Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi XtremeMusic 7.1 Channels 24-bit 96KHz PCI Interface Sound Card - Retail

Reviewed By: SCAVENGER1 on 10/2/2006

Tech Level: high - Ownership: 1 month to 1 year

This user purchased this item from Newegg

Pros: it works only if it doesnt have any kind of IRQ conflicks. which i have finally figure out how to do it. i run a asus a8n32-sli-deluxe mobo. i use this procedure to fix it: use driver cleaner pro then Download newest Chipset Drivers, but do not install yet
* Download and install any BIOS updates
* Reboot and enter BIOS
* Set what you want, disabling any stuff you never use (whether it be firewire or midi or whatever)
* Reboot to Windows
* Uninstall all drivers related to sound and video (the b******t apps that go with it too)
* Run Driver Cleaner Pro and multi-select all video and sound remotely related to your hardware (I select everything under manufacturer name)
* Reboot TO SAFE MODE (keep pressing F8 during reboot until you get the menu choice)
* Run Driver Cleaner Pro and clean the same things you just cleaned in normal mode
* Select CAB cleaning and clean all CABs it has an option to clean
the rest continues in other thoughts>

Cons: creatives tech support is very poor. still waiting on a new driver update. to help out with BSOD=blue screen of death.since the asus mobo have alot of conflicks with creative sound cards. just check out creatives forums you will see what i am chatting bout

Other Thoughts: * Reboot to normal Windows, cancelling out all the search for a driver gumps
* Install the newest Chipset Drivers
* Reboot, enter and recheck BIOS settings (chipset drivers can sometimes screw with this)
* Reboot to Windows
* Install latest OnBoard Sound Drivers if seperate from Chipset
* Reboot
* Set Windows sound applet stuff, test onboard sound. Any pops? Should be fine
* Reboot
* Install Sound Card DRIVERS (non of that extra c**p)
* Reboot
* Set Windows sound applet stuff, test both sound sources
* Reboot
* Recheck sound applet settings, reboot again if you need to set stuff again (it can be difficult to get Win to set some of that in stone)
* Now you can install your Video Drivers
* Reboot and retest everything
* Lastly, I would suggest the latest monthly version of DirectX to be installed
then you should either give you a clean and working as you want it system, or give you an indication of where the problem lies, depending on where in the process

15 out of 15 people found this review helpful. Did you?

Thanks for the valuable feedback you provided!

Music lovers take note

Reviewed By: mark on 4/30/2006

Tech Level: high - Ownership: 1 week to 1 month

Pros: First things first: I am not a gamer. I listen to lots of music and watch many movies, and am very picky about the quality of the sound. This card does a great job at these tasks!

In entertainment mode it halves the number of sound channels from 128 to 64 so the APU can perform more quality processing. On-chip SRC engine is astounding! (Seriously, you will wonder how you ever listened to music without it.) Heatsink is funny, but surprisingly the card gets kind of warm so it has to be at least somewhat useful.

Normally, I would fret over not being able to do a straight pass-through of audio from the pc to the DAC, but in this case I will make an exception. The audio processing engine is so good that it really doesnt matter whether its bypassed or not when the effects are turned off.

Oh, and you can play DVD-audio at 192khz/24-bit with this card, too.

Cons: I really don't like their decision to restructure the output/input ports on the back of the card. I came from an SB-Live 5.1, and I thought the I/O on the back of that card was darn near perfect. Combining line-in, mic and digital I/O was a stupid choice... but luckily, the onboard DAC is good enough to use the 3 analog outputs for THX surround sound so its not a huge deal being without digital out.

24-bit crystalizer can make some sounds/music tracks way too bright... especially if they are lower bitrate. I suggest keeping the crystalizer down near 10 to 20 percent until you are used to its effects.

I hate the way creative marketed this card (there's no way to make MP3s sound better than CDs... it's mathematically impossible).

AudioHQ/Env Audio lovers: take note that I couldn't find anything yet that lets you add/remove environmental effects and save custom environments! I haven't searched too hard, though.

Other Thoughts: I've never had problems with crackling/skipping. That problem usually manifests itself permanently into the sound card when bad or overstressed power supplies are used, or overheating in the case causes the chip to go bad. If you have a modest computer and mount the card vertically like I have (booksize barebone), then there is virtually no chance of this problem happening.

I also rarely use this card in gaming mode, and never use it in audio creation mode, so I really don't have opinions when it comes to any of those features.

8 out of 8 people found this review helpful. Did you?

Thanks for the valuable feedback you provided!

Stay away from this card

Reviewed By: panda on 2/16/2007

Tech Level: high - Ownership: 1 month to 1 year

Pros: This card sounds great. Much better then onboard sound. I believe it is also the cheapest X-Fi card that supports EAX.

Cons: Drivers suck. You will have about 10(No joke) processes running at all times when you install this card. Creative hasn't released an update for the drivers yet. It screws up for me and 2 other people I know that own it while playing games. Some of them crash to desktop, some lock up, mine personally just stops recognizing the card everytime I restart. I'm going to reformat and try again, if it doesn't work this time, I'm sending it back.

Other Thoughts: Newegg was great in this deal, if we were rating them it would be a 5. If we were rating just Creative I would give it a 1. But since we have to rate both, I gave it a three, Newegg shipped fast and has great customer service, Creative gave this great card poor drivers and poor driver support.

Did you find this review helpful?

Thanks for the valuable feedback you provided!

Really Worth it?

Reviewed By: Naxin on 2/16/2007

Tech Level: somewhat high - Ownership: 1 month to 1 year

This user purchased this item from Newegg

Pros: The card was awsome the first week I had it. Worked like a charm. Went in easy and there was no issues.

Cons: After week one it started having some odd issues. It would basically act like it was not in my comp. Windows would see it was there, but none of the drivers worked. There were no IRQ conflicts (it was the only audio device active and the one of two PCI devices the other being my vid card). Eventually I had to almost every 3 days uninstall and completely reinstall even switching PCI slots from time to time. Finally after a month of this the thing simply stopped working and would never work again, not in my computer or anyone elses (creative made me try it in some one elses comp before they would let me RMA it). Creative Tech support is annoying and not helpful. Took them a month to agree to give me an RMA and I had to pay for the shipping both ways even though they made a defective product. Took them a month and a half to get the card in the mail to me and never updated me at all on its status I had to keep calling and asking them.

Other Thoughts: When the repaired card got to me it once again worked like a charm, but I've only had it for like a month so we will see if it lasts this time. I only wish that turtle beach would offer cards with the same game features as Creative. I never had any issues with any turtle beach card. Always had issues with Creatives though it seems.

Did you find this review helpful?

Thanks for the valuable feedback you provided!

Reviewed By: Raiden Kitsune on 2/13/2007

Tech Level: somewhat high - Ownership: 1 month to 1 year

This user purchased this item from Newegg

Pros: Every feature you could possibly ask for, incredible sound quality. Choice of sound modes (game, entertainment, or audio creation) that optimizes the card for whatever you're using it for.

Cons: Typical bloated creative software suite that will happily take over half of your system if you let it; fortunately easier to disable than with older versions.

Other Thoughts: Install in minimal mode to avoid the ridiculous number of unnecessary applications, and it's perfect.

Did you find this review helpful?

Thanks for the valuable feedback you provided!