Dedicated Video & Sound Cards advantageous, or just use built-in?

[louv68]

I've purchased parts for a new i7 3770k build I'll be using to encode audio and HD video.
Would it be advantageous to use a dedicated video and sound card, or just use the built-in CPU's video and audio off the motherboard? I don't play PC games, so was thinking of just getting an inexpensive < $65 graphics card, and an inexpensive audio card. Would I be wasting my $$$, or would they actually be a good idea?

Thank you in advance for your comments and advice.

[aedipuss]

cheap boards wouldn't do any good. a $300 up vid card would with a program that supports gpu acceleration would. audio cards don't figure into encoding.

[jagabo]

The 3770K's GPU is more than sufficient for regular desktop usage. Since you don't play games there's no need for an add-on graphics card.

If you want GPU encoding the i7 GPU's Quick Sync is faster than any other GPU encoder. But all the GPU encoders deliver inferior quality. You'll find that x264 at fast settings on the 3770k is almost as fast as Quick Sync and still delivers better quality.

Regarding audio, onboard audio is usually fairly good these days. The major problem area is noise. Some motherboard manufacturers don't properly shield and isolate the analog audio circuitry. Try the onboard audio first. If you're not happy with it, upgrade.