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x-fi in PCIe
- Thread starter Bigbacon
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Menelmarar
Supreme [H]ardness
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Keep in mind the popping and crackling issues in even the PCI cards are hit or miss. Many have no issues. All you see screaming are vocal unsatisfied minority.
I have heard neither good nor bad concerning the PCIe versions. Just make sure you don't get the X-Fi XtremeAudio, the original PCIe version as it had no hardware acceleration and was basically a rebranded Audigy Value thing.
I have heard neither good nor bad concerning the PCIe versions. Just make sure you don't get the X-Fi XtremeAudio, the original PCIe version as it had no hardware acceleration and was basically a rebranded Audigy Value thing.
MittWaffen
Limp Gawd
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I'd recommend staying away from X-fi.
Crap company, crappy product tons and tons of issues with them. Some might disagree but you slowly find more and more problems the card causes as you use the card more and more, its like a used house you slowly find cracked foundations, leaking pipes etc. Creative X-fi is like a used house, just made in the 1800's thats burnt down and been rebuilt 100's of times. It always has the same core problems no matter how many times they try to 'repaint' it.
With Vista and Win7 putting an axe to EAX (Alchemy isn't a solution) you really should just invest in card from Asus or if you must get an X-fi an Azunetech (SP?) card will suffice.
Crap company, crappy product tons and tons of issues with them. Some might disagree but you slowly find more and more problems the card causes as you use the card more and more, its like a used house you slowly find cracked foundations, leaking pipes etc. Creative X-fi is like a used house, just made in the 1800's thats burnt down and been rebuilt 100's of times. It always has the same core problems no matter how many times they try to 'repaint' it.
With Vista and Win7 putting an axe to EAX (Alchemy isn't a solution) you really should just invest in card from Asus or if you must get an X-fi an Azunetech (SP?) card will suffice.
Bollocks...
Win7 plus alchemy works just fine...and my X-Fi Elite Pro is ABOVE any asus card in gaming.
MittWaffen
Limp Gawd
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While I agree it makes 'EAX' functional (on some apps), Alchemy has memory leaks out the A including features such as CMSS3D and EAX when enabled with a game and any Voip program such as ventrillo or ingame voip.I've been in contact with Creative driver team for some time and they still cannot find the root cause of this issue. Happens on Vista 32/64 and Windows 7 32/64, X-fi with the new audio subsystem in Vista and Windows 7 is a hunk of crap. Most people don't even realize that their audiodg.exe is eating tons of ram.
Another issue is mouse buzzing with 4gb ram.I've been able to replicate this issue on motherboards and different models of cards. USB mice with high DPI settings can cause high pitched static when the mouse is moved over high intensity colors. Im convinced this is a design flaw since the driver team cant figure this one out either. There are alot more but thats just one ill throw out there.
Your money is better put into a product without serious issue such as these, if it was a good card and had some small issues I would recommend it. However I highly recommend you avoid it with the bigger more serious issues it has.
Another issue is mouse buzzing with 4gb ram.I've been able to replicate this issue on motherboards and different models of cards. USB mice with high DPI settings can cause high pitched static when the mouse is moved over high intensity colors. Im convinced this is a design flaw since the driver team cant figure this one out either. There are alot more but thats just one ill throw out there.
Your money is better put into a product without serious issue such as these, if it was a good card and had some small issues I would recommend it. However I highly recommend you avoid it with the bigger more serious issues it has.
MittWaffen
Limp Gawd
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You just like to make wild claims eh?
I have no muse buzzing..and I have 4 GB and XP 32bit, Vista 64 bit and Win7 64 bit
Let me guees...crappy NVIDIA chipset?
Wild claims? Look on the forums champ and google search it. Thousands of people have these issues and no it isnt run on a nvidia chipset. I said i've run it on many different board with the same issues - X48 P45 P35 X58.
Also you're saying half of the information needed to figure out why you dont even have the buzzing, Ram speed, Video card, psu etc. The X-fi picks up TONS of electro interference, why do you think all of their new cards have a shield on them...it isn't looks thats for sure.
If you're trying to hear the buzzing off of speakers pick up some hi-fi headphones and you can check to see if its there.
I could care less about what you think when i have the issues right in front of me, while i never said everyone had these issues, allot do.
80% of those people as far I can see, have a NVDIA chipset..the rest I suspect is due to IRQ sharing and other stuff:
http://forums.techpowerup.com/showthread.php?t=40613
Do some looking around, eh..
