experience.