You can pick it up for $79.99 in the US while those in Europe will have to fork out 79.99 Euros when it is released worldwide sometime in the first quarter of the year.
HT Omega, Inc. was one of the first companies to offer authentic high-fidelity sound at a true 24-bit level of performance in their Original Claro sound card. Now revised, a new AD8620BR Op Amp from Analog Devices has joined the world class Oxygen 8788 based audio processor in the Claro Plus+. Like the Claro, the new Plus+ model supports EAX™ 1.0 & 2.0, A3D™ 1.0 and DirectSound™, but also adds Dolby Pro Logic IIx, Dolby Headphone, and a precision Base Management system. Benchmark Reviews has been fortunate enough to compare the HT Omega Claro Plus+ 24-bit/192KHz 8-channel high definition sound against the entire C-Media CMI8788 family of audio products in this review.
But we don't stop there. Back when the Claro was reviewed, integrated 5.1 channel sound was commonplace. These days, 7.1 (eight channel) audio support can be found in nearly every motherboard produced over the past year, so Benchmark Reviews will also test the HT Omega Claro Plus+ against the integrated High Definition Audio chipset previously codenamed Azalia. Don't be fooled though, because while integrated audio may offer the same high-quality 192KHz/24-bit audio output, it cannot do so without a hit to processor performance and system memory usage.
It is because of these integrated audio chipsets that manufacturers continue to throw around the term High Definition in all directions. It's everywhere; even the low-end segment seems to be offering onboard eight channel sound with their products. But it doesn't take long to notice that not all audio solutions sound alike; even if it has been labeled "High Definition". The sad truth is that consumers are unaware of the loose requirements necessary of such industry tags, and in the end some poor quality audio gets passed off as a premium solution.
This is because most computers being used today provide audio through low-quality integrated sound, or in some small numbers the computer may have a dedicated audio controller based sound card. At a glance, the two most prevalent forms of audio quality in personal computers are poor and acceptable. Although the industry tries to keep in step with Moore’s Law, there is one thing that is predominantly true: computer sound is the last item on the list for performance evolution. Gamers and audiophiles alike know better then to make this mistake, and keep sound quality at the forefront of there needs whenever they make a purchase.
In this review, I will revisit the features made famous in the original HT Omega Claro, and the new features will be showcased in the more-powerful Claro Plus+. With a sound level rating beyond 110dB, I will share the experience of clarity and definition in every melody that frolics on my eardrums. Intended for the audiophile with a discerning ear, the hardcore computer enthusiast and serious gamer who demands only the best, and the home theater buff who settles for nothing less than DTS: HT Omega offers the Claro Plus+ to delivers only the very best sound possible.
HT Omega is a US based company operating out of Ontario, California which manufactures multimedia hardware and peripherals. With a dedicated R&D division for PC and professional audio components, HT Omega is quickly expanding into the global market for consumer PC audio equipment based on Dolby Digital and DTS technologies. Game users and home entertainment enthusiasts around the world use HT Omega for the ultimate results.
HT Omega specializes in multimedia devices, especially electronic audio. The research and development engineers at HT Omega have designed some of the most successful sound cards sold globally over past five years. The drive and passion of HT Omega's highly qualified employees is to continue to develop innovative and ground-breaking new products.
The HT Omega Claro Plus+ with AD8620BR Op Amp is a premium-quality PCI bus 8-channel High Definition sound card that can be built into home audio electronics or personal computers to provide high fidelity sound playback and processing. The Claro Plus+ enables studio level audio performance, and offers gamers the complete spectrum of sound they require. With support for 8 outbound streams, Claro Plus+ can easily support the latest theater quality 5.1, 6.1, and especially 7.1 surround sound systems. For enhanced playback, Claro Plus+ reduces the system hardware resources used which allows complete surround sound experience whether using speakers or headphones.
• HT Omega Claro Plus+ AD8620BR Op Amp HD Sound Card
• TOSLINK Fiber Optic Digital Cable
• Owner's Manual
• Drivers/Applications Installation CD
• Warranty Card
Since you can't see the immediate difference between sound card products, unlike processors or video cards, you depend on other senses. This is why sound cards have become something of a mystery to consumers. Even still, with such a fierce market for audio supiority it has become unproductive to compare one high-end card against another using your own ears. Manufacturers learned this important lesson very early on, which is why we see so many new audio devices equipped with gold-plated bells and solid-state whistles. Making a product which is visually different is a lot easier (and cheaper) then designing a high-performance product.
