Creative Sound Blaster Z Series ZXR (70SB151000000) PCI Express x1 Interface Sound Card

Pros: Well designed, ability to have both speakers setup, and headset/mic plugged in simultaneously with good solid connectors

Cons: A bit pricey, but you get what you pay for. I personally didn't need the second (aka daughter card) but it comes as a package deal. But for audio philes, they will love the 2nd card.

Other Thoughts: My old SoundBlaster X-Fi Titanium sound card was doing just fine but because I upgraded from Logitech ClearChat Pro Wireless-USB headsets/mic to Sennheiser PC 350 Special Edition High Performance Gaming Headset, then a sound card with AMP was needed as my Senns are rated 150 ohm impedance.

The sound cards (2 of them which surprised at first) along with a well designed ACM (Audio Control Module) makes it a well-built plug-n-play setup that allows me to have both my PC speakers (2.1 w/sub-woofer) and my headset always plugged in. I just switch from one output device via the software module (PC speakers <---> Headset). Some people complain about not having a physical switch to do the switching but to me it's no big deal.

The secondary (aka daughter card) is for plugging into an AVR (audio-video receiver or plugging in an external device such as an iPod). It's not necessary for me, but it is part of the package and has the audio equivalent of an SLI bridge to connect both cards. But to remind people the 2nd card does NOT plug into any slot as it is just a board with no connection to the motherboard. Only inputs/outputs to other devices and the connection wired bridge to the main sound mothercard. Overall after about a month's worth of online gaming, I can say that explosions never sounded this good especially deep bass EMP (electro-magnetic pulse) bombs!

Pros: Great sound! easy setup Tons of Options .. i connected the rca out cables to my onkyo receiver in another room .. so when company comes over i can blast my music through my home stereo

Cons: wish there was a way to change voices ex.. male to female
in itunes or any other music program not just microphone .. my onboard sound card lets me do that

Pros: Awesome sound, its clear and crips. I have beyer 990DT 600 ohm versions and i think it sounds good despite other reviews. The SBX studio seems equivalent to Dolby surround, overall seems awesome for gamming

Cons: after a little over a month of use my computer started to blue screen. After attempts of trying to repair with windows, i ended up reinstalling the whole system no huge issue. After reinstall my ZxR no longer can switch to headphones mode. When i switch it, i no longer hear the "click" i used to, and it always outputs sound to the speakers. It sucks because my 30 day warrenty just ran out.

Other Thoughts: I really want to love it. I do love it when it works, now its just a $250 paper weight since i use headphones 90% of the time since i have roommates. Be aware guys this thing just dosen't last long term

Manufacturer Response:

Hi, this is definitely unusual for this product and we'd like to collect some additional information and help you out. Can you please contact us at socialmedia@creativelabs.com. We want to make sure you get up and running.

Pros: awesome sound out and has some serious bass punch while keeping clean highs and mids.

Cons: ASIO
I get noise from RCA inputs on daughter board while hooked up to a foot pedal for guitar even if the power is off on the pedal itself. This happens far too often and was never the case on my onboard audio.

Other Thoughts: This is a follow up on a review I wrote a few days ago. I was wrong about the asio. it ONLY SUPPORTS asio out as triples has already stated. this has been verified by creative tech support themselves. however as I stated in my last review this card does somehow seem to bypass WAVE RT (not to be confused with WAVE) even though it is not is ASIO. my DAW software says my latency should be 20ms but this card is low enough latency that if settings are correct I can actually record in WAVE RT. I don't understand why this is the case for me but it is.

This card is one very expensive gaming card. forget this card for DAW. hard lesson learned for me and returning it would cost as much as a mid range card. The sound out is nice so I am probably keeping this card with a lot of regret.

I was actually able to get this card to record via ASIO in windows 7 through tremendous work but it sounded worse than WAVE (Not WAVE RT) @ 1 ms. It just hurt.

Creative labs bottlenecked their own product before it ever left the factory with this card.

Frustrating. this card is not for recording despite what they advertise it as. Tech support hides behind beat around the bush phrases that never truly address the issues. I do not recommend this card or any other creative sound card at this point period.

JMHO

Manufacturer Response:

Hi! We'd like to get some more info from you on the issues you ran in to while using the card. Please contact us at socialmedia@creativelabs.com so we can help out. Also note that we have an update coming shortly for ASIO support which includes full recording support as well. Looking forward to hearing from you.

