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X-fi worth a darn?

TeeJayHoward

TeeJayHoward

Limpness Supreme
2FA
Joined
Feb 8, 2005
Messages
13,386
I'm looking for a sound card, and the X-Fi is recieving high praises from a lot of people... But there's also a lot of people who are pretty pissed at it. I've heard of compatibility issues with the nF4 chipset, cracks/pops after a while, inability to play BF2 at more than 15FPS, and numerous other issues. Are these problems in the past? Should I get the card? (lookin' at the XtremeMusic, as I don't need a front panel connector thingie)

Uses:
Gaming (Oblivion, BF2, FEAR, Doom 3)
DVD/Anime watching via Logitech X-530
MP3s via Logitech X-530/Sennheiser HD 280 Pro

Another question I had was concerning the number of ports on the back of the card. My integrated audio has 6 ports, but the card appears to only have 4. Surely I'm not going to lose my surround-sound by switching to this card... Right? How do you hook it up?
 
TeeJayHoward said:
I'm looking for a sound card, and the X-Fi is recieving high praises from a lot of people... But there's also a lot of people who are pretty pissed at it. I've heard of compatibility issues with the nF4 chipset, cracks/pops after a while, inability to play BF2 at more than 15FPS, and numerous other issues. Are these problems in the past? Should I get the card? (lookin' at the XtremeMusic, as I don't need a front panel connector thingie)

Uses:
Gaming (Oblivion, BF2, FEAR, Doom 3)
DVD/Anime watching via Logitech X-530
MP3s via Logitech X-530/Sennheiser HD 280 Pro

Another question I had was concerning the number of ports on the back of the card. My integrated audio has 6 ports, but the card appears to only have 4. Surely I'm not going to lose my surround-sound by switching to this card... Right? How do you hook it up?
Click to expand...

I personally am using this machine on a gateway with a nforce 4 mobo, and experience no problems whatsoever ..... you will not loose youer sorround sound as long as your speakers have 3 auxillary imputs, which they should imo..... its great for gaming, and there probably ok to buy now as the newer versions work a lot better than the old..... id deffinatly check it out.... buy it on the egg and u can always return it in 30days if its crap
 
TeeJayHoward said:
I'm looking for a sound card, and the X-Fi is recieving high praises from a lot of people... But there's also a lot of people who are pretty pissed at it. I've heard of compatibility issues with the nF4 chipset, cracks/pops after a while, inability to play BF2 at more than 15FPS, and numerous other issues. Are these problems in the past? Should I get the card? (lookin' at the XtremeMusic, as I don't need a front panel connector thingie)

Uses:
Gaming (Oblivion, BF2, FEAR, Doom 3)
DVD/Anime watching via Logitech X-530
MP3s via Logitech X-530/Sennheiser HD 280 Pro

Another question I had was concerning the number of ports on the back of the card. My integrated audio has 6 ports, but the card appears to only have 4. Surely I'm not going to lose my surround-sound by switching to this card... Right? How do you hook it up?
Click to expand...

I personally am using this machine on a gateway with a nforce 4 mobo, and experience no problems whatsoever ..... you will not loose youer sorround sound as long as your speakers have 3 auxillary imputs, which they should imo..... its great for gaming, and there probably ok to buy now as the newer versions work a lot better than the old..... id deffinatly check it out.... buy it on the egg and u can always return it in 30days if its crap, btw the headphoe quality compared to soundblaster live 24bit is HUGE... and the live is better than most integrated sound..... the headphone quality is a big ramp up with cmss-3d, and the 5.1 quality is good also, (bf2 sounds insane), imusing the xtreme music btw
 
You'd enjoy the Ultra High sound quality mode in BF2 and it would drive those cans better.
 
I just installed a X-Fi XtremeMusic. I had planned to use the onboard sound but got electronic noise from the video and usb. The X-Fi is crystal clear. Even using quality headphones. My mobo is nforce4.

I did not load all the bloat software that is on the driver CD. Check for updated drivers before install.

Three connectors on the card for front, back, and center channels.