But what happens when you mix good looks with great performance? The last time we asked this the HT OMEGA Claro surprised us by offering both with no questions asked. This time around, the new HT Omega Claro Plus+ AD8620BR Op Amp HD Sound Card answers the question a different way: you get more than you bargained for.
Since both the Claro and Claro Plus+ are descendants of the Bgears b-Enspirer, it is refreshing to see that HT Omega did not just simply re-brand a similar product as their own. At first glance, you can see that HT Omega's use of all solid state capacitors in the product really catches attention. Not only will these components lend to a longer overall product life, but they certainly provide a more modern look to a very modern product - especially now that Gigabyte has started making them part of their marketing backbone.
At this point in technology if a product uses anything other than solid state capacitors, it might as well be tagged obsolete at the factory. Not much changes in the new Claro Plus+ AD8620BR Op Amp HD sound card, because everything is very much the same as it was originally designed for the Claro.
The new AD8620BR OPAMP for Front Channel output is complimented by two 192k/24-bit S/PDIF high grade special Optical and Coaxial connectors for 44.1kHz, 48kHz, 96kHz, 192kHz SPDIF output. Both of these S/PDIF connectors work simultaneously.
In the next section, we offer a more detailed look at the HT Omega Claro Plus+ AD8620BR Op Amp HD sound card, and prepare for testing.
So far as I can tell, Benchmark Reviews has tested nearly every CMI8788-based sound card made, with the exception of the Sondigo Inferno and Auzentech X-Meridian (but not for a lack of trying). Unlike the b-Enspirer and Inferno which are clones of the C-Media reference model, the Claro and Claro Plus+ have much more in common with the X-Meridian.
The new Claro Plus+ sound card is essentially identical to the original Claro, which both use a design based on the C-Media reference model, and with the exception of an added AD8620BR Op Amp to the Plus+ they are quite literally the same product. Looks and op amps aside, these sound cards all utilize the same CMI8788 Oxygen audio processor. And why not? The C-Media Oxygen audio processor is among the best on the planet, so it makes perfect sense to build a better sound card using tried-and-true technology.
HT Omega didn't make any cosmetic changes to the Claro Plus+ when they added the AD8620BR Op Amp onto the PCB of the original Claro HD sound card. This is still evident by the ink stamped "Claro" on the top of the PCB which is identical for both versions. In all honesty though the original Claro didn't look bad at all, which gives this Plus+ version a head start on competing sound cards.
HT Omega includes an instruction/installation guide, driver software, TOSLINK optical cable, and the Claro Plus+ AD8620BR Op Amp HD Sound Card with this kit. The contents are very much identical to that of the original Claro, with the exception of a "Plus+" sticker on the front of the box.
Certainly the CLARO takes some of its styling cues from the auto industry. Between the black PCB and the gold plated accents, this card is clearly following the trends most enjoyed by the Bentley and Cadillac Escalade crowd. Come to think of it, I believe it was Creative's Sound Blaster Platinum that first hit the market with the black and gold outfit. I can accept this design, because despite it's overuse it is still attractive and refined. Let's just be thankful that colored LED's haven't made their way onto this device like they have with recent video card trends.
The HT Omega Claro Plus+ maintains a very slim profile; something most HTPS builders will appreciate. Installation is very standard: remove power from the system, install the sound card into an available PCI 2.2 slot, and fasten it to the case. The software provided by HT Omega on CD-ROM was also the most current version available at the time of this writing, so no additional downloading was necessary. I installed the HT Omega Claro Plus+ into a Windows XP Pro system at first, and later tested it with Windows Vista Ultimate Edition. To my surprise the Windows Vista system installed the device and worked without any problems.
With the Claro Plus+ in place, I found that Windows Vista did not automatically install a reference driver for the device, which I expected. So I used the drivers designed for Windows Vista available from the C-Media website to complete the installation.
There were some noticeable differences in the installations between Windows XP and Windows Vista. One difference is that Windows Vista requires you to right-click on the setup.exe file in order to run it as an administrator, and then proceed with the Windows Vista recommended installation procedure. Once installed, a small Xear 3D icon appears in the system tray. It's worth noting that a 64-bit driver is also available for both Windows XP and Vista Operating Systems.
Most people may not need much more then the default settings for their audio equipment. Those people are also the same bunch that suffer from hearing loss and think that onboard audio is as good as it gets. HT Omega borrows from the refined C-Media toolbox to utilize the 3D Audio Configuration software (version 1.0.48.51). With the Oxygen HD Configuration software you can customize the settings to your ears’ content.
