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Creative Labs 70SB046600002 Sound Cards
Customer Reviews for Creative SOUND BLASTER X-Fi Fatal1ty FPS 7.1 Channels 24-bit 96KHz PCI Interface Sound Card - Retail
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Review Summary (167 Reviews): Rating + 4
OverallLast 2 WeeksLast 6 Months
Excellent Rating + 5 108ReviewsExcellent
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newegg
18%
Average Rating + 3 12ReviewsAverage
newegg
7%
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newegg
3%
Very Poor Rating + 1 12ReviewsVery Poor
newegg
7%
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Reviewer Product Review
Mystikal_Pooka
Tech Level: somewhat high
Ownership: 1 week to 1 month
This user purchased this item from Newegg
7/24/2007 8:10:21 PM

Rating + 5 Simply Amazing!


Pros: Absolutely the best sound I have ever heard come from a computer, its even better than a lot of home theater systems ive heard, and I only use 5.1 computer speakers with this... My games sound a lot better, even those that dont support the xram.

Cons: pretty much the only cons I see are the drivers being slightly buggy with the remote (at least for me, but they work fine otherwise) fact that it only comes with 1 1/4 stereo jack-to-3.5mm converter, and you can buy those anywhere for like $2.

Other Thoughts: 24-bit crystallizer does definitely make music sound a lot better!

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freeplayguy
Tech Level: somewhat high
Ownership: 1 day to 1 week
This user purchased this item from Newegg
7/22/2007 10:55:26 PM

Rating + 3 ok


Pros: Capable of very good sound in games and music. More in/outs than I'll ever use.

Cons: Stupid ribbon cable. Creative continues to suppy the worst user's manual I've ever seen. Generally cheap packaging.

Other Thoughts: In/out front panel was D.O.A. Tracked the problem to a short in the headphone level control which was shorting out the front panel. Too bad, the front panel was the reason I bought this board.

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N/A
Tech Level: somewhat high
Ownership: 1 month to 1 year
This user purchased this item from Newegg
7/22/2007 6:42:16 AM

Rating + 5 Outstanding card


Pros: Incredible sound, many features.

Cons: My only complaint is with Creative not this card, I wish creative would allow for use of their cards headers with the case audio jacks without needing to build your own cable.

Other Thoughts: Many reviewers have stated this card doesn't work with Vista, I have been using it with Vista since March and I have yet to have a problem. The card blows away my old Audigy 2 using my Klipsch Pro-Media 5.1 speakers.

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stryfe
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 day to 1 week
6/16/2007 11:04:38 AM

Rating + 5 Awesome sound card


Pros: Whenever i kill someone in unreal tournament 2004, the soundcard plays a "WOOOO COME ON!!" .wav file. It really pumps me up. What a great addition to an already awesome sound card.

Cons: There's a weird problem i'm encountering. On ventrilo all of my teammates sound like they're talking with a lisp. It's worth it though!

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fatal1ty
Tech Level: high
Ownership: more than 1 year
6/16/2007 11:02:02 AM

Rating + 1 DOesnt work


Pros: Looks cool

Cons: I tried plugging this into my laptop but it didn't even come with the right plugs!!! Bad!!

0 out of 2 people found this review helpful. Did you? Yes No

Beau
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 week to 1 month
This user purchased this item from Newegg
6/16/2007 12:53:46 AM

Rating + 5 Exactly what I needed... May not be for others.


Pros: Amazing sound through my Logitech X-530 speakers. Front CD-ROM slot bezel is simply awesome, and the reason I chose this. Its optical input allows you to input something such as an Xbox 360's sound and have the card decode it to the PC analog (3 mini jack) surround speakers, in 5.1 surround. Also has inputs for RCA audio so my over the air HDTV tuner works too, all without having to buy a receiver, another set of speakers, or swapping cables constantly. Honestly the product is superb in almost every way.

Cons: Here's why I said 'almost' every way. Instruction manuals can be understood by 5 year olds... That's all fine and good, but it's because they're almost 100% pictures. Need support for the software? Umm... Figure that out yourself, sign up for their forums, or wait days for a generic response from their support team. Sometimes the settings in the software don't
'stick' in my situation. It kinda forgets some of the settings I enabled for some reason, and I have to re-enable them every time I want to use them. One example of this is the DTS decoder. This is what allows use of 5.1 surround through the SPDIF input (Xbox 360 Optical Audio in my case). To enable this in your situation, go to the Creative Audio Console (in the Creative programs list under X-Fi) and choose the tab SPDIF I/O, then select Dolby Digital/DTS SPDIF-in Decode to enable. Xbox 360 will play sound for the logo, and then the sound craps out on you if you don't re-enable that every time you restart your pc.

Other Thoughts: (Continued) This setting doesn't seem to remember itself, and annoyingly has to be fixed constantly. The other option is to have your 360 send stereo sound, but that's lame. Either way, the great quality everywhere else isn't enough to downrate this to 4 eggs... It's quite simply a nitpicky con.

If you simply want the card itself, and don't need all the inputs and remote, get the XtremeGamer Fatal1ty Professional Series (Newegg # N82E16829102005). If you don't need X-Ram, which isn't really used, get the XtremeGamer (N82E16829102006). If you need everything, but want an external media box (PC not close to media center, etc.) Get the Elite: (N82E16829102191).

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RJS
Tech Level: somewhat high
Ownership: 1 month to 1 year
This user purchased this item from Newegg
6/15/2007 7:16:54 PM

Rating + 5 Works fine for me in XP


Pros: Exceptional sound clarity in all ranges. My 7.1 speakers are now the limiting factor. Picked up a few FPS in most games.

Cons: Increases heat load when sandwiched between SLI cards. Make sure your cooling is good.

Other Thoughts: Haven't experienced any of the SCP issues that have plagued others. E6700, 680i, 4G OCZ, 2x8800GTS SC.

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N/A
Tech Level: high
Ownership: more than 1 year
5/26/2007 6:57:11 AM

Rating + 5 If you run vista run away from this card


Pros: Has killer sound and apps in xp.
Has features that are unmatched.

Cons: Is not supported by creative in vista! I'm back to using onboard sound because of this. There's a huge outcry of owners over at the creative forum.

Other Thoughts: In xp this card is excellent with fully functional features. In vista this card is unsupported by creative and becomes a paper weight. I'm so disgusted with creative that I won't buy anything else from them. I had to rate it excellent because in xp this card is excellent with all of its features activated and functional.

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N/A
Tech Level: somewhat high
Ownership: 1 month to 1 year
This user purchased this item from Newegg
5/24/2007 11:43:21 PM

Rating + 4


Pros: great sound - amazing in BF2 but haven't been able to use the aux ports in the frot for a separate headset to use in TS or vent. Instead I run my headset through the mobo and the game sound through the card. Haven't had a problem yet.

Cons: overpriced, only buy this one if you really need the front aux ports otherwise they are a waste. No to mention they are over sized inputs.

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HBoy
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 week to 1 month
5/24/2007 10:14:04 PM

Rating + 1 Avoid This Card


Pros: The blue X-FI light on the card looks cool. Sweet!!! But I can't hear anything...

Cons: Card was 100% unusable on Vista, even with latest drivers from Creative (dated March 2007). The install CD won't even work on Vista. Most frustrating aspect is that sometimes the install would work and I could hear audio, only to have it fail 3 minutes later (usually coupled with BSODs). Most times, however, I'd get the famous "no supported device could be found" error. Look around on Google, Usenet and even on the Creative forums. This card has problems on Vista. I've consistently bought the top of the line offerings from Creative before. After this, forget it. Oh, and the Creative installer puts on the "Register Your Product" application on your system even if the install completely fails. Nice. Really.

Other Thoughts: Yeah, some people have had success with this on Vista. But at varying degrees. On SLI systems, there would be lockups, distorted sounds and of course BSODs. By the way, even though the "drivers" are available, most of the functionality on the original software discs isn't available on Vista as of yet (this is assuming you CAN get the drivers to work). Lastly, because of changes to how audio works on Vista, you need what essentially amounts to a hack (third party software needed) to get audio acceleration for your old games (by old I mean XP games). You know, the on-board audio isn't that bad after all.

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Duhoh
Tech Level: somewhat high
Ownership: 1 month to 1 year
5/15/2007 7:27:17 PM

Rating + 4


Pros: I can use my Logitech Z2300 speakers as an amp for my bass guitar now!

The front panel owns!

Cons: My Audigy 2 Notebook seems to pump out more DB than this. But then again, this is a gaming card, not a music card.

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Squirrel
Tech Level: average
Ownership: 1 month to 1 year
This user purchased this item from Newegg
5/11/2007 5:48:33 PM

Rating + 5 A Leap of Faith


Pros: Wonderful sound, absolutely superior to my last card, an Audigy 2 ZS. The front panel is nice if not for one feature - plugging in the headphones automatically changes the speaker setup to headphones, and it reverts to whatever the last setting was when you unplug them, all without opening any control panels. Ultimate sound from Battlefield 2 and 2142, though I suspect that I've gotten used to it. If I were to go back to the Audigy, I'd probably notice, though. First time I played and a Yastreb flew over, I was floored. Got killed because I was busy staring at the sky!

