Looking for an external sound card? Compare the codecs available on the market:

DAC - a dedicated chip responsible for converting a digital signal into an analog signal; the higher the resolution and sampling rate of the files, the more efficient the chip. The most efficient chips are marked as HD DAC; in addition, some DACs are equipped with XMOS microcontrollers with a USB port, which allows digital signal transmission while bypassing the sound card thanks to compliance with the USB Audio Class 2.0 (UAC 2.0) standard

SBC - the basic Bluetooth codec found in all Bluetooth devices using the Classic Audio standard

LC3 - the latest codec developed for the LE Audio standard; it is one of the main new features of Bluetooth 5.2

aptX - a codec licensed by Qualcomm; both the transmitting and receiving device must support this codec. It is available in aptX HD, aptX LL and aptX Adaptive versions; in addition, aptX LL provides latency of 32ms and is especially recommended for gamers and movie lovers

AAC - an Apple codec found in all products from this company; it is currently also available in Android 8 and higher

LDAC - a Sony codec found in the company's phones, distinguished by the highest audio signal quality

GOLDEN RCA - gold-plated RCA ensures more efficient signal transmission

PCM - a method of encoding an analog signal into digital form

Hi-Res Audio - this term refers to lossless audio file formats, including e.g. FLAC, DSD 64, DSD 128, DSD 256, DSD 512