They sell a lot of these cards and have a few complainers. If in doubt buy from a place you trust. I found one last month sale priced at $70, so check around.

have fun
 
I'm not convinced that the X-Fi offers anything useful to me over my Audigy 2, other than better driver support.
 
Picked up the X-Fi and HD280s off NewEgg just now. Thanks for the advice.
 
Scyles said:
I'm not convinced that the X-Fi offers anything useful to me over my Audigy 2, other than better driver support.
Click to expand...


...and better sound.
 
I have a soundblaster Live and Audigy. And onboard from 3 different motherboards. Realtek, Nvidia and AC97. I cannot tell the difference between any of them.

After I installed the X-Fi there was a noticable difference in music and gaming. It really is a great card.
 
Archer75 said:
I have a soundblaster Live and Audigy. And onboard from 3 different motherboards. Realtek, Nvidia and AC97. I cannot tell the difference between any of them.

After I installed the X-Fi there was a noticable difference in music and gaming. It really is a great card.
Click to expand...

I think the live and standard audigy are just about the same thing but could be wrong. I know the audigy 4 is between the standard audigy and x-fi and sounds comparable to the x-fi but not as good.
 
With my x-fi and my mid-fi(hi-fi to normal folks, mid-fi to audiophiles) headphone, I can hear details that I ABSOLUTELY didn't hear before. I mean not just little tiny raindrops in the background, but WHOLE parts of the song that weren't there before. Even to add to that, things that were in songs before with lesser setups now sound beautiful and complete. It's highly entertaining.

Also, I give props to Creative for stretching out to the x-fi community and giving us drivers that enables the x-fi xtrememusic card(no x-ram version) the ability to play bf2 at ultra-high quality, which was made for and designated solely to x-fi's that has x-ram. This way, you're ensured that you get the best gaming quality regardless if you spend $100 on an x-fi xm, or $300+ on on its bigger brother.

As far as all the complaints you've been hearing: This is my second x-fi xtrememusic soundcard, which I happen to use with an nforce4 mobo. Even though I haven't used either for extended periods of time, I have used them for concentrated periods of time, and I've had no problems so far, and don't expect any either:D Some people have reported being able to run bf2 at ultra quality without x-ram and without problems(before the new drivers), but some have. But now, with Creative officially making the non-x-ram x-fi's support hundreds of mbs worth of gaming sound files without a hickup, I don't see why someone would avoid buying an x-fi because of problems people complain about.

Remember, you'll hear the PISSED customers more loudly than you'll hear the happy ones:)
 
phide said:
Allegedly.
Click to expand...

Well it depends on what sound system you have. If you have Logitech Z-640 quality speakers, you should probably just stick with onboard (any upgrade will only result in equal quality).

But once you start moving up to higher end systems, of course there is a difference between the Audigy 2 ZS and a X-Fi. I owned an Audigy 2 ZS; it is a joke. Bass didn't even work with receivers using the analog out. The SRC is laughable at best. I had to use a software SRC just to get decent quality from my music (which eats up unnecessary CPU). The simple fact that the X-Fi has a SRC that is 300 times more accurate (and the ability to completely bypass a SRC) makes it far greater choice than an Audigy 2 ZS. There is no "allegedly" better sound quality. It isn't the sound card's fault that a user has horrible speakers. Comparing card to card, the X-Fi does have better sound quality than an Audigy 2 ZS. There is no arguing this. It comes down to though does the user have a quality source (not a poorly encoded mp3) and does the user have quality speakers (Z-640's owners need not apply).
 
phide said:
Allegedly.
Click to expand...

Is that all you can add to the discussion Mr. Cochran?

lend82 said:
Also, I give props to Creative for stretching out to the x-fi community and giving us drivers that enables the x-fi xtrememusic card(no x-ram version) the ability to play bf2 at ultra-high quality, which was made for and designated solely to x-fi's that has x-ram. This way, you're ensured that you get the best gaming quality regardless if you spend $100 on an x-fi xm, or $300+ on on its bigger brother.
Click to expand...