Cons: In this day and age, we shouldn't still be stuck with flat ribbon cables. Why it doesn't include a round cable for the front panel is beyond me. Beyond this, I don't really have a negative comment about the unit.

Other Thoughts: Every Creative sound card I've owned has had issues, almost always related to drivers. The Live! I had did not like most systems it was in. The Audigy 2 ZS I built my last rig with blue-screened immediately after installing. After reading all the frightening reviews in all the places I have, I really didn't want to get one just yet. The only reason I made the jump is because of a rebate, a credit, and an instant discount cutting the price to just a little more than half. :) This card has not yet caused any issues that I can attribute to it, which amazes me, since the XRAM ones are supposed to be worse than the regulars, which are supposed to be worse than my Audigy 2 ZS.

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steve
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 week to 1 month
This user purchased this item from Newegg
5/8/2007 6:21:09 PM

Rating + 5


Pros: great sound card

Cons: none

0 out of 1 people found this review helpful. Did you? Yes No

DeeJay1337
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 month to 1 year
This user purchased this item from Newegg
5/8/2007 5:45:22 PM

Rating + 5 Wonderfull!


Pros: Sound Quality is just super! All games sound realistic! X-Ram helps in games like Quake 4, Battlefield 2142, etc... More and more games will support X-Ram so dont worry about thinking its a waist.

Cons: Front panel screws are tiny, I used my own, but then agian easy fix!

Other Thoughts: Some people dont even know the difference between this sound card and built in Mo-Bo sound...I'll explain:

When you are using onboard sound the CPU has to give a certain percent of power to process the sound bits, and transfering it to the RAM and then it finally goes out, When you have a sound card like this, it does the job on its on, On average I got about a 5-10 FPS boost over my Audigy 2 ZS, and even though that was a good card!

CREATIVE PRODUCTS For EVER! *Can't say For the Win :D

Newegg is my new best freind!

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tech219
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 week to 1 month
5/4/2007 10:55:02 AM

Rating + 5 The difference is amazing.


Pros: This card is amazing, it changed the quality of sound being outputted to my 5.1 dramatically. The software allows for so many tweaks, music sounds AMAZING on this. I play BF2142 just fine, along with FEAR and COD2 with NO issues. You hear everything so much more clearly!

Cons: - The ribbon cable it comes with. Cannot replace it with a ide cable, and its fat and wide destroyed my cable managing. And the front I/O for Mic and headphones are not standard, so i'll have to get adapters.

Other Thoughts: Got it as a present :) be nice if it came with a free game !

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Jeff
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 month to 1 year
This user purchased this item from Newegg
4/19/2007 4:40:53 PM

Rating + 5 Outstanding!!!


Pros: I've been reading up alot on sound cards and headphones. This particular sound card with 24-bit crystalizer and CMSS and EAX 5.0 just amazes me so much. I pop on my Audio-Technica ATH-A900 headphone (which by the way feels very very comfortable) and I hear music in a totally new dimension. All of a sudden, I'm out there in the middle of the concert. Gave me goosebumps! The 24-bit crystalizer noticibly enhances the music I play. And CMSS really made gaming feel like a surround sound environment. I'm playing counter-strike, and I can literally hear people running all around me.

Cons: The ribbon cable that connects the soundcard to the front deck is really fat and ugly. They could have used a serial cable... now I have obstructed airflow in my mini-atx tower =[

Other Thoughts: Get it, you wont be disappointed. It was a pretty big improvement over my onboard realtek sound card.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful. Did you? Yes No

Russ
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 month to 1 year
4/17/2007 4:45:50 PM

Rating + 1 MAJOR problems with NFORCE motherboards


Pros: Great Sound. . the Crystallizer is amazing!

Cons: Absolutely horrid experience with Creative. There are KNOWN conflicts between the x-fi and the NFORCE4 motherboards but there are no warnings nor could I find any reviewers who said it. Do a google search for x-fi and nforce. . see for yourselves!

Other Thoughts: With there was an alternative to this!

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful. Did you? Yes No

Crabclaw
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 month to 1 year
This user purchased this item from Newegg
4/17/2007 10:37:06 AM

Rating + 5 I like it...I like it alot...


Pros: First off, I know there are alot of people that are down on this card due to alot of incompatibility issues and I feel their pain. I have owned about 12 different soundcards in my life starting with the original Soundblaster 2.0 in 1990 all the way through to the exceptional Audigy 2 ZS Platinum. I am running this card with an EVGA 680I MB and WinXP SP2 and have not had any showstopping problems other than a few playback issues in Windows MP9 that were codec related. When this card works to specs there is nothing that can touch it. Gaming with high end headphones like the Sennheiser HD280 and this soundcard are a religious experience, the Creative CMSS-3D technology works awesome and you will hear things in your games that you have never heard before. Any new cutting edge technology will have teething problems and this product is no exception, but trust me there is a definate sound improvement over the last generation Creative products.

Cons: None.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful. Did you? Yes No

J
Tech Level: average
Ownership: 1 month to 1 year
4/13/2007 5:04:59 PM

Rating + 4 Rebate


Pros: I did FINALLY get my fifty dollar rebate check.

Cons: It took every bit of 10 weeks to get it. I checked the online rebate checker once and it had no record of my rebate. I was pretty upset at first, then forgotten about it.

Other Thoughts: seems like a good card, it sounds good, but I can't say it's life changing or anything. I can hear different tire noises in BF2 while driving. That's probably the biggest change really. I was using an old Creative Audigy 2 sound card before this. both were hooked up to Klipsch ProMedia Ultra 5.1 speakers. X-Ram may have boosted 5-10 frames in BF2... maybe. I'm running a 7800GTX KO at 1600x1200 with a P5W DH & E6600 (OC'd @ 3.2GHz)

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Joey Hiller
Tech Level: somewhat high
Ownership: 1 day to 1 week
This user purchased this item from Newegg
4/13/2007 2:31:22 PM

Rating + 5 Score One for Vista!


Pros: Contrary to the other reviews here... this thing is absolutely AWESOME under Vista. (x64)
I had no problems with drivers, just go to their website and get the latest set.

It seems to be little known, but Vista's new audio manager is about a million times better than the old one.

Cons: I could do without all this "Fatal1ty" branding. The Newegg picture shows the front panel without any fatality logos, but the one shipped does have one.
Its a big grey ribbon cable in my case.

Other Thoughts: I used to own a SB Live! Platinum 5.1 and was forced to upgrade due to incompatibility. I am sure glad that I did. My 5.1 Midiland speakers never worked well with that card, and now I am streaming beautiful Dolby Digital over the front SPFDIF port.

Oh, and whatever happened to sending out free games with the package? Unreal Tournament, Deux Ex, Thief?

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ScottieB
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 week to 1 month
This user purchased this item from Newegg
4/13/2007 8:13:11 AM

Rating + 5 Great Card!


Pros: Best soundcard I've ever heard - easily. Sounds great, CMSS3d headphone works really well (with most sources), front panel is nice, with many useful connections, well built, good price after rebate!

Cons: Like others have said, the ribbon cable to connect front panel is pretty bad - they should really use a smaller, more modern style of cabling. Back panel connections leave a LOT to be desired - sharing the digital I/o with the line in port is just bad form on a card in this price range.

Other Thoughts: Got this more expensive version because of the front panel (which somewhat makes up for the bad connection options on the back panel. With rebate it is a bargain! Not sold on x-ram as I haven yet to see anything take advantage of it. Crystalizer is all hype - I leave it turned off.

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Rollins
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 month to 1 year
4/12/2007 12:36:24 PM

Rating + 2 >3GB RAM and 64bit OS will cause problems


Pros: The sound is good when working.

Cons: I have the ASUS P5W DH Deluxe motherboard with 4GB of OCZ RAM running XP x64. This card has a known issue with sound degradation on 64bit OS with any chipset (see Creative customer support forums). Creative has been totally unresponsive to this issue. Furthermore, in 64-bit operating systems, hardware-based sound acceleration is automatically disabled because of poor driver and/or hardware addressing conflicts (use dxdiag to check this). Creative implemented this as a work-around to allow 64 bit Windows users to use their cards.

Other Thoughts: Make sure to research this card a little if you are a truly high-end user. If you are thinking about upgrading to >3GB RAM, and therefore, using a 64bit OS, expect to start hearing static and crackles in your sound and/or mic input (ie Ventrilo). Why did I pay $150 to buy a card that can't use hardware acceleration when my on-board HD sound could?!?

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful. Did you? Yes No

watch dog
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 month to 1 year
4/11/2007 7:28:26 AM

Rating + 3 Great when it works


Pros: Sounds great, drive bay adds front-panel convenience.

