New Sound card from Creative Labs?

  • Thread starter Thread starter boe
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B

boe

This group seems to take pc hardware very seriously and there was no
response in the creative group I posted in. I tried
creative.products.sound_blaster.live - if there is a better forum for
creative I'd appreciate the info.

I got a pretty good ATI video card (using 4.7 drivers with great success so
far) recently and a nice bigscreen and some great speakers - now I'd love to
be able to play my games back using that system with surround sound. My
preamp is a few years old but it still has a couple of optical ins still
available. I don't want an extra set of speakers like those Cambridge ones,
the ones I have are significantly better speakers. But from what I've read
including from Creative, not many games outuput through the SB Audigy2 in
5.1 unless the source is already encoded - e.g. DVD's. I did get a response
from Creative saying that the chips to enable encoding for surround on sound
cards has just recently been made affordable and fast enough to add on to
cards. The big question is has anyone got any information on when there
next card is coming out and if it will have such a chip on board.
 
I have an SB Audigy 5.1 and a nice set of 5.1 speakers to go with it. Games
that I play right now that have 5.1 audio (not just talking about
pre-encoded 5.1 music here... the whole game is output in 5.1) are:

Painkiller
FarCry
Joint Operations: Typhoon Rising

can't think of any more... The point is though, that you don't need
real-time AC3 encoding to utilize all 5.1 channels in real-time.
 
can't think of any more... The point is though, that you don't need
real-time AC3 encoding to utilize all 5.1 channels in real-time.
Click to expand...

Also, EAX2 and 3 can convert stereo to pseudo 5.1 (even 7.1).

So if a game suports EAX, you wont be wasting your 5.1 speakers even if the in game sound engine is
really stereo. Games like Battlefield Vietnam have it.

I also listen to lots of CDs on my 5.1s, and use the Soundstorm preprocessing (it can create the
missing channels on the fly to expand the stereo image), so again, there is no specific need to
actually have a 5.1 source to use 5.1 speakers.

In all cases, the difference is discernable and much better than stereo.

S

Sound card - Soundstorm (i.e. the onboard 5.1 on my MSI Nvidia nForce2 mobo, very good but has a
slight hiss at zero volume, prolly because of all the high frequencies on the mobo... but not
noticeable as soon as you start playing something),
speakers - Creative 550 (5.1, THX... excellent, they compare well to my separates system downstairs,
and quite useful when I am having a shower upstairs and want some tunes to drown out my singing :)
 
boe said:
This group seems to take pc hardware very seriously and there was no
response in the creative group I posted in. I tried
creative.products.sound_blaster.live - if there is a better forum for
creative I'd appreciate the info.
Click to expand...

Go to the newsgroups on their server:

news.soundblaster.com
 
This group seems to take pc hardware very seriously and there was no
response in the creative group I posted in. I tried
creative.products.sound_blaster.live - if there is a better forum for
creative I'd appreciate the info.

I got a pretty good ATI video card (using 4.7 drivers with great success so
far) recently and a nice bigscreen and some great speakers - now I'd love to
be able to play my games back using that system with surround sound. My
preamp is a few years old but it still has a couple of optical ins still
available. I don't want an extra set of speakers like those Cambridge ones,
the ones I have are significantly better speakers. But from what I've read
including from Creative, not many games outuput through the SB Audigy2 in
5.1 unless the source is already encoded - e.g. DVD's. I did get a response
from Creative saying that the chips to enable encoding for surround on sound
cards has just recently been made affordable and fast enough to add on to
cards. The big question is has anyone got any information on when there
next card is coming out and if it will have such a chip on board.
Click to expand...
You are confusing Encoding with Decoding. Creative labs has been able to
decode DD 5.1 for years now. Encoding DD real time is another thing all
together.
 
I'm not sure what you are trying to say but the current cards don't have an
ENcoder on them - they need this for preamps to get the 5.1 from other
sources than preencoded formats such as some DVDs.