Agreed, but too bad they're really jewing their flag ship Elite Pro users in the driver department.
 
BBA said:
...and better sound.
Click to expand...
Well, I certainly don't think my X-Fi sounds any better than the A2ZS it replaced (especially with the crystalizer crap). The drivers are much improved, and that is definately worth it IMO. Plus, with the new drivers coming out next year, we will get EAX effects in Linux with the X-FI! Fun stuff :)
 
i made the jump from audigy 2 to xfi; and definatly noticed a difference. of course i went from hd 212pros to dt 770pros at the same time; hehe.

But seriously, for cmss3d alone its well worth the price difference imo. (to use my 2.1 speakers; i have them set to rear channel; so I just set cmss 3d on, set to all rear; and it sound great no cable switching or external breakout box [which caused noise on my dt770s, which annoyed me])

woo
 
I have a Audigy 2, and was wondering the same thing as the OP, but I don't think that my system sounds bad at all, but at the same time, I can tell bad and good and great car audio, so my ears are kinda in tune with things. I dunno.
 
MetalX said:
Agreed, but too bad they're really jewing their flag ship Elite Pro users in the driver department.
Click to expand...

Care to elaborate? I was thinking of biting the bullet and getting one around Christmas. I would like to know what the problem is and if anyone thinks it will be resolved soon.

Thanks.
 
Xaeon said:
Care to elaborate? I was thinking of biting the bullet and getting one around Christmas. I would like to know what the problem is and if anyone thinks it will be resolved soon.

Thanks.
Click to expand...

They haven't been "jewing" the Elite Pro users; they just haven't fixed an ASIO bug that has been present for like 6-8 months (it effects all X-Fi users).

The problem was that the Elite Pro comes bundled with a program (Cubase) that uses ASIO and thus becomes unusable with the latest batch of drivers. When Creative was about to release new drivers in August, they found that Cubase no longer worked. They originally thought the problem was isolated just to Cubase so they felt comfortable releasing drivers to the whole X-Fi family save the Elite Pro. Confused Elite Pro users felt miffed that they were excluded from the new drivers (even though the beta's, which was exactly the same as the official release, was still available; not to mention it was very easy to "modify" the official drivers).

About a week ago Creative released new drivers that offered a "hot-fix" (if you can call it that...) to the ASIO issue for the whole X-Fi family. While the ASIO driver no longer crashes the program that uses ASIO, it now just stops the ASIO driver and prevents further playback/recording without a restart of the ASIO driver (What a hot-fix right? :rolleyes: ). Basically, ASIO is still useless on X-Fi cards, but now no longer crashes your system.

Creative did say though that they hope to release a "full" fix to the ASIO issue within a month.
 
hopefully they will have knocked all the kinks out of the X-fi drivers by the time they get around to releasing linux drivers.
 
saturnine2 said:
Well, I certainly don't think my X-Fi sounds any better than the A2ZS it replaced (especially with the crystalizer crap). The drivers are much improved, and that is definately worth it IMO. Plus, with the new drivers coming out next year, we will get EAX effects in Linux with the X-FI! Fun stuff :)
Click to expand...

So, like I said, you are paying for the software (drivers), because I don't think many people can tell a difference between sound quality of Audigy 2 and X-Fi once you turn off the crystalizer crap that fools average users.

If you're an audiophile and you use a pair of $300 amped Sennheisers, then perhaps there is a noticable difference, but I feel that the other 95% of users are fooling themselves thinking they can "hear things they never heard before" coming from an Audigy 2. This is my opinion, as a person who is not an audiophile, but considers himself to be more attuned to sound detail than the average listener.
 
Xaeon said:
Care to elaborate? I was thinking of biting the bullet and getting one around Christmas. I would like to know what the problem is and if anyone thinks it will be resolved soon.

Thanks.
Click to expand...

I bought the Elite Pro, great card, nothing but good things. The breakout box is big, and functional.

True, some drive kinks need working.

You can pick one up for about 250-270 after rebate now.
 
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