Cons: Playing BF2142, after a while, random noises occur, which is very annoying. It will also crash and lock up with a BSOD (Blue Screen of Death) that blames the ha20x2k.sys file (which is the SB XFI driver). So far, Creative Labs's forums is filled with these complaints and Creative is not doing anything about it at all except giving rubber-stamped responses that doesn't work. Also replaced the card with another XFI (yes, I bought another for testing) - same problem. Either it's a problem with manufacturing or a driver issue. WinXP SP2 is a fresh install, so is the game and all drivers are new (downloaded from respective manufacturer's web sites). DFI LPUT NF4 Expert, 7900GTX, stock-clocked. Also tried some user-given fixes (changing PCI latency, changing PCI slots, ensuring that XFI is on their own IRQ) - nothing worked - still get BSOD after a while of playing (and that dang random noises that happens just before it crashes, too).

Other Thoughts: Creative needs to get their act together. I hear it happens in other games too (WoW, Company of Heroes, Fear, etc), so it's not the game. It's not the OS, since it is a fresh install. It's not the PC, as it is stock-clocked, and on another machine with a different chipset (ATI-based), it still happens. Based on my findings, this card is flawed. I would not buy it until you hear about a fix.

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N/A
Tech Level: high
Ownership: more than 1 year
This user purchased this item from Newegg
4/10/2007 8:30:38 AM

Rating + 4


Pros: Great sound, remote feature is handy.

Cons: Creative tech support isn't very good. I had to RMA my card and they sent me the wrong card 4 times in a row. Tech support has the "I could care less" attitude. Shipping is horribly slow for an RMA, all 4 times.

Other Thoughts: Good card and now it has an attractive price tag. Beware of lousy Tech support.

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N/A
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 month to 1 year
This user purchased this item from Newegg
4/3/2007 3:48:39 PM

Rating + 1 Creative + Vista = wasted money


Pros: The breakout box is the only reason I purchased this card. I have a Hercules Game Theater XP for 4 years and loved that card for the breakout box. So when I was shopping for a new sound card I found that creative is the only company that has one(that I could find on newegg.com).

Cons: Do not expect to hear anything out of your speakers when using this card with Vista. I have tried contacting tech support, asked on their forums, and even tried to get a refund. They blame it on Vista. I don't care what MS did to the sound layer, I care about my sound, which comes from my sound card.

Other Thoughts: Creative majorly dropped the ball on this one. Their customer service is the lowest I have ever seen.

Vista wasn't a sneak attack OS. Creative knew about the sound drivers/cards being handled in Vista for over a year and did nothing.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful. Did you? Yes No

-Lx.!nS!de^
Tech Level: average
Ownership: 1 day to 1 week
This user purchased this item from Newegg
3/31/2007 6:44:13 AM

Rating + 5 WOW!!!


Pros: Okay people this sound card is one of the best i have ever owned! With the right tweaking of the settings, you will hear almost EVERYTHING! Not to mention the sound quality. In games you hear just about every footstep around you for a good distance, and the sound detail is amazing.GREAT peice of hardware here ladies and gentleman.

Cons: I installed all the software and it started to cause my computer to lock up. So i uninstalled all the software and cleaned out all the creative stuff on my computer as well as taking the card out. then i put the card back in and reinstalled all the software. Worked like a champ! Probably a installer error caused by me.

Other Thoughts: Great price for this peice. i recieved it in 2 days from newegg and i think when i opened the shipping box i got to excited and all my family called me a nerd. LOL but other than that NewEgg is the BEST! so is creative when it comes to sound cards!

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OneEyeLucky.
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 week to 1 month
This user purchased this item from Newegg
3/30/2007 2:01:20 PM

Rating + 4 Nice SoundCard


Pros: Crispy clean sound output, Does the work fine, No problems so far. No complaints.

Cons: The data cable is just too out of dated Creative should come up with something new, because this card does look so much like my SB Audigy. It just needs a face-lift. Smaller SATA looking cable would win this card a trophy, but that massive cable just makes the card look cheap.

Other Thoughts: NewEgg Rules.

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N/A
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 week to 1 month
This user purchased this item from Newegg
3/29/2007 10:34:59 AM

Rating + 5 Probably overkill


Pros: The X-Fi changes sound in new and exciting ways, from the crystalizer to simulated 3d on headphones, it really stands head and shoulders over the audigy based card that I had in my PC. Nothing uses the ram yet, but I feel better knowing it is there. This is the sound card that will follow from old gaming rig to new, because it has that sort of longevity and appeal.

Cons: No multi-purpose cable for the card based PCM bitstream was included. There is a Creative multi-use cable you might have to look into if you want to run from the card instead of the expansion
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Expansion dock has an UGLY cable. Huge gray ribbon, you would think that they could round it out for you, but I guess thats what exacto knives are for.

Other Thoughts: I think this is still a developing technology. Some of the drivers/effects aren't quite right. I turned off some effects because they brightened some sounds and deadened others with no apparent reason. I love the card, and think that time will sort out these glitches and X-Fi with integrated ram will be the platform of choice for discerning game designers.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful. Did you? Yes No

sixtywattman
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 month to 1 year
3/28/2007 9:19:09 PM

Rating + 5


Pros: Everything sounds so great now with this card. My music and my games all sound so much better after getting this I was very suprised. I have not had 1 problem with this card at all.

Cons: NO ROUND CABLE

Other Thoughts: Great card. If you play games alot like I do, this is a must have. Especially if most of the games you play support EAX and the X-RAM

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slave_
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 month to 1 year
This user purchased this item from Newegg
3/25/2007 12:44:43 AM

Rating + 4 nice


Pros: good sound, some bugs in the drivers, but overall its pretty good. it hasnt led to any crashes and all my music sounds so much better, even through the same headphones.

Cons: the front panel doesnt work well in a toolless case, it kinda slides around. And the remote/front panel must have some problems or something because i cant get the remote to work.

Other Thoughts: pretty good overall.

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gT. chAos | RicK!
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 month to 1 year
3/22/2007 8:59:32 PM

Rating + 5 GREAT CARD!


Pros: This card is great. I can hear EVERYTHING when playing Counter Strike:Source. It's so easy to get banned now! My CS:S skill-shot + this AMAZING sound card = pwnage.

Cons: I got banned from servers. :'[

Other Thoughts: Great card.

2 out of 2 people found this review helpful. Did you? Yes No

gangsta
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 week to 1 month
This user purchased this item from Newegg
3/21/2007 5:50:21 PM

Rating + 5


Pros: beyond compare, simply the best of what is available, great features

Cons: none

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Rockyw
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 week to 1 month
This user purchased this item from Newegg
3/16/2007 4:25:57 AM

Rating + 5 X-Fi Excellent


Pros: Install went very easy. I found the front panel to fit very nice in my Silverstone case and it looks great.I like the driver setup. I could choose what I wanted to install and nothing extra. I bought this because my onboard sound card was hard to record with. I had some voice over to do for a video project and this card works very well for recording.

Cons: I wish they would get with the program and make the cable a ROUND cable instead of the old flat style. It was long enough, but a round cable would be better to route through the case and it would look better.

Other Thoughts: The sound is good, programs that came with the card are very nice and work well. I'm running XP pro and will do so for at least a year or more before I bata test Bills new Vist program for him. My advice is to stay away from Vista untill the first service pack or two comes out. The front panel is nice for easy hookup for a mic, head phones or RCA in from my mini disk recorders. Great card from my experience so far.

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Steve
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 week to 1 month
3/8/2007 5:23:56 PM

Rating + 5 X-Fi Platinum


Pros: I really have the X-fi Platinum (and they've discontinued them), but the only difference between that card and the Fatal1ty card is the 64MB of XRAM. The X-fi has pretty amazing sound quality and the full EAX5 support is nice. For music, the crystalizer is a little overrated but it does sound good at very low settings, like around 20-30%. Any higher and it sounds bad. Having a graphic EQ with no lag is pretty great too. But I love the front panel (the reason I bought this card). I use it to plug my guitar directly into the 1/4" and record. The RCA inputs are also handy so I can plug a mixer or almost any audio device into it too.

Cons: Mode switching is stupid. I only use Audio Creation mode if I'm actually recording. Otherwise I just leave it on gaming mode for music and movies since it's essentially the same exact thing as entertainment mode. All the creative media software is also worthless.

Other Thoughts: I didn't really get any performance increase in games over onboard, but I didn't really want to mention that as a con since I don't have the XRAM on my card. But I heard that even without the XRAM, the X-fi is supposed to increase performance. I'm using this with the Z-5300's and they sound amazing for everything.

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greatestloveofall
Tech Level: somewhat high
Ownership: 1 day to 1 week
3/2/2007 11:22:32 AM

Rating + 4 Great card, useless remote


Pros: Great sound quality in movies and games, notable improvement from Audigy 2 series. Front panel is cute and there are dedicated control for both the earphone and the line in. Don't know if there is any use of them but boys it got 64M of RAM!

