X-Fi Xtreme gamer vs Audigy 2

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Mike89

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I know there have been posts like this but the ones I see are like 2 years old. I have the Audigy 2 ZS. It has been a great card for me with zero problems. I have been considering buying the X-Fi Xtreme gamer but would like to hear more up to date comments from people who have made this change to decide if it's really worth it for me to finally switch out my trusty Audigy 2 ZS. I'm running Windows XP Pro so would rather hear comments from these experiences. BTW, I'm running the Logitech Z-5500 5.1 speakers so would be using the SPDIF passthrough for digital (since these speakers do the decoding). Thanks
 
In the right game, it's gooing to be a pretty nice jump in sound.

BF2 and 2142 make real good use of the X-Fi, other than that, I am not sure what games do.
 
the x-fi has slightly better/larger 3d soundstage than an audigy PLUS it does above and below sounds really good. i also went from an audigy2 to an x-fi-i have loved it
 
I'm noticing that the X-Fi Xtreme gamer has a "flexijack" instead of the usual SPDIF passthrough jack. I assume this would be the same thing?
 
I've upgraded from the Audigy 2ZS to an X-Fi ExtremeMusic and really have not heard anything other than minor differences... Nothing that I would attribute to one being better than the other in games, CD's, nor MP3 audio (I don't use my computer system for listening to DVD-Audio's... it's my secondary system.) I still have the Audigy 2ZS in another computer so I have actually done side to side comparisons using Grado SR60 headphones and an analog 5.1 system with a Denon receiver driving a dual Hsu Research Ventriloquist speaker system with dual subs. IMO, Unless people have done side by side comparisons, for anything other than huge differences, their opinions are greatly suspect since a human's audio memory fades after just minutes based on psycho acoustic studies.

Pretty much if you have no problems with your Audigy 2ZS, don't mess with it. I had no problems with my upgrade, but others have had nothing but trouble.
 
Met-AL said:
BF2 and 2142 make real good use of the X-Fi, other than that, I am not sure what games do.
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Not really. Both BF2 and BF2142 are actually EAX 4.0 games, which is Audigy 2-class. They both support X-RAM, EAX Voice and 128 voices, but, aside from that, the presentation is basically the same on the Audigy 2 as it is on the X-Fi. The extra voices help on occasion, but that isn't actually an X-Fi-exclusive feature (though the Audigy 2 only supports up to 64 hardware voices with EAX).

There's a list on Creative's site somewhere that lists games that support EAX and what version they support, but I can't ever find the damn thing. The marketing pages tend to try to paint an entirely different picture.

Off-hand, I'm fairly sure Prey is one bona fide EAX 5.0 game, as is BioShock (I think).
 
phide said:
Not really. Both BF2 and BF2142 are actually EAX 4.0 games, which is Audigy 2-class. They both support X-RAM, EAX Voice and 128 voices, but, aside from that, the presentation is basically the same on the Audigy 2 as it is on the X-Fi. The extra voices help on occasion, but that isn't actually an X-Fi-exclusive feature (though the Audigy 2 only supports up to 64 hardware voices with EAX).

There's a list on Creative's site somewhere that lists games that support EAX and what version they support, but I can't ever find the damn thing. The marketing pages tend to try to paint an entirely different picture.

Off-hand, I'm fairly sure Prey is one bona fide EAX 5.0 game, as is BioShock (I think).
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RGR that, with BF2 and 2142 you get 128 voices instead of only 64 with the X-Fi (the bottom line is that it sounds amazing)

On a side note, what is EAX-HD? The EAX-HD logo comes up when you turn on X-Fi mode and Ultra Quality in BF2 and 2142.
 
EAX HD (Advanced HD) is what Creative calls any version of EAX greater than 2.0. 3.0 was kind of the first major shift for their DSP, and subsequent versions have been incremental upgrades on top of that basic architecture. It's just a marketing thing, really.
 
bf 2142 and unreal tournament 3 have the best 3d audio out there and use and x-fi very well. try those demos
eax hd is eax 3 and 4 - the audigy flavors
 
Met-AL said:
RGR that, with BF2 and 2142 you get 128 voices instead of only 64 with the X-Fi (the bottom line is that it sounds amazing)
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For what it's worth, I've been playing BF2 on an Audigy 2 ZS for a while now and it sounds great. I had an X-Fi a while back; when I switched to the Audigy (yes, I downgraded) I didn't notice a difference. If it's making use of 128 voices instead of 64 it doesn't seem to do much for the game.
 
deruberhanyok said:
For what it's worth, I've been playing BF2 on an Audigy 2 ZS for a while now and it sounds great. I had an X-Fi a while back; when I switched to the Audigy (yes, I downgraded) I didn't notice a difference. If it's making use of 128 voices instead of 64 it doesn't seem to do much for the game.
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Yea, most likely you didn't have it on Ultra High mode, it's often over looked as you have to scroll the list down one slot to see Ultra High and most people end up just seeing High as the highest setting and use that.
 