Pros: Good while it worked.

Cons: Dead after 2 weeks of light usage.

I will update this review based on RMA service and replacement card.

Manufacturer Response:

Hello! Please contact us at socialmedia@creativelabs.com so we can help resolve this if you have not already gone through the RMA process.

Pros: Decent sound, cool volume knob, high quality metal construction

Cons: Software is a buggy mess.

After about 2 and a half months of ownership, the hardware itself started causing bluescreens daily. A week and a half later, it's throwing "This device cannot start. (Code 10)" in the Device Manager, and Creative's software can't see it.

Their support have been utterly unhelpful in repairing or replacing it. While the hardware's nice, it's not realiable, the software's a mess, and the company is unhelpful. Stay away.

Other Thoughts: The ASUS Xonar Essence STX is basically the same hardware without all the issues this one has.

Manufacturer Response:

Hello there, can you please contact us at socialmedia@creativelabs.com so we can help resolve this issue. We'd like to get some system information as well as the issue(s) you are reporting might be a system level issue or incompatibility and we want to work to resolve if this is the case.

Pros: Almost everything.
8 processors
120db SNR in
24 bit audio in
S/PDIF in Aux in
ACM

Cons: 24 bit audio out
(the human ear cannot hear anything past 16 bit audio so 24 bit audio out is merely an up sale. They could lower the price considerbly and still give the absolute best hearing quality a human can and ever will hear)

The price tag
1/4 inch mic jack
(the mic jack will only work for a microphone as far as I have been able to tell. I would love to plug my guitar directly in through 1/4" but for some reason the playback is absolutely terrible. I couldn't get the mic to work for skype but I didn't try that hard and the recording through all of my mics are at best mediocre. I cannot attest to how it sounds with a high end mic plugged in because I don't have one. My biggest letdown was no support for a guitar directly in.)

(I can use S/PDIF or Aux in for the guitar)

ACM

Other Thoughts: The ACM (audio control module) is interesting. It was a selling factor for me but not the deciding factor. As stated earlier the mic in is blah from what I have found so far. The headphone jacks rock. The volume control knob is awesome. It is just beautiful to look at and will grab peoples attention. The ability to have headphones and speakers plugged in at the same time is ingenious. This card DOES SUPPORT ASIO. It is built into the drivers so you are always active with ASIO. I use mixcraft 6 and although I have no control in the ASIO settings in mixcraft I record using wave but using the ASIO driver and recording in real time. This has been the biggest subject on this card from what I can tell and it is different for every systtem. It took me a while to figure this card out but once you do it is beautiful. This card is not for everyone though. Really consider do you need this card or would another z series card work for your needs? This card is meant for high end speakers and optimized for 5.1 surround.

Specs:
SB ZXR
Logitech z623 2.1 speakers (amazing and prices well)

If you buy this card make sure to either have or buy speakers for it. You will only shame this card if you do not. Kudos to creative on this product line.

Thank you newegg for great customer service.

Pros: So far, liking the upgrade in sound quality over my soundblaster X-FI gamer, installed easy works great.

Cons: 1 Egg for a few issues but there are work arounds.

First, the card does not seem to like being in the PCI-E 2.0 slot "while" a video card is in the PCI-E 3.0 slot.

2nd the soundblaster zxr has an odd issue which seems rare? and after some research it seems to have cought onto other soundblaster cards in the past, basically at random the 5.1 output will bug out and it will randomly change to center speaker only, or swap left/right audio, or swap front with rear speakers etc.

Only way to fix this is to change from 5.1 -> 2.0 -> 5.1, it happens maybe once a week... debating asking for a replacement...

motherboard is a GIGABYTE GA-Z77-HD4 LGA 1155 Intel Z77

Other Thoughts: Expensive, but sounds awesome

Pros: Fantastic sounding out of the box. I love the idea of swappable on board op amps, and even then the included TPA6120s sound good enough that you may not even want to switch them. Grounding and shielding on the card is fantastic, I had to rearrange my card set up to install this new unit and unfortunately had to place it directly next to another piece of hardware that caused massive noise on my old sound card when I tried the same. Absolutely no hiss, noise, or distortion on this one in the same situation.