Cons: The remote control that comes with the package is useless. Sensitivity is terrible, it takes about one second for the program to respond to it, and you must point to the exact direction of the receiver. Nothing compared to the remote control that comes with the Windows Media Center, with whom you can do almost everything the creative remote can do, except the EAX. Anyway, who needs to control them remotely?

Other Thoughts: minor compatibility problem with the ASUS M2R32-MVP board, you need to set the PCI latency to 96 and above to make it work properly.

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Naviss
Tech Level: somewhat high
Ownership: 1 day to 1 week
This user purchased this item from Newegg
2/28/2007 10:37:20 PM

Rating + 4 Great but they need to work on Vista


Pros: It's a GREAT card don't get me wrong. Just they need to work on their Vista driver's. I got the Beta driver's... But it look's really slick.

Cons: Vista driver's. I'm not shure my I/O pannel is working yet. I'll check tomorrow.
The IDE cable that come's with is suck's. I ordered a round cable instead to keep my case clean.

Other Thoughts: E6700, 4 Gig's Corsair XMS2 DDR 800, 2 eVGA 8800 GTX ACS3 KO's, 2 WD 150 Gig Hard Drive's, In Raid 0, 850 Watt TT PSU, eVGA 680i Mother Board.

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Copyritepunx
Tech Level: somewhat high
Ownership: 1 month to 1 year
This user purchased this item from Newegg
2/28/2007 9:35:21 AM

Rating + 5 Less Switching


Pros: This product is great for those looking to use less switching in the back with Mic inputs and line in's. It's very nice for those making music at home.

Cons: Some of the software gets confused at times and switches settings.

Other Thoughts: Sound is INCREDIBLE! The crystalizer really brings out amazing sound in music. I'm super impressed.

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Redbeard
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 week to 1 month
This user purchased this item from Newegg
2/22/2007 4:15:40 PM

Rating + 3 Platinum Card


Pros: good looking unit,

Cons: Terrible Instructions and documentation. No supportive docs on installation. Should have a panel power light on front panel. Need extra power plug not supplied that fits a floppy

Other Thoughts: Creative going down hill. Save your money use onboard sound

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Glimmung
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 week to 1 month
2/18/2007 3:27:22 PM

Rating + 5 Works well with my nforce4 board


Pros: Fantastic sound with a myriad of input options. I updated the bios of my nforce4 board (ASUS A8N5X Socket 939 NVIDIA nForce4 ATX AMD Motherboard) and experienced none of the conflicts that people warn about (most conflicts with the nforce4 boards are with the xtrememusic and platinum cards). 7.1 and 5.1 sound work under vista as well (I have a triple boot of xp pro, mce 2005 and Vista on this PC). So if you are concerned about the future of this card under vista, have no worries.

Cons: The driver disc would not even run under mce 2005.. demoshield crashes.. I just went to the creative site and downloaded the software form them. The remote does not work on my system because I have a windows mce ir remote already with my VisionTek VTK-THMCE550P PCI tv card.

Other Thoughts: Definitely use the audio console program to tweak your settings.. I had to manually set the speakers to 7.1 under vista - before I did I was only geting 2.1 sound.. spdif has several combinations of settings in audio console, so if you can't get spdif going, play with the choices. I read a review where someone couldn't see a certain input in their windows volume control - just go to options, select properties, choose to adjust settings for playback, and then check the boxes for volume controls that you want shown. I would buy this card again in a heartbeat.

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N/A
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 day to 1 week
2/14/2007 7:37:25 PM

Rating + 5 Works Great for XP/Not for Vista


Pros: Works great under Windows XP.

Cons: none

Other Thoughts: SLI will not work under Vista nor will the Audio Software with this card. You can download some strip down version online. VISTA buyers beware.

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N/A
Tech Level: somewhat high
Ownership: 1 week to 1 month
This user purchased this item from Newegg
2/7/2007 3:20:59 PM

Rating + 3 Untapped Potential


Pros: Excellent sound quality. X-Fi drivers seem better than older model ones.

Cons: A very good sound card but not a huge improvement over the Audigy 2 ZS, based on a gamer’s perspective. Even recently released games do not offer much support (if any) for the higher end features this card can provide (X-Ram, etc.) Most games will offer various versions of EAX support but little else. Cable for the I/O Drive is a huge, flat and ugly for cable management.

Other Thoughts: No PCI-Express versions yet?

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N/A
Tech Level: somewhat high
Ownership: 1 month to 1 year
2/6/2007 11:55:20 AM

Rating + 2 eh


Pros: sounds fabulous if it works

Cons: This soundcard is known to have many problems. I have spent much time trying to get it to work correctly. It is glitchy, and if you go to creatives forums, there are 1000's of people looking for help with one of the many problems they are having with their x-fi cards.
As for my problem my I/O drive isn't working properly and I can't figure out what is wrong with it. The sound works and everything but there are no options to use my line in 2 for my microphone. And also when I tried to set up my remote it said "NO IR device detected" or something along those lines... Don't buy this card

Other Thoughts: wish I hadn't bought this expensive piece of garbage

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Woody24
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 week to 1 month
This user purchased this item from Newegg
2/4/2007 8:21:37 AM

Rating + 4 One minor complaint


Pros: I haven't seen any games not work with it yet. They might not take full advantage of the card, but there is sound, and sounds no worse than my previous SB card.

Cons: The front interface isn't tall enough. There is about a 1/4 inch gap from the top of the interface to the bottom of my DVD burner. This is poor design.

Other Thoughts: Even though most games right now don't support the X-fi it doesn't mean there won't be any sound. But I've only tried a few games so far.

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N/A
Tech Level: average
Ownership: 1 week to 1 month
This user purchased this item from Newegg
1/28/2007 10:12:20 AM

Rating + 5


Pros: Love the front headphone jack and the independent volume control for it.
Absolutely love what it does for stereo speakers in FPS if you set it up properly. Modifies the sound so it's defacto surround sound. Hard to explain but glorious.

Cons: The connector from the card itself to the interface on the front of the computer could be a little less bulky.

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OverDamage
Tech Level: somewhat high
Ownership: 1 week to 1 month
1/24/2007 10:16:34 PM

Rating + 3 Typical Creative


Pros: Lots of features, more than most people need. Cool front mount interface with added inputs/outputs. Card has a little red backlit fatality symbol on it.

Cons: I would be ashamed to license my name to this card (hello Mr. Falality). The front mount interface is a pile or steaming...you know what. Why you may ask? Because it outputs audio BACKWARDS on the optical out thats why; no option to change this to be found. Also the optical out is only supported in the native 2.1 channels, again no option to output a compressed 5.1 stream. Thats a big CON for me anyway as i rely on optical out to transmit audio to my speaker system. Oh yea and today my card decided to eat most of it's drivers, sound recording no longer works, which was a huge hassle to set up in the first place. As far as sound quality goes i noticed nothing different between this card and my Audigy 1. Typical creative has you install at least 7 DIFFERENT programs to run this single card which is probably the main reason whay it has so many compatibility issues and problems. The X-ram feature is used by...nothing ATM.

Other Thoughts: worst buy I have ever made! My only hope is to sell this lemon befor Creative alienates all it's customers.

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Will
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 day to 1 week
1/19/2007 5:32:34 PM

Rating + 5


Pros: Solid card. Works fine in an ASUS P5W DH Deluxe board. Bought this primarily for BF2142 and some musical recording. Being able to set the audio to ultra high in BF2142 has helped me, insofar as I'm able to hear approaching enemies sooner.

Cons: I don't notice much of a difference from my Audigy SE in terms of mp3 playback quality. Crystalizer simply raises highs and lows.

Other Thoughts: Have yet to use the drivebay add-on for recording music. My friend however has this card and runs a small mixing board to the drivebay add-on through the right and left channels. With a decent consensor mic, he's able to record to fairly good vocal and instrumental tracks.

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Musicmaster
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 week to 1 month
This user purchased this item from Newegg
1/19/2007 12:37:31 PM

Rating + 5


Pros: So many options, so much more power than my integrated one, and the 24bit crystallizer is really worth it, my games load so much faster BF2 load twice as fast for me now!

Cons: None that make me want to rate this 3 or 4 I did have one problem with Battlefield 2 not seeing the card installed but I updated the drivers and it fixed that, but no hair pulling issues with it. Oh and I have an Nvidia chip set and had no issues installing at all.

Other Thoughts: I would highly recommend this to anyone who is serious about music or makes it like I do..

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N/A
Tech Level: somewhat high
Ownership: 1 day to 1 week
1/9/2007 9:24:28 PM

Rating + 5 X-Fi + Sennheiser HD485 = AWESOME


Pros: Too many features to list... I love all of them. After long researches I went ahead and bought this card together with Sennheiser HD485 Supra Aural headphones... And it like opening a whole new world! Virtual headphone surround is totally AWESOME. Accurate sound positioning. MP3 is sickening GOOD! Crystal clear, its true about you can hear sounds u never knew were there before.

Cons: WHAT? NEVER!!!