Could have been. I honestly don't remember, it's been so long since I had the X-Fi installed.

Thing is, if it sounds fantastic on "high" then what does "ultra high" really bring to the table?

That's rhetorical. My point is I don't think the Xtreme Gamer is worth the money to upgrade from an Audigy 2 ZS at all. It may be "better," but I don't feel that it is $90 better.
 
The difference between my audigy 4 and an x-fi is that with the audigy I don't hear crackling or popping noises while playing BF2. Other than that there's no big difference.
 
I have both Audigy and X-Fi. IMO, the X-Fi sounds harder than the Audigy. Audigy is softer.
 
deruberhanyok said:
Could have been. I honestly don't remember, it's been so long since I had the X-Fi installed.

Thing is, if it sounds fantastic on "high" then what does "ultra high" really bring to the table?

That's rhetorical. My point is I don't think the Xtreme Gamer is worth the money to upgrade from an Audigy 2 ZS at all. It may be "better," but I don't feel that it is $90 better.
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I have tried to describe it many a time, but it's hard to put in words.

When running on the beach in BF2, it sounds like you can hear the individual grains of sand crunching under your feet. When another player is running near you within hearing range, you can pinpoint pretty much exactly where he is and how far away he is. It's almost like having a wall hack in a way.

I was playing on high for the longest time until one day, I realized that if I clicked on that setting there was a scroll bar and if I scrolled it one more notch, there was a Ultra-High setting....then it was wow.
 
Well I took the plunge and got the X-Fi Extremegamer pro. I know sound impressions are highly subjective but I have to say I do notice a difference from my Audigy 2. The sound on the X-Fi is generally "cleaner" and "fuller". I know there could be discussions all day long on what one's interpretation of those words mean. I do really like the software better, it's more compact and the interface is better, opening each option in the same window rather than separate windows like the Audigy 2 software did it. I also really like having the "Game" mode and "Entertainment" modes done separately so each one's settings are independent of each other rather than having to change with each application. Just played Mass Effect again and it definitely sounded better (subjective again). In this game with the Audigy 2, there was popping at times firing weapons. I don't get this with the X-Fi. So far I'm really glad I made the change.

The one thing I would have liked better is having more jacks on the card. The Audigy 2 had both Line In and SPDIF out jacks. The X-Fi XTreme Gamer Pro combines them into one (Flexijack). Have to use either/or but not at the same time. This caused me a bit of a problem because I use both, the SPDIF jack for the Digital out to the Logitech Z-5500, and I have a USB TV Tuner that feeds it's audio into a Line In jack on the sound card. I had forgot about the TV tuner until I tried to watch TV. Bummer, no audio! Stupid ass me, I forgot about that jack. Then I'm thinking I need the I/O module that I didn't really want to buy. I did an end around by cutting off one end of the 3.5mm TV tuner audio cable and splicing it into another cable that had the aux audio connector on one end to plug into the Aux connector on the sound card. Ended up working fine but I would rather have had the other jack on the X-Fi. Now I have the TV tuner sound but it still doesn't solve the problem if I ever wanted to plug in a microphone (though right now I personally have no use for one). I would either have to unplug the SPDIF cable, plug in the mic (and change the Settings) or get the I/O console to have more jacks. Creative must have thought that gamers don't do anything other than play games. A bit of an oversight on their part as far as I'm concerned. This particular card also doesn't have Dolby/DTS decoding capabilities. Doesn't affect me cause I have the Z-5500 that does this but it's something to consider for those who have speaker systems that don't.
 
Well yes there would be a benefit to switching from a Audigy 2 ZS for spdif output because it was "broken" on the Audigy 2 series, the output was not bitperfect and was resampled.

Although TBH there are a ton of cards that do spdif bitperfect that cost next to nothing compared to the X-Fi and do it just as well.
 
Well yes there would be a benefit to switching from a Audigy 2 ZS for spdif output because it was "broken" on the Audigy 2 series, the output was not bitperfect and was resampled.
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That's the first time I've heard that. I had been running digital through the Audigy 2 SPDIF for a couple of years and thought it worked quite well. If the X-Fi's SPDIF is not "broken", I guess that is better still. I'll have to keep my ear on that part to see if I notice anything different (if one was broken and one is fixed).
 
I've never done ABX tests regarding this obviously, but it is broken from an academic standpoint since it largely defeats the purpose of spdif passthrough. I believe the only sample rate that the Audigy 2 didn't resample in spdif passthrough was 96KHz.

If it's going to be resampled anyway it would be better to use the analog outputs and put Creative's trademark DSP to use.
 
I only use the SPDIF passthrough for Digital Movies (that have either Dolby Digital or DTS). The Audigy 2 had it's own Dolby/DTS decoder but I never used it because my Logitech Z-5500 5.1 speakers had it's own Dolby/DTS decoder and has to have the un-decoded digital signal. With my X-Fi Xtreme Gamer Pro, it's basically the same deal because this sound card does not have the Dolby/DTS decoder that the Audigy 2 did. For everything else I use the 3 wire analog connections.
 
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