In the Main Settings page, you can adjust settings to best suite your system equipment. In this configuration, I have selected a 6-channel system with 192KHz digital audio output. Even beyond this first step, I am afforded the opportunity to raise and lower the gain from +12db to -96db on each channel. There is also a test sequence and sample music available at the bottom of the page to sample each channels configuration. During this process a simple bar graph will be drawn in the Audio System Status window showing audio peaks and valleys.
Even headphones are given special treatment, since HT Omega and C-Media are aware that not everyone has the ability or desire to mount eight speakers in their work environment.
The Mixer page is very similar to the Windows Audio advanced properties page. The one thing I noticed it that the volume knob displayed on this page will show the volume level, but it will not allow you to move the dial. I though this was a bit meaningless in a sea of feature-rich functions.
On the Effect page, you can customize and save 10-band equalizer settings to unlimited profiles. The Environment tool is a creative feature to disguise sounds or alter their presence and location. The Environment Size tool allows you to scale the sound reverberation based on your listening environment.
The FlexBass page allows for specific frequency crossover ranges to be programmed into your system. In my application, I noticed that enabling this feature cut-out my subwoofer channel and put the rear speakers in its place. I have this feature disabled so that the channels will not be affected by software separation of the channels.
Since hearing and sound sensitivity is subjective to the individual, I relied upon software to do my bidding. It has become necessary to distrust my own ears, since each and every manufacturer declares specific device features; such as support for particular APIs and extensions, specific number of hardware accelerated sound buffers. it has become impossible to check the presence and quality of features declared for any sound device or new drivers without special software. Therefore, a dedicated sound test is required to diagnose and test the feature implementation quality of specific sound system.
This is where I depend on software to assist me in a subjective comparison. For testing sound cards, I know that my ears aren't a calibrated device nor are they reliable. I depend on RightMark 3DSound (v2.3). This is an independent synthetic sound test for benchmarking hardware features and quality of software support, specifically using the RightMark 3DSound: CPU Utilization test. All tests were run using the DirectSound test battery, and were configured with a frequency of 192,000 and 128 buffers.
It would be unfair to compare audio devices which promise very different features, so in my testing I decided to compare the HT Omega CLARO to its slightly older cousin, the Bgears b-Enspirer. Both devices utilize C-Media's CMI8788 Oxygen chipset, and both offer audio quality up to 24bit/192kHz over eight channels. The major difference between the two is in the construction and I/O interfaces.
From the charts above, you can see that the HT Omega CLARO is clearly not the same card as the Bgears b-Enspirer. While sound output quality may be identical, the CPU usage is slightly different. The DirectSound 2D tests showed that the Bgears b-Enspirer peaked at 5% and dropped to as low as 2.5% CPU utilization, while the HT Omega CLARO peaked as high as 7.5% and dropped to 3.5% comparatively.
Again, for the DirectSound 3D and EAX test you see that the HT Omega CLARO requires just a little more CPU then the Bgears b-Enspirer. In this test, the Bgears b-Enspirer peaked at 7% and dropped to as low as 2.5% CPU utilization, and the HT Omega CLARO peaked as high as 9% and dropped to 3.5%. These results certainly won't translate into any noticeable performance hit, but the numbers are there.
There really aren't a lot of testing programs out there for audio processors. In many ways, it becomes unfair to test one against another unless they share the same input/output interface.
Passmark offers a testing program named SoundCheck, which monitors the bitrate output and CPU usage. While the CPU usage is virtually useless on most systems anymore, since the figure is often times less than 1%, I didn't bother to take it into consideration. Especially when you consider the degree of error in such a result. Watch the Windows Task Manager on an idle PC and you'll see what I mean: the CPU usage moves all over the place even if you're system has been streamlined down to 16 processes (like our test system).
For testing this set of sound cards, I used the highest settings the SoundCheck software would allow. In each test, SoundCheck's sample rate was set to 128,000. I really would have liked to see a higher rate, as to really stress the cards, but it didn't exist in the program. Next, the channel setting was set to 2 stereo channels and the resolution was set to 24-bit. Finally, the sound buffer was set to 1MB and the white noise test sound was played.
Passmark's SoundCheck (v3.0.1001) is a software-based tool for benchmarking the CPU usage and bitrate delivered from the sound card.
To begin the testing the set, I started with the onboard audio chipset. With the onboard audio enabled and the Soundmax HD driver installed, I used Passmark SoundCheck to measure bitrate output.
In all honesty, I sincerely though Passmark's SoundCheck benchmark tool would prove that onboard sound is a poor audio solution. As it turns out, I was wrong. Offering only 0.2551% bitrate loss, it seems that the ADI AD1988B Audio CODEC is very much a competitor to aftermarket solutions. It may not a 24-bit audio solution, but it still offered great output... for free.