Other Thoughts: You've gotta break these headphones in!! I left it on MID-HI volume while at work for 4 days and its all tuned out. WHAT? You are still reading? Take the VISA and go get one right now. You dont even know what you are missing out...!!!

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Matt
Tech Level: somewhat high
Ownership: 1 week to 1 month
1/2/2007 8:33:36 AM

Rating + 4 Slightly Difficult to get to work properly


Pros: Great Sound, even in 2.1, 4.1 & Headphone Configurations

Cons: Difficult to get microphone to work properly for different Line In & Microphone in settings.

Other Thoughts: Solid buy, Creative Labs leaves much to be desired on their support site.

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Conrad1415
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 month to 1 year
1/1/2007 7:00:37 PM

Rating + 5 Wonderfull sound


Pros: Sound is amazing, I upgraded from the Audigy2zs and the difference using a good pair of cans is amazing. Everyone but an audiophile will be ecstatic with the quality of sound they hear from the bay as well. The front bay has no shortage of ports and, as a bonus, it catches peoples eyes with it's slick looks.

Cons: Movies in the Creative Media Center are choppy for me so I won't be using the remote to watch movies.

Other Thoughts: This is obvious but: This is for GAMERS. Movies and Songs are wonderful as well though. Plenty of options but is not cumbersome. BF2 is a dream with this card as it supports the x-ram. I have had no problems with popping with my nForce4 mobo.

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N/A
Tech Level: average
Ownership: 1 day to 1 week
This user purchased this item from Newegg
12/29/2006 10:53:12 AM

Rating + 5 Great upgrade!


Pros: Big improvement over the Audigy line. The sound is noticeably crisper and more dynamic.

Cons: None yet.

Other Thoughts: I was concerned over the compatibility issues expressed by other users because I have a main board with the nforce 4 chip set. However, after completely removing the old sound card drivers and updating the chip set drivers to the current version, the x-fi card worked perfectly!

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N/A
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 week to 1 month
This user purchased this item from Newegg
12/28/2006 10:25:01 PM

Rating + 5


Pros: Very nice upgrade from my SB audigy platinum. Better sound quality and less CPU utilization.

Cons: Nothing uses the 64MB X-RAM!!!

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EL STEVE 505
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 week to 1 month
This user purchased this item from Newegg
12/27/2006 2:31:44 AM

Rating + 5 Thought mine was Half DOA....but all is well, and WOW does it sound G R E A T


Pros: Excellent Sound Quality. I love just about everything this card does. had a few issues at first install, but now that they have been resolved, and my front I\O Panel and Remote are working flawlessly, I have no complaints! Well maybe that I have to learn all the sweet things this beast of a soundcard can do!

Cons: Of course, it has to be the ribbon cable to the I\O Drive. Especially since that was what my problem ended up being from the beginning! At first, my I\O drive didn't work at all. It would only get power sometimes, or not at all, and of course I had no sound out of it. Also at first my games didn't detect the card itself, i.e. Doom 3 and others. Switching
pci slots was the fix for that. As far as the I\O drive, the ribbon type cable that was included, was faulty somehow kept it from powering up. Thought I had a PSU issue, but once I replaced it with an older 40-pin, non keyed ribbon cable, OH YEAH, front panel is all good. That's right everyone, you C A N use another cable for that, it's not so special after all! So go get one, and a sleeve for it while your at it!

Other Thoughts: Creative Labs was so-so with their help with my I\O drive issue. The web help didn't really help me much with my issues, in fact it probably made me feel more hopeless reading all the other peoples problems! E-mails to them about it were surprisingly answered the next day, even on christmas eve! Although all they were was a quick auto-reply email filled with "check out these great links to our knowledge base section" shtuff.....great...thanks creative. Thank the lord i fixed my issues without having to RMA or actually try to get someone on the phone. WOO HOO!! So over all...go get one. Really. it kicks major you know what if it works!!!!!!

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mrBallistic
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 day to 1 week
This user purchased this item from Newegg
12/25/2006 12:53:09 AM

Rating + 5 so far, so good


Pros: great sound with the crystalizer. the front panel breakout box is a godsend for plugging headphones in. once you update the drivers, this thing peels.

Cons: don't install all of the software that comes on the cd -- it's a pig. you can get by with just the drivers and the 'audio console'.

Other Thoughts: others have complained about static and the such, but i'm not hearing it. all in all, it's a great upgrade from my onboard audio.

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xuegui
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 week to 1 month
This user purchased this item from Newegg
12/23/2006 11:30:55 AM

Rating + 1 Bad card


Pros: Don't know, doesn't work

Cons: Got a bad card, RMAed it. Driver failed to load, the Creative software + driver could not see the card even though it was listed in the device manager. Turns out there were some batches produced in Malaysia. Hopefully Newegg will pull through on a replacement.

Other Thoughts: Apparently, there are a lot of problems with the Xfi cards, see the manufacturers forum for details. Look for driver installation problems.

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Jedi2155
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 week to 1 month
This user purchased this item from Newegg
12/21/2006 4:07:35 AM

Rating + 4 Excellent Sound Quality but only 2.0/1 Digital out!!!


Pros: Excellent sound quality, Useful Front I/O, Automatic Headphone Detection.

Cons: 2 Channel Digital out makes my Creative DTT3500 5.1 Digital speakers only 2 channel!!! Audigy's supported 5.1 so why can't this?! Digital Out Flexi-jack and microphone uses the same jack so you can't have both plugged in at the same time.

Other Thoughts: I love the sound quality improvement over my old Audigy 2, but I just wish it supported my speakers :(.

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Dan
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 month to 1 year
12/14/2006 9:48:50 AM

Rating + 4 XFI with No Issues in this Config


Pros: I have not experienced the hiss, crackles and pops on my configuration (listed below). I can confirm that they do exist on another motherboard with the same card (see the forums - don't buy XFI cards if you have the nforce4 chipset - and some others - be prepared to return this item). There isn't a lot of difference between the onboard HD audio and this card for uncompressed music; however, the "Crystalizer" (set to minimum) does make compressed MP3s sound much better. The headphone surround sound positioning, particularly in game mode, with standard stereo headphones, is amazing. The headphone capability for games could be the single reason to get this card if that is your primary method of gaming. 3D sound positions in BF2 are quite incredible.

Cons: In order to send digital out on the "FlexiJack" you need a 3.50 mm (1/8-inch) mono-to-RCA cable, that is not included. C'mon, this isn't a standard type of cable and should have been included in the package. I would rather have paid a couple of dollars more to have it in the box, instead of calling and/or driving all around trying to find this thing. This is why I rate it a 4 out of 5 eggs. The speaker calibration test sends a very slightly crackled "hello" to the right rear speaker; however, I have confirmed that other test tones and music to this channel do not exhibit any distortion - so it is somehow in the test calibration system/software.

Other Thoughts: Have had the card for 1-month. System: Asus M2N-SLI Deluxe nForce 570 SLI, AMD Athlon 64 X2 5000+, Corsair TWIN2X2048-6400C4 Memory, Western Digital 250GB 16M Sata2, EVGA 7950 GX2, SoundBlasterFatal1ty X-FI FPS, Belkin 615W UPS, Sony DVD DRU-810U, Sony MPF920 Floppy, PC Power & Cooling Silencer 610

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Scott from Maryland
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 month to 1 year
12/8/2006 6:09:27 AM

Rating + 5 Great Card


Pros: -Great SQ
-Great Features
-Cool soundboard

Cons: -Remote only works when in sight of sound box bay
-sometimes confuses itself when changing modes

Other Thoughts: To whoever said this card's been out for 18 months, it's only been out a year.

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Ninjawithagun
Tech Level: high
Ownership: more than 1 year
This user purchased this item from Newegg
12/6/2006 5:54:56 PM

Rating + 4 Great sound card overall


Pros: Very good sound card overall. Upgraded from MSI K8N Diamond Plus (motherboard) onboard audio to the Creative Fatal1y card. All I can say is "WOW"! The MSI mobo supposedly has onboard 24-bit audio, but the real deal lies in getting an add-on card. Day and night between these two 24-bit standards. Bottomline, the Fatal1ty delivers! If you want true crystal clear 5.1 or 7.1 surround sound, this card is the answer! Also, if you use headphones for gaming (don't want to wake the wife, kids, neighbors, etc), then you will enjoy the CMSS-3D option which allows for you to hear your environment in surround sound through your headphones - very nice indeed. In the end I am very pleased with this product and with Newegg's "as always" excellent service and shipping.

Cons: You need a higher quality set of speakers to really enjoy the full potential of this card. The Mic 2 input (on the 5 1/2" bay control panel) cuts off and must be turned back on when you ALT-TAB out of games to get back to the desktop. This product is still a bit pricey considering the card is PCI and has been out for over 18 months. PCI-Express sound cards will be out very soon...

