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Creative X-Fi

post #1 of 4
Thread Starter 
X-Fi Elite Pro
X-Fi Fatal1ty FPS
X-Fi Platinum
X-Fi XtremeMusic

all X-fi using pci slot
how's pcmcia and usb
post #2 of 4
I just picked up a xfi plat.
post #3 of 4
"X-Fi and the Elite Pro: SoundBlaster's Return to Greatness"
from Anandtech.com

Interesting review.
post #4 of 4
even more interesting comments:
Quote:
I work with audio devices for a living. I've worked with the X-Fi since it was a prototype(as have a couple dozen other people in my lab). Certainly it is an improvement over previous Creative efforts, and at first we were a bit wowed by the paper specs and proposal. However after working closely with it for months, I honestly can say that no one here feels its anything special. Perhaps some of that is the novelty wearing off, but in any ad-hoc test with someone who hadn't heard it before, they could rarely tell the difference between it and an Audigy, and the M-Audio Revolution generally was said to produce clearer sound. Not that our tests were scientific or anything, we weren't trying to write articles for publication.

I'd really suggest some blind tests with a variety of content. I think you may be suprised to find that while for MP3's the X-Fi sounds good, for CD's and especially SACD's the mid-range is poorly reproduced. Make certain you use a wide range of music, and prefferably classical numbers that you know very well.

Something else is you could list what type of speakers/headphones and recievers you are using, if you are testing with something like Klipsch then your credibility would go down considerably for anything but games and action movies, after all the card cannot make up for poor speakers(when measured by reproduction accuracy, not volume).

I would suggest establishing a baseline and going from there. Based on my experience, in the 'consumer' segment the M-Audio Revolution 7.1 is a good baseline, however any baseline that you could compare against would be beneficial to strengthening the credibility of the review. Granted anything audio is subjective, but when you say something is 'better' you need to at least be able to point to some specific reasons as to why.

And finally, the section that read like Creative marketing PR was your explanation of their audio architecture. There is nothing inherantly 'better' about the approach Creative is taking, it is simply different, there are both advantages and drawbacks. Furthermore, while they make the product seem like the 'next generation of audio' no one has managed to get a commitment from them to support the upcoming Windows Audio Architecture that will be a part of Vista, without that support they will be behind several others. Their lack of support for Linux is also a drawback for many.
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