 
Thanks, I'm not sure but if you can check on these, it would be appreciated.
I'd like to play Halo, Call of Duty, Jedi, Voyager and others and have the
EAX enabled so that if a shot is fired, the sound comes from the speaker in
the direction of the sound source. I don't just want sound from all my
speakers, I want discreet sound sources.
 
boe said:
This group seems to take pc hardware very seriously and there was no
response in the creative group I posted in. I tried
creative.products.sound_blaster.live - if there is a better forum for
creative I'd appreciate the info.

I got a pretty good ATI video card (using 4.7 drivers with great
success so far) recently and a nice bigscreen and some great speakers
- now I'd love to be able to play my games back using that system
with surround sound. My preamp is a few years old but it still has a
couple of optical ins still available. I don't want an extra set of
speakers like those Cambridge ones, the ones I have are significantly
better speakers. But from what I've read including from Creative,
not many games outuput through the SB Audigy2 in
5.1 unless the source is already encoded - e.g. DVD's. I did get a
response from Creative saying that the chips to enable encoding for
surround on sound cards has just recently been made affordable and
fast enough to add on to cards. The big question is has anyone got
any information on when there next card is coming out and if it will
have such a chip on board.
Click to expand...

Voyetra-Turtle Beach :) Rivera

I have an el cheapo Santa Cruz, and it stomps the SB Live! series flat.
Not that much because of the hardware, both make great boards with a lot
of potential. Software/drivers.
The Santa Cruz can do things that even Audigy2 cannot. Shop around and
read a bit.
You'll find that even motherboards now come with 8 channel sound.
What's that now, 7.1 surround? I don't trust Creative Labs now.
Something has changed with that company and they do not treat customers
the way they used to. What things CL touts their sound cards have is
"conditional", only IF you have this or that yadda yadda. The Turtle
Beach cards? Heck you'll find all the goodies right in the control
panel applett on the taskbar. I'm impressed.
McG.
 
boe said:
This group seems to take pc hardware very seriously and there was no
response in the creative group I posted in. I tried
creative.products.sound_blaster.live - if there is a better forum for
creative I'd appreciate the info.
Click to expand...

**** Creative. This is the company that was responisble for the demise of
Aureal through malicious litigation. A3D 3.0 was about to turn the sound
card industry on it's head, Creative saw that they were about to be screwed
and did what most corporations do nowadays when faced with competition from
a smaller competitor, sue them. After killing Aureal, Craptive bought the
remains and now A3D 3.0 lies in their vaults somewhere and will never see
the light of day. Bastards.

If you want sound that's as good, if not better than an Audigy for a
fraction of the price then get an Nforce 2 motherboard with SoundStorm. Also
SoundStorm has the lowest CPU usage of any sound solution. It really is that
good, Nvidia should have advertised it as 'the soundcard that comes with a
free motherboard'.

K
 
**** Creative. This is the company that was responisble for the demise of
Aureal through malicious litigation. A3D 3.0 was about to turn the sound
card industry on it's head, Creative saw that they were about to be screwed
and did what most corporations do nowadays when faced with competition from
a smaller competitor, sue them. After killing Aureal, Craptive bought the
remains and now A3D 3.0 lies in their vaults somewhere and will never see
the light of day. Bastards.
Click to expand...
If you want sound that's as good, if not better than an Audigy for a
fraction of the price then get an Nforce 2 motherboard with SoundStorm. Also
SoundStorm has the lowest CPU usage of any sound solution. It really is that
good, Nvidia should have advertised it as 'the soundcard that comes with a
free motherboard'.
Click to expand...

Agree with everything you say, but that's not why I posted, just to
say I like this description :
'the soundcard that comes with a free motherboard'
Click to expand...
K
Click to expand...