Other Thoughts: Great card if you have the money to spend. Recommended for avid PC gamers who must have the best sound. On a budget? Get the Extreme Gamer version for $xxx (though you won't be able to do audio creation). If your a music creator or edit your own soundtracks, I recommend you take a step up and purchase the Soundblaster X-Fi Elite Pro.

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Hoosier1981
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 week to 1 month
This user purchased this item from Newegg
12/6/2006 3:56:06 PM

Rating + 5 EXCELLENT


Pros: Amazing sound for gaming...really does make good headphones sound 3D.

Cons: ribbon cable should be rolled up...just did it myself tho.

Other Thoughts: I used my guitar for effects software, and it works great...low latency.

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Wicky
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 month to 1 year
11/26/2006 8:31:22 AM

Rating + 5 Answer for Mic/Bass issue


Pros: Bass and Mics are Hi-z devices, you need to get a D/I box, or use the headphone out on your amp.

Cons: none

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Cruxdagger
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 month to 1 year
11/21/2006 4:02:57 AM

Rating + 5 Quality sound


Pros: being a tech junkie and building rigs for the last 10 years A an A+ net+ MCSE tech. this card is hands down the best on the market next to the Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Elite. Ive used with F.E.A.R., Doom3, Prey, ect... all on my 7.1 entertainment system and on 7.1 CL speaker solution. it cant be beat hands down. and thats not even touching the entertainment mode.

Cons: yea i have to agree on the flat canle but the solution is easy, "sleeve it"

Other Thoughts: have not had any probs with static at all. even my guitar sounds fine. though i usually use the x-fi elite sys i have for that, thats what the elite is for creating music... no probs wth optical with any system gameing or dvd/blueray

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DigitalHunter
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 week to 1 month
This user purchased this item from Newegg
11/20/2006 9:07:08 AM

Rating + 3 Do NOT get this for Xbox 360 or any other item that has Optical out.


Pros: Great sound even on a 5.1 speaker setup. Cool software interface and excellent driver setup (I was surprised as CL usually has pretty bad drivers).

Cons: Overall I had a pretty bad experience. I had planned on using this card as a Dolby Digital 5.1 optical input for my Xbox 360 so I could use my computer speakers for sound. Lag, lag, lag. It's not so bad at first, however if you keep playing it gets worse. You can fiddle with it to make it go back to minimal lag, for example pull out the optical cable and put it back in, but who wants to do that?

Other Thoughts: It didn't work so well with my mic or my Bass guitar (which were both advertised as something you could use it for.When my Bass was connected all it did was create static. I tried to check the options and controls and nothing. I could hear my Bass but the static was louder. Also on Gears of War for the Xbox 360 whenever you shot an enemy loud popping sounds could be heard in the rear speakers (even after I turned down the in game audio).

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Brian
Tech Level: somewhat high
Ownership: 1 day to 1 week
This user purchased this item from Newegg
11/15/2006 4:15:32 PM

Rating + 4 Sounds Great


Pros: Great sound, interface with a lot of connection possibilities.

Cons: Flat ribbon cable is horrible

Other Thoughts: Excellent quality product. To get around the flat ribbon cable, you can sleeve it without removing the ends. Can just roll around the connector end so is rolled in with the ribbon, slide sleeve over it, and do your best to make it look pretty after the connection ends are unrolled. Looks great, just a slight pain.

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N/A
Tech Level: high
Ownership: more than 1 year
This user purchased this item from Newegg
11/12/2006 10:15:03 PM

Rating + 1 Not worth the money


Pros: None

Cons: When playing games like bf2 and battlefield 2142, you hear major static in intervals of the game. To be honest, I havnt seen no mark improvements in fps with the x-ram.

Other Thoughts: Lots of people in creative forums have been getting lots of static complaints also. So, I highly recommend not buying this product, its not worth your money.

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ComputrGuy
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 month to 1 year
11/11/2006 3:33:24 PM

Rating + 4 Hmm... that's odd


Pros: Sounds good, use it for gaming and my dad uses it to convert old records to MP3s.

Cons: This card is appealing to gamers and most gamers (like me) have clear side panels on their case and have round IDE cables to increase air flow. When I got this card I was VERY annoyed with the fact that it had a big fat ribbon cable that you need to use. That cable just makes my case look stupid and decreases air flow. for my ram, proccessor, etc.

Other Thoughts: Good sound card with poor design. If you dont have a clear side panel and dont care about air flow than this will not bother you. Even though this bothers me I would buy it again because it is such a good sound card.

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Max A
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 day to 1 week
This user purchased this item from Newegg
11/3/2006 2:32:28 PM

Rating + 5 X-Fi Fatal1ty


Pros: This thing definitely is an improvement over onboard audio, after toying with the settings my music and games sound amazing. The red light on the card itself is quite cool as well along with the shiny black finish on the 5in bay device.

Cons: Flat ribbon used to connect card to the 5in bay clashes with my other rounded wires.

Other Thoughts: Scored this thing after the price drop, before that this card wasnt worth it, but now its worth the look unless you dont want the 5in drive. Theres no picture of this, but there is a heatsink on the chip in this version for a little added security.

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Untot
Tech Level: high
Ownership: less than 1 day
10/23/2006 9:17:18 PM

Rating + 1 Throw it away


Pros: It's too pretty to smash on your floor.

Cons: This card will not be picked up in your device manager (problem with many motherboards...go look at the Creative discusion forums and you'll see how many people are unhappy with this card).

Other Thoughts: This card would be great...IF it worked.

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Rifter
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 month to 1 year
This user purchased this item from Newegg
10/18/2006 3:08:51 PM

Rating + 4 Very sexy sound card.


Pros: Very cool looking, great sound. REALY great sound. Upsampling CDs is quite cool. More expandability with the Xram.

Cons: There is little to now support for the Xram. I have read that the Fatal1ty is a little more unstable than the other Xfi cards, because of the memory.

Other Thoughts: Awesome sound card, would have gotten a 5, if more games supported it.

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N/A
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 month to 1 year
10/17/2006 11:26:28 AM

Rating + 5 Best sound card for gaming, period.


Pros: I bought my X-Fi Fatal1ty FPS for my then-new gaming PC the weekend after Creative released the X-Fi cards, and I can honestly say it's the best sound card I've ever owned.

The sound quality is superb and the multi-channel positioning over stereo headphones is amazing.

In the year I've owned the card, Creative has updated the drivers a few times, and they've provided a patch for UT2004 to enable it to use more of the X-Fi's 128 voice channels and dynamic music that changes depending on the intensity of the game action.

Take a look at the new games coming out, many of support X-Fi right out of the box now.

Buy this sound card, you won't regret it.

Cons: None.

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Autobahn97
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 month to 1 year
This user purchased this item from Newegg
10/8/2006 7:23:35 AM

Rating + 3 Not all its cracked up to be


Pros: When this card works well is sounds stunning! UT2004 with the XFI audio enhancement download sounds awsome! BF 2142 Demo sounds very good too but I'll wait for the full version before making a decision on that game.

Cons: FEAR doesn't even detect HW audio support at all so I may as well be using the built in audio! This is a known issue - apparently since the XFI came out and still has not been resolved a year later! Also FEAR specificaly has crackling noises while playing as did UT2004 before downloading the XFI enhancement patch/upgrade. Also having trouble with mic - can hear output on speakers but that's not passed onto any programs.It may be I don't know how to use the over complicated front panel I don't know how to use. The XRAM doesn't seem to do anything at all for me. Creative's support sucks and so does thier lock on the market

Other Thoughts: I am a little unique as I am running WinXP x64, NFORCE Pro chipset & GeForce 7950gx2 on HP XW9300 workstation with 6GB RAM & 2x Opteron285 CPUs. My advice is unless you absolutly need the front audio just get the basic XFI or skip the XFI and get the Audigy2. If you play FEAR alot like me skip this card and use the Audigy2. Last thought - if Creative can nail down the driver to work better this card would rock, however I have a feeling we will need to wait for a PCI-E variation of it.

2 out of 3 people found this review helpful. Did you? Yes No

Tilly
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 week to 1 month
This user purchased this item from Newegg
9/29/2006 8:45:36 PM

Rating + 5 Incredible


Pros: I'm still learning all this card will do and keep getting blown away. Do everything way over the top. 5.1 surround sound while in game is unbelievable with the Turtle Beach HPA headphone. Pay the price you won't be sorry.

Cons: I hesitated to buy it!

Other Thoughts: NOPE

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful. Did you? Yes No

GreenMartian
Tech Level: somewhat high
Ownership: 1 month to 1 year
9/26/2006 11:38:53 AM

Rating + 1 Lots of Issues


Pros: Looks good in the drive bay. Yippee!

Cons: The X-Fi Fatal1y has been the only component that has given me more headaches than any other component in my new computer that I built one month ago. At first I couldn’t get any sound. Then after I got the no sound issue resolved, now I’m dealing with a high pitch whining/cracking sound that I haven’t resolved yet. The headphone jack in the I/O drive doesn’t work, and I’m currently trying to troubleshoot that issue. Online manual is no help. And what’s up with that 1980’s wide flat ribbon cable that Creative is using. And what’s worse, I can’t find a round cable to replace that ugly grey three inch wide dinosaur. Seems they have a propriety type cable that is not interchangeable with other cables on the market. Creative should strongly consider color coding the speaker input jacks on the sound card. Their speaker cables are color coded, why can’t the jacks? They have input identification stamped into the slot pate, but heck, I had to use a magnifier to see it.

