[section_title title=”Conclusion”]Conclusion
So I’ve been using the U5 for a good few weeks now, what are my thoughts?
Well when it comes to design, aside from the materials I cannot fault the U5 one bit. I really like the stealthy design, it looks great just sat on top of your desk (which it does wonderfully thanks to a good weight and grippy rubber feet) and the ergonomics are great. As I said though I would like to see the U5 made out of a slightly nicer plastic, or even to have some aluminium touches would just help the quality feel that little bit better.
From a performance standpoint I really liked the U5, the sound quality is decent but it is the compatibility options and ease of use that really make this little thing shine. When you combine this with a robust software offering the U5 really is an attractive option for those that need to switch between audio systems from the same computer quickly and easily with most of the quality of a discrete sound card to boot.
So that brings me on to value, is the U5 good bang for buck? £65 is a good chunk of money but for the convenience and feature set on offer here I’d consider it well worth it. I would happily stump up my own cash for one, and that’s the most I can ever say for a product.
In light of all the above, I’m happy to give the Xonar U5 from ASUS a Gold award, and being that I am now using it with no plans to swap back to my sound card it has to deserve an Editors Choice too.
I’d like to say a big thank you to ASUS for today’s sample, I hope to see more from them in the future.
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Performance
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Design
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Value
Summary
Pros:
– Much better sound quality than most motherboard audio
– Lots of connectivity options
– Amplified headphone port
– On the fly output switching
– Robust software suite
Cons:
– Some metal touches would be nice