BoroLad
 
Voyetra-Turtle Beach :) Rivera

I have an el cheapo Santa Cruz, and it stomps the SB Live! series flat.
Not that much because of the hardware, both make great boards with a lot
of potential. Software/drivers.
The Santa Cruz can do things that even Audigy2 cannot. Shop around and
read a bit.
You'll find that even motherboards now come with 8 channel sound.
What's that now, 7.1 surround? I don't trust Creative Labs now.
Something has changed with that company and they do not treat customers
the way they used to. What things CL touts their sound cards have is
"conditional", only IF you have this or that yadda yadda. The Turtle
Beach cards? Heck you'll find all the goodies right in the control
panel applett on the taskbar. I'm impressed.
McG.
Click to expand...

I got myself a Videologic Sonic Fury (European issue Santa Cruz) a
while ago, McG, and was very disappointed with it - sound was
excellent, but it slowed my system down.

But that was on a W98SE box - I've since tried it on a W2K box and I'm
delighted with it - I'd say my system's, if anything, even brisker
than with an SB card, and I do like the sound.

I think it may have something to do with drivers - the only WDM driver
available for the card is for XP and W2K only; otherwise you seem to
be stuck with VXD drivers. Turtle Beach do a W98SE WDM driver, which
I tried - that was better, although the SB (Digital 5.1) still worked
better, and I had some other issues with the driver.

Moral is, if you're using W2K or XP (I presume would be Ok), get a
Sonic Fury/Santa Cruz; if you're using W98SE, stick with an SB or find
something else. ;-)

patrickp

(e-mail address removed) - take five to email me
 
I had some humming problems w/the soundstorm on my Abit NF7s v2.0. When I
turned down the CD volume to zero it disappeared. You might try lowering the
input volumes on some of your devices and see if that affects your hissing. I
don't have any hissing or humming w/my soundstorm. It's just downright fô¥ked
that soundstorm is to be discontinued. Isn't soundstorm the only
high-performance sound solution to Creative Labs?
S

Sound card - Soundstorm (i.e. the onboard 5.1 on my MSI Nvidia nForce2 mobo,
very good but has a
slight hiss at zero volume, prolly because of all the high frequencies on the
mobo... but not
noticeable as soon as you start playing something),
speakers - Creative 550 (5.1, THX... excellent, they compare well to my
separates system downstairs,
and quite useful when I am having a shower upstairs and want some tunes to
drown out my singing :)
Click to expand...

-Bill (remove "botizer" to reply via email)
 
Yeah! They're almost as bad as Microshaft. Didn't they also kill Sensaura
(Sensura).
**** Creative. This is the company that was responisble for the demise of
Aureal through malicious litigation. A3D 3.0 was about to turn the sound
card industry on it's head, Creative saw that they were about to be screwed
and did what most corporations do nowadays when faced with competition from
a smaller competitor, sue them. After killing Aureal, Craptive bought the
remains and now A3D 3.0 lies in their vaults somewhere and will never see
the light of day. Bastards.
Click to expand...

Ditto. I wonder if Craptive had anything to do w/Nforce's decision to give up
on Soundstorm. I'm sure Craptive is happy to hear it.
If you want sound that's as good, if not better than an Audigy for a
fraction of the price then get an Nforce 2 motherboard with SoundStorm. Also
SoundStorm has the lowest CPU usage of any sound solution. It really is that
good, Nvidia should have advertised it as 'the soundcard that comes with a
free motherboard'.
Click to expand...


-Bill (remove "botizer" to reply via email)
 
Ditto. I wonder if Craptive had anything to do w/Nforce's decision to give up
on Soundstorm. I'm sure Craptive is happy to hear it.
Click to expand...

Fortunately Soundstorm (the main reason I bought an Nforce board) is not
dead and will be updated for Nforce 4.

http://www.theinquirer.net/Default.aspx?article=17058

Soundstorm was actually designed by ex-Aureal engineers. I bet they had to
tread carefully to avoid being sued. They wanted to incorporate A3D support
into Soundstorm but couldn't because Creative now hold the patents.

K
 
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