Reddit mentions of StarTech.com USB Sound Card w/ SPDIF Digital Audio & Stereo Mic – External Sound Card for Laptop or PC – SPDIF Output (ICUSBAUDIO2D),Black

Are there any good audio interfaces / external sound cards that can sit on my desk and allow me to plug in a 3.5mm headset and ideally have some sort of volume knob too? My PC sits under my desk and running a long extension cable to it is less than ideal. I'd rather have a small device sit on my desk that I can easily plug into when needed.

I've found this but it looks more in-line than "desktop". Also this one that doesn't have a combo jack. Anything else similar I may not be aware of?

You can get away with 128GB it will even have some extra room mostly because you're dual booting it will take a while to even fill a 128GB SSD also Sweex 7.1 External USB Sound Card or StarTech.com External Sound Card USB Stereo Audio Adapter they're both pretty good alternately you can get a headset with the soundcard built in but, those are pretty expensive and worse than getting a pair of AKG's and getting a nice modded mic with it

> you are only as good as your worst component

This statement right here is what makes me spend way too much money whenever I upgrade my computer, haha. I'm not expecting flac quality from everything, and I do enjoy using spotify for music so there's a major downfall in itself, but even with this subpar usb thing I've got now the quality is so much better, I'm finding.

This works fine for my use case of measuring signal power: https://www.amazon.co.uk/StarTech-com-Stereo-Adapter-External-Digital-Black/dp/B00F7120TQ/ref=sr_1_24?keywords=usb+to+jack+adapter&qid=1567789063&rnid=1642204031&s=computers&sr=1-24

Fair point.
I think I might have found something that will do the trick for cheaper
http://www.amazon.co.uk/StarTech-com-External-Sound-Stereo-Adapter/dp/B00F7120TQ/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1451414767&sr=8-1&keywords=StarTech.com+usb+audio

Not sure if the sound is going to be as good as the creative one though.

Would something like this work?

http://www.amazon.co.uk/StarTech-com-External-Sound-Stereo-Adapter/dp/B00F7120TQ/ref=sr_1_1?s=computers&ie=UTF8&qid=1452800158&sr=1-1&keywords=dac

or

http://www.amazon.co.uk/StarTech-com-External-Sound-Stereo-Adapter/dp/B00F7120TQ/ref=sr_1_1?s=computers&ie=UTF8&qid=1452800158&sr=1-1&keywords=dac

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Creative-Sound-Blaster-System-Preamp/dp/B00GMDWNJK/ref=sr_1_2?s=computers&ie=UTF8&qid=1452800158&sr=1-2&keywords=dac****

(thanks btw)

The speakers will have an independent power source, if that helps. Sound quality is not my main concern. More so latency, as I want to use it for a pa / karaoke system.

I've also read good things about this product. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00F7120TQ/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_dkp0Ab5P88VT5

Or if you have any other good alternative solutions. It will run on a Linux OS.

So, to be clear, I want to use this with a set of gaming headphones that uses a line for headphones and a line for the mic. So far I've seen these two: 1 and 2

So the less than great quality will be remedied by the built in DAC in the Onkyo? The only thing I really need to do is convert my audio into a digital signal and let the built in DAC scale it up?

Would something like this work?

Would this be what I'm looking for? Or would it be something else?

EDIT: Would this work too? Or this Turtle Beach one? Or this StarTec one? Or this Behringer UCA202?

Something like this would work. No idea how the sound quality is though, you might be better off with extension cables depending on your onboard audio.