Other Thoughts: Buy this and you'll become a frequent user of the forums.

4 out of 8 people found this review helpful. Did you? Yes No

Sinster
Tech Level: somewhat high
Ownership: more than 1 year
9/20/2006 7:48:44 PM

Rating + 5 I recommend higly


Pros: I purchase the X-treme Music when the first hit the scene. The reason I did was I was sick and tired of getting lag or hiccups during FPS with my Audigy and Audigy 2. BF2 was pretty bad at hiccuping. I was running 512 x 2 of ram, a 3000+ and a 6800 Ultra. So I was pretty sure it wasn't any of those. So I purchased the X-fi slapped that bad larry into my computer and all my stuttering during loading up of BF2 and hiccups disappeared totally. I was so impressed with this card.. I couldn't stop bragging about it.. I convinced at least 8 others to purchase an X-fi. I was so impressed with it. I purchased the Fatal1ty version and installed my xtreme music into my 2nd computer. I couldn't more anymore happy with this card. I play guitar and bass and I just plug right into the I/O panel and record.

Cons: Creative support. After the last update I finally started to get the crackling sound only in GRAW.

Other Thoughts: I don't know if this holds true for others. ONce I installed the nVidia 91.47 drivers my crackling disappeared.

2 out of 2 people found this review helpful. Did you? Yes No

sonic
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 month to 1 year
This user purchased this item from Newegg
9/16/2006 3:18:52 AM

Rating + 5 Great


Pros: Good quality sound.
Increase in sound quality and clarity.
x-ram is a feature that should garner more popularity and use by developers.

Cons: Front panel may not fit in some cases with doors.
Software remains to be spotty.
The front panel must be connected to the card by an ide ribbon that is not rounded.

Other Thoughts: I upgraded to this soundcard from the audigy2zs and I wasn't expecting a large difference I did notice a difference in the clarity of the sound that is produced by this sound card.
As always, use high quality soundcards with high quality speakers, YES speakears made a significant difference.

0 out of 1 people found this review helpful. Did you? Yes No

ArchAngel
Tech Level: somewhat high
Ownership: 1 week to 1 month
This user purchased this item from Newegg
9/4/2006 10:22:39 PM

Rating + 5 Great card!!!


Pros: Amazing sound quality! BOSTED FPS!!!!

Cons: Remote didn't work, though it's probably something that I'm doing. Don't use it anyway so it doesn't bother me. Pricey!

Other Thoughts: I waited till it was on sale before I bought it. Boy am I glad I got it though. Still was a little pricey but you get what you pay for with this thing.

0 out of 2 people found this review helpful. Did you? Yes No

The Realm Walker
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 week to 1 month
This user purchased this item from Newegg
8/30/2006 9:12:52 AM

Rating + 5 Amazing Sound


Pros: Awesome sound output, and with the I/O Drive you can plug your instruments and record your music. Easy to Install

Cons: None

Did you find this review helpful? Yes No

N/A
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 week to 1 month
8/27/2006 7:10:21 PM

Rating + 1


Pros: Great Sound for the 2 hours that it worked

Cons: Died after 2 hours. Didn't have chance to review most of the features

1 out of 7 people found this review helpful. Did you? Yes No

N/A
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 week to 1 month
8/26/2006 10:25:47 PM

Rating + 4


Pros: The sounds are incredible while gaming. The 3D feature is amazing considering I don't have 5.1 headphones. Might be the last sound card you ever buy.

Cons: Something is buggy; either mobo compatibility or drivers. I have to reboot after startup or there are very weird sounds that make game play impossible.

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brante
Tech Level: somewhat high
Ownership: 1 week to 1 month
This user purchased this item from Newegg
8/26/2006 12:29:38 AM

Rating + 5 excellent


Pros: well, I really enjoy the ports on the front for al of my different imputs, it's nice to be able to plug a guitar in. Oh yeah, and the sound is really amazing. coupled with creative's relativly cheap 7.1 speakers, it sounds awesome.

Cons: it was a little bit pricy and you don't get a whole lot more than the stripped down X-fi, but hey, why not go all out

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Rocketry
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 week to 1 month
This user purchased this item from Newegg
8/23/2006 5:46:08 PM

Rating + 5 0 M F G !!!!!!! WOW !!!!! Buy it now


Pros: Wow this sound card has it all I have never heard of music of this quality it comes with all the softwhere you would ever need and the features are unbeatable. It supports every format and lets you play and create the most realistic midi ever also the in game expirience in FPS games is extrordinary you can here the people behinde you. Also this applys an EAX sound effect to even the mic. Other gusfual facs are that this card is the same one in the preamium the only diffrence is in the preum you get an external box with the same funcanality ecept for one more input. not worth $xxx to spend on that. This card has given me the best sound I have ever heard.

Cons: none

Other Thoughts: I stated enough above.

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Mark
Tech Level: somewhat high
Ownership: 1 day to 1 week
This user purchased this item from Newegg
8/15/2006 7:25:35 AM

Rating + 3 New Drivers Didn't Fix


Pros: Tons of features and GREAT sound....IF you can get it.

Cons: I was getting intermittent static/crackling until I downloaded the new drivers. Now I'm getting TONS of static/crackling and my computer is even freezing up.

Other Thoughts: This product is warrantied through manufacturer ONLY.

2 out of 2 people found this review helpful. Did you? Yes No

N/A
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 week to 1 month
This user purchased this item from Newegg
8/11/2006 6:20:01 AM

Rating + 4 Great card!


Pros: Extremely crisp sound, 24-bit upsampling, OpenAL support (used by F.E.A.R., Prey, and others).

Cons: It's a tad expensive, and I can't help but think that the price is high because of the Fatal1ty endorsement. Sound quality is not much better than Audigy.

Other Thoughts: The card itself is exactly the same as the bottom end Xtreme Music, but also features 64MB of XRAM, a Fatal1ty light, and of course the 5.25" drive. I was skeptical about the XRAM when I read about it. I mean, how much difference could some sound memory make? Well, I stand corrected. For games that support it (Prey, F.E.A.R., etc.) I actually do get slightly higher framerates and fewer hiccups in the game. It definitely frees up some CPU power to use for other things (AI, Physics, etc). If it weren't for the 24-bit upsampling, this card would sound the same as my old Audigy 1. Nevertheless, the different modes are cool, and actually do affect the sound, and I don't regret my decision. Of course, when I bought it, it was on sale for $xxx, and I had a $xx rebate from Prey. I don't think I'd buy it now at $xxx. Look at the Xtreme Music unless you have an older machine (for the framerate boost) or if you need the 5.25" drive.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful. Did you? Yes No

elvn
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 day to 1 week
8/5/2006 2:31:05 PM

Rating + 2 Creative Cards still bugged


Pros: "Hi-end" creative cards have alot of great features. I like their front panel or breakout boxes with remote and onscreen menus. The EAX is very cool, and the sound itself is very good.

Cons: I had two audigy1's with front panel. One panel died fairly early on. They also had popping/crackling. Year(s) later I upgraded to audigy2 ZS platinum with ext. breakout box. Had to return once due to malfuntion. Also had ALOT of popping/crackling very annoying esp.in games. Now my new Fatal1ty card's front panel doesn't work right out of the box. No onscreen display or remote funtionality, and no lights on the digital optical ports. Also have a history of glaring driver problems with creative cards all the way back to Live!

Other Thoughts: I build and repair pcs, use anti-static wriststrap and am cautious with my hardware. Creative dissapoints me. They release some bad hardware, and has in many cases some buggy driver support. As with my other cards I will return this one for replacement and play some creative roulette again. If a 'working' one ends up having crackling I will just get a refund and use my HD sound on my foxconn mboard instead. If there were more full featured and mainstream competition to creative I would never buy from them again.

1 out of 3 people found this review helpful. Did you? Yes No

MadHatter
Tech Level: somewhat high
Ownership: 1 month to 1 year
This user purchased this item from Newegg
8/3/2006 10:53:11 PM

Rating + 3


Pros: Sounds great. Software is quite easy to use, which is always a plus. The three listening modes are great and sound good no matter what. Audio creation mode is great, I get no delay when pluggin a guitar in. Could not ask for much more to be honest.

Cons: The whole snapping/popping thing pretty much never goes away for me. Apparently, a lot of people are having this problem. I figured I'd be able to deal with it once I got the card, but it's a lot worse than I thoguht it would be. Upon recording, it actually records the snaps/pops and can really mess with the card. It's almost impossible to record when it happens. I'd say I get the snapping/popping issue 8/10 times. Rebooting usually doesn't do much, so I have to live with it. It's getting quite frustrating. BIOS/drivers update did nothing.