I've been using mainly a set of HD600s and MTH-50s, and I've noticed punchier and more precise bass, and much cleaner and less distorted highs. I'm not thrilled with the fact I basically HAVE to use digital to connect to my 5.1 system, but the abysmal digital support from the previous generations seems to be a thing of the past. I had no issues using the supplied optical cable to connect, and switching between headphones and 5.1 in the control panel is easy and convenient.

The desk piece is decent enough, although the mic is not all that great as one might expect. I do like the fact it has both 1/8" and 1/4" inputs, but I really miss my old front box with the rest of the input/outputs.

SBX Studio versions of Surround and Crystalizer seem to just sound better then their predecessors, and the way it colors bass is super satisfying. Recon mode is an interesting idea, and you can definitely tell were people are at in games easier, but in my opinion it sounds way too unnatural for me to still enjoy the experience. Finally, the idea of having a second board with a second core just for recording is a great idea that I love. Sadly it doesn't seem I'll ever find out how great it could be because...

Cons: Atrocious ASIO support. The other Z series didn't even ship with ASIO support AT ALL. This one has support out of the box (the others can get support from a driver update), but IT IS ONLY FOR PLAYBACK. THERE IS NO ASIO INPUT SUPPORT.

This is absolutely stupefying to me; why would you include an entire second card, complete with high quality phono inputs, and then force the user to use Directsound to record? None of the recordings I have made so far, from multiple sources and at one point even through an outboard rack mixer, sound remotely as good as on my old sound card with ASIO support. ASIO4ALL doesn't help as the input it provides is of a lower sample rate then the regular DirectSound input for some reason.

Outside of just recording quality, another thing I loved about my X-Fi was the fact that with Guitar Rig and the ASIO support I could just plug my guitar in the front box and go if I didn't feel like hauling the rest of my equipment out. No can do with this card, and again ASIO4ALL does not help as it adds a half second or so delay, making it very hard to play naturally.

Creative support either seems to have no idea what the company itself is making for the card, or Creative actually does not intend to fix this massive (for some) problem, as there is zero indication on their website or through my support contacts that has any hint of full ASIO support being added at a later date. Truly disappointed with this. Full ASIO support has been a part of Sound Blaster flagship cards since the Audigy 2. I have no idea why they've chosen to dump this starting with the Recon3D and Z series.

Other Thoughts: I was bouncing between 3 and 4 stars for my rating, and I decided on 4 as if this card had better ASIO support it would have easily gotten 5 stars and I realize ASIO support issues are not relevant to all users.

Only bought this because my old X-Fi Fata1ty finally gave up the ghost after a long six years of service. It sounded good for what it was, especially with an outboard headphone amp, and I loved the front box with MIDI, phono, and 1/4" ins, something which I don't think we'll see again. That and the apparent lack of proper ASIO support makes me want to toss this and go find an old X-Fi to put in and hold on for dear life.

Manufacturer Response:

Hey there! We have an update coming soon for full ASIO support. Stay tuned to the Sound Blaster website for an update.

Pros: Definite improvement over my X-Fi Fatality that I've had over 7 years now.

Software works first time every time, unlike the X-Fi software/drivers.

The ACM is nice and feels solidly built.

Cons: It's advertised to put out 80mW of power for headphones, doesn't even put out 50mW. I made the mistake of not seeing what it was advertised to put out, thinking it'd power my Beyerdynamic DT990's 600ohm, not only are they unable to but they don't even put out what's advertised. Now not putting the 100mW out for my headphones is my fault for not reading, it's the not getting even 80mW that's the problem.

Drivers/Software can be problematic when moving the card to a different slot. Doesn't properly recognize the card, software won't work, etc. If it's in the slot it was in when the drivers were installed there's no problems.

Beamforming mic with the settings doesn't seem to do hardly anything other than make it harder for people to hear you (at least in Skype). Friends could barely hear me, said I sounded like I was far away, turning off more of the settings allowed them to hear me better (and also everything else unfortunately).

Other Thoughts: At first I had a buyers remorse and was wanting to return it or sell it to someone else. Thinking it'd properly power my headphones only to not be able to was a downer, however it turned out to be partially my error and partially Creative's for false advertising.

The beamforming mic features are a bit of a downer, was hoping I'd be able to use my speakers occasionally while in Skype instead of my headphones all the time. Oh well no real loss.

I'm giving it 3 eggs because of the card not being able to put out the advertised 80mW for headphones, Creative saying it'll power any headphones out there (It can't obviously), and the beamforming mic not working like it's advertised (barely an issue however).