Unknown-One
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I take a peek at the x-fi's every once in a while...and I still see no compelling reason to upgrade from my Audigy 2.
I have gone from a:
SoundBlaster 16 Pro ->
SoundBlaster 32 AWE Gold ->(Bigget mofu card I ever have had in a PC )
SoundBlaster 64 AWE ->
SoundBlaster Live 5.1 ->
SoundBlaster Audigy ->
SoundBlaster Audigy 2 ->
SoundBlaster X-Fi Elite Pro
And every time I have gained in either immersion or features.
I consider sound just as important as visual input...sound is a very old sense, it's very hardwired in our instincts.
(I may suffer the "damage" of having been stationed in a hot civilwar, where sound often was the first indication of where the action was, so I can't stand poor 3D sound with no everiomental effects...just dosn't feel the same)
MittWaffen
Limp Gawd
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Your looking at non official forums, yeah while nvidia chip sets are POS, are you trying to imply x-fi have no issues? While i agree and x-fi with nvidia chip set would case even more problems than just an x-fi on a intel chip set. It still has issues. Really, why the hell are we arguing over the same end result, the x-fi has problems on chip sets regardless of brand- while different chip sets have more issues than others isn't anything new.
I don't need to have some pissing contest. I'm giving my ten cents you can give yours leave it at that.
Unknown-One
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That was just vague enough to mean something!
Seriously though, what did you gain going from the Audigy 2 to the Xfi Elite, exactly? Specifics. Things that actually matter.
128 hardware accelerated sounds (with 4 similtanous effects in EAX)...you try doing that on an Audigy 2...then we can talk again.
(BTW: This should be common knowlegde, don't know what rock you have been living under?)
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I get that buzzing on my mouse (Razer DeathAdder). I didn't think it was the soundcard causing it because it doesn't come from the speakers. Something on the soundcard itself maybe?
i own the dfi 975 x/g + x-fi titanium fatali1ty champion card, when i first put it in the pci-e 1x slot i checked the device manager and saw that it was the only device assigned to IRQ 17, so i thought it was all good till i played some BF2, loads of SCP !! i thought wtf ?
Seated it in the lower pci-e 4x and SCP was gone ! even tho the card was sharing irq 16 along with a ton of other devices, really weird :S
Seated it in the lower pci-e 4x and SCP was gone ! even tho the card was sharing irq 16 along with a ton of other devices, really weird :S
Unknown-One
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Yes, the cards tech specs are plastered all over Wikipedia, that's not what I was getting at. I know there are improvements on paper, but what are you actually gaining from that? What actually makes use of that extra hardware?
X-Fi's share the same 109dB signal to noise ratio (apart from the X-Fi Elite Pro) as my Audigy 2, so the cards are going to sound just as clear. The 24bit crystallizer on the X-Fi is worthless, as it damages audio that's already good to begin with by running dynamic EQ over it (and if you really want it, it can be replicated via software such as FFDshow). Both cards have the CMSS-3D modes relevant to my speaker configuration. The only thing that looks marginally interesting is the upgrade from EAX 4.0 to EAX 5.0, but I'm not sure the extra 64 channels would be noticeable on my 2.1 speaker setup (in the handfull of titles that actually support EAX 5.0 and can make use of those extra channels).
It really seems like a lot of money for very little gain...
You have to hear it...find a friend and try eg BF2 in EAX 5.0 HD...it has to be heard.
You have never heard it right?
That explains it.
Not really, compared to the real estate in the brain dedicated to audio.
Unknown-One
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Don't be so quick to assume. I've heard EAX 5.0 working in Bioshock, and I'm hard pressed to hear any difference between that and its EAX 4.0 mode.
So what you're saying is, it's worth it to upgrade to an X-Fi purely for the couple of games I own that support EAX 5.0...
I only have about 6 games that support EAX 5.0 at all, and I'm only actively playing one or two of them anymore. Everything else either uses EAX 4.0 or has already moved on to OpenAL. Honestly, EAX 5.0 seems like a very short-lived and under-supported technology. As for your "128 channels" argument, further reading has reviled that it's already possible to have 128 channels of audio on an Audigy 2, everything past the 64th channel just drops back to software acceleration and basic 3D audio.
So in the end, for $100, I would only really gain some supplemental EAX effects on those last 64 channels in one or two games that I currently play that even support EAX 5.0; all my EAX 4.0 games gain nothing...
Yeah, I think I'll stick with the Audigy 2. It already supports up to EAX 4.0 (which is what most games use), and doesn't appear to suffer from all the driver and hardware issues the X-Fi does.