Other Thoughts: It's truly an awesome card when it works. If I didn't have this problem, it would get a 5/5 for sure. Creative says they're working on a fix, but I don't even want this card enough to wait it out. It's pretty frustrating when you spend $500 on audio equipment and you can't get anything to sound good because it's being suppressed by snaps and pops. I'm not happy with my purchase, but I guess I'll just live with it. Do your research before you buy this card.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful. Did you? Yes No

N/A
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 week to 1 month
This user purchased this item from Newegg
8/2/2006 8:19:49 PM

Rating + 5 Wow


Pros: Wow. I flipped when I did the headphones demo for cmss3d. I showed it to my family and they flipped (even my mom!). She even showed it to her friends when they came over. Changes the gaming experience. Sound quality is incredible.

Cons: None. Worth every penny.

Other Thoughts: I never even played though half of Doom 3; thought it was boring. I got through it after getting this.

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Chewbacca
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 day to 1 week
This user purchased this item from Newegg
8/1/2006 6:11:25 AM

Rating + 5 Oh my word!!! - In the best way possible


Pros: Where to begin? The main reason I am giving this product 5 stars is due to Newegg's UNBELIEVABLE service!!! They are the best computer supplier ever! I ordered this on a Monday afternoon and it arrived on my doorstep Tuesday evening!!! Sorry I can't get over it. But onto the product. The X-Fi is an excellent card for pristine audio quality and reproduction. Anyone in the recording industry would see this as a sub par product but most consumers will be blown away by the product.

Cons: Well there is just a few flaws floating around the internet...Issues with the Nforce chipset interfering with the built on ram on this card. After some tweaking of the settings there are no other issues.

Other Thoughts: NEWEGG FOREVER! lol

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful. Did you? Yes No

MEH
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 day to 1 week
8/1/2006 2:37:40 AM

Rating + 5 AMAZING


Pros: Amazing... I can't stop listening to music... I have been missing so much in music for years now... This is the way music and games are meant to be heard

Cons: Price.. but if you like music and games... its worth every single penny

Other Thoughts: buy it

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful. Did you? Yes No

LordMax
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 day to 1 week
7/31/2006 6:27:28 PM

Rating + 4 This thing rocks!


Pros: For starters.. BF2 rocks.. no more lag and long waits to load a map or join a server.. Of course.. some folks are not setting up their game correctly when installing this card to reap the benifits.

Cons: Price.. Drivers had to be updated to play BF2

Other Thoughts: I have been gaming 20+ years and at least 7 online... This card made a signigant improvement over my Audigy II ZS gamer with BF2.. I was shocked..

1 out of 2 people found this review helpful. Did you? Yes No

Strangel
Tech Level: average
Ownership: 1 week to 1 month
7/23/2006 8:03:51 PM

Rating + 5 Whoa..... (Keanu style)


Pros: The sound quality is amazing and the x-ram is an awesome delight. Customizable to the hilt.

Cons: Ugly ribbon cable... yup, that's it!

Other Thoughts: The first time I heard the demo upon installation I got all giggly like a little school girl. I haven't even tapped into half the features yet cause I cant stop playing my games (they sound TOO good!).

Did you find this review helpful? Yes No

core2>am2=OwN3d!
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 month to 1 year
7/19/2006 10:47:12 PM

Rating + 4 Good with new drivers


Pros: With the latest drivers most of the issues (stuttering in games etc) appear to be fixed.
Sound is great, low cpu utilization. Always better than onboard sound.

Cons: I cannot believe I spent so much money on a soundcard!

Other Thoughts: It really isn't that much better than my audigy2. I wish more MB's just came with HD audio onboard.

0 out of 3 people found this review helpful. Did you? Yes No

N/A
Tech Level: high
Ownership: less than 1 day
This user purchased this item from Newegg
7/19/2006 3:38:18 PM

Rating + 4 WOW


Pros: This sound alot better then the onboard on my Asus A8N SLI DX.

Cons: Had to remove the PCI mounting thing for to fit. Wouldn't go all the way in.That why i gave it a 4.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful. Did you? Yes No

Rattler
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 week to 1 month
7/18/2006 7:55:13 PM

Rating + 5 The Best


Pros: Best sound DEVICE EXCELLENT FEATURES AWESOME SOUND an absolute neccessity for gaming,. Remote for DVD playback and more. SOUND BLAST X-fi is THE BEST.

Cons: EXPENSIVE but it is worth it, night and day difference in sound.

Other Thoughts: Yes it costs a lot but it is like comparing a YUGO to a LAMBORGINI performance wise IMHO SB X-fi is the KING of sound cards.

0 out of 1 people found this review helpful. Did you? Yes No

N/A
Tech Level: somewhat high
Ownership: 1 week to 1 month
This user purchased this item from Newegg
7/18/2006 3:18:13 PM

Rating + 5


Pros: Great price, the xx$ off makes this the best sound card for the money!

Cons: None so far.

Did you find this review helpful? Yes No

N/A
Tech Level: somewhat high
Ownership: 1 week to 1 month
This user purchased this item from Newegg
7/15/2006 7:59:46 AM

Rating + 4 Great Card, Not Great Bugs


Pros: First I have to say this makes my mp3's sound AMAZING. Throw on the 24-bit crystalizer and some EAX and it sounds like the band is in your backyard! I tried this thing out on BF2 and after a jump from low sound settings to ultra high settings I'll never go back to on-board sound.

Cons: Though BF2 sounds amazing, it actually got me less FPS! Even after it tells me I'll get a 15% increase in frame rates. Also, when loading BF2 the sounds start crackling, but it does stop when it is done loading sounds so it's not that bad.

Other Thoughts: When I installed the card my comp stopped playing dvds! I don't know if the X-Fi caused it but it's a thought. Overall it is a huge upgrade from on-board and just sounds amazing, if you can stand a couple bugs and the price( I got it at $xx off, FTW) it's the (second only to Elite Pro version) best sound card you can buy.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful. Did you? Yes No

Retreat
Tech Level: somewhat high
Ownership: less than 1 day
This user purchased this item from Newegg
7/3/2006 8:54:18 PM

Rating + 4 Great Sound Card, But Really Expensive


Pros: The sound. 64MB X-Ram and EAX 5.0 support.

Cons: Really expensive.

Other Thoughts: The sound card is night and day compared to my intergrated Sound Blaster Live! 24 bit. The sound coming out of my speakers are fuller and richer. There's a ton of features which you can tweak to your heart's content.

If this card were $xx cheaper, it would have had an excellent rating. As it stands, it's only a good and I have yet to see if this card is worth every penny seeing as though there's very limited support for X-Ram.

0 out of 1 people found this review helpful. Did you? Yes No

Cheezwiz
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 month to 1 year
This user purchased this item from Newegg
6/26/2006 8:52:25 PM

Rating + 5 The best you can get


Pros: Best sound you'll get, hands down.
Immersion expands one thousand-fold from an SB Audigy.

Cons: Nothing I can think of.

Other Thoughts: Oddly enough, I like the gaming audio better when the drivers are in "Entertainent" mode than "Gaming " mode. It utilizes the center channel more.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful. Did you? Yes No

N/A
Tech Level: high
Ownership: 1 month to 1 year
6/17/2006 10:16:08 PM

Rating + 5 24-bit Crystal Clear!


Pros: The crisp and clean quality that the 24-bit crystalizer gives to the sound processing is phenominal! Never have I heard this dramatic of a clarity boost in anything else. The 64MB of X-RAM on this card is DEFINITELY lessening the load on my system RAM and I have had from 10 to 40 more frames per second when gaming.

Cons: Price is quite a hard-hit!

Other Thoughts: For the non-gamers, I suggest the X-Fi Platinum as you get the same thing without the 64MB of X-RAM for cheaper. If you are into high rate sound and video rendering or gaming, this card is for you.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful. Did you? Yes No

Phyco
Tech Level: somewhat high
Ownership: 1 week to 1 month
6/14/2006 4:54:05 PM

Rating + 1


Pros: It give a new experience as it claims with sound. Great for some systems, read my other thoughts...

Cons: The experience is that I along with thousands of others on the Creative forums got cracks/pops while listening to music and gaming, recieved crashes on our pc's, IRQ and IRQL errors even when making sure it had a proper setup.

Other Thoughts: I'm sure Creative will make a patch to fix all these errors but it's taking them a while so I suggest you wait until owners start seeing improvments. Don't get me wrong on some systems it's flawless but on others like mine it fails.

6 out of 8 people found this review helpful. Did you? Yes No

bob jr.
Tech Level: somewhat high
Ownership: 1 week to 1 month
5/28/2006 11:02:27 PM

Rating + 5 the best


Pros: the best sound ever. i love it.

Cons: none

Other Thoughts: the second i got it i cranked up the volume and it sounded so much better than my old sound card.

1 out of 2 people found this review helpful. Did you? Yes No

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