SoundCheck Test on ADI AD1988B 8-channel High Definition Audio CODEC (ASUS P5K3)
Moving on to the Bgears b-Enspirer, I tried not to form the same opinion. Even though the b-Enspirer doesn't look as modern since it has standard capacitors, it offers every bit the same sound quality as the other two C-Media Oxygen HD CMI8788 based sound cards.
SoundCheck Test on Bgears b-Enspirer 7.1 Channel 24-Bit Sound Card
HT Omega's original Claro sound card practically matched the b-Enspirer performance in the SoundCheck benchmark. Just as the RightMark 3DSound testing showed, the Claro products are not quite as efficient as the b-Enspirer despite the looks.
SoundCheck Test on HT OMEGA Claro 7.1 Channel 24-bit 192KHz PCI Sound Card
Finally we arrive to our featured product. Based on the previous tests, the Claro Plus+ fall directly in-line with the results of the other two Oxygen HD CMI8788 sound cards. Considering that the error of margin should be at least 0.01%, it could be argued that all three audio products offer the same output bitrate.
SoundCheck Test on HT Omega Claro Plus+ 8 Channel Sound Card with AD8620BR Op Amp
HT Omega Claro Plus+ 8 Channel Sound Card with AD8620BR Op Amp
Have we reached a point in technology where the product exceeds our needs? This was the question that kept ringing in my ears throughout the article. I appreciate good quality sound as much as the next person, but even with a 5.1 channel Logitech X-540 speaker set positioned around me I still seem to feel very underpowered. It would be unfair to say the HT Omega Claro Plus+ 8 Channel Sound Card with AD8620BR Op Amp is just another sound card waiting to turn your gaming experience into a live action movie; the 7.1 channel integrated audio proved that it could do that. To fully appreciate the quality an operational amplifier attached to a 24-bit audio processor, you'll need to invest in some very high-quality (read: not Logitech, Creative, or Altec Lansing) or at least some very nice headphones.
From the colorful retail box to the black and gold accents, the Claro Plus+ maintains an appealing presentation. Solid state capacitors ensure long-life durability. and true 24-bit sound promises performance.
If you are even slightly inclined to appreciate great, high-quality sound, then you owe it to yourself to move up to professional grade audio hardware; and if you already insist on only the best than the HT Omega Claro Plus+ with AD8620BR Op Amp is clearly the sound card for you. Back when I reviewed the original Claro sound card I mentioned that my Logitech X-530 5.1 speaker system seemed outclassed by the quality; and even with a slight upgrade to the X-540 system I stand by my original statement. If you buy a race car, you buy racing tires. So if you want professional-grade audio from your computer you had better be prepared to step up into a full range 7.1 speaker system that can handle the fidelity.
The biggest setback for this premium product is the premium price. At the time of this writing, the HT Omega Claro Plus+ 8 Channel Sound Card with AD8620BR Op Amp is available at Newegg.com for $174.99. The price of the original Claro sound card has actually gone up since it was first available from NewEgg, perhaps because of the comparable products (Xi-Fi and Sonar) which cost slightly more but offer the same specifications. At any rate, we should hope to see some other major online retailers picking up on this product soon so that the competition can begin dropping the prices to meet with consumer demand. In regards to the overall value, it's difficult to ignore the quality sound card bundled with an included TOSLINK Fiber Optic Digital cable.
In conclusion, this is the answer audio professionals has waited for. If you approach the Claro Plus+ with the proper speakers, it will exceed your expectations. To a large extent this review has focused on the C-Media Oxygen HD CMI8788 audio processor driven family of sound cards, but I have done so for a specific reason. It's not as if Benchmark Reviews is unaware of the different sound card products outside of the b-Enspirer, Claro, or Claro Plus+, but these are the most popular sound cards utilizing the Oxygen 8788 processor at the moment. The X-Fi and Sonar are just settling in on the market with the same hardware as the CMI8788 has offered for over a year now. So when it comes down to decision making, you need to only determine if you're willing to use premium audio hardware with a premium sound card. Anything less would be unfair to your ears.
+ Unparalleled sound quality
+ True 24-bit audio processing
+ Digital 192KHz output into 8 independently controlled channels
+ AD8620BR Op Amp front channel enhancement
+ Feature-driven software interface
+ Solid state capacitors
+ Simultaneous optical and digital coax output
+ Gold plated I/O panel
+ Internal & front panel digital/analog connections
- Premium pricing for a premium product
- Requres audiophile-grade speakers to achieve best results
- Software interface would benefit from a help file or balloons
- Audible improvement over ADI AD1988B integrated audio (ASUS P5K3) was marginal
