I slotted in my Soundblaster X-Fi Fatality edition yesterday and have run some tests on it. Why I threw a ton of money on buying it when I had a perfectly functional SoundMAX AC97-compatible mobo-based sound solution? Well, I'm not really sure actually...
Anyway! The card itself is relatively large with today's standards, especially if comparing to the boardspace consumed by built-in sound solutions, and absolutely packed with discrete components. The X-Fi DSP itself is covered by a passive heatsink, something I didn't really expect seeing as there hasn't been a sink visible in any of the PR images I've seen, but I have also wondered how a 50-million, 400MHz ASIC stays cool during operation. Guess I know now.
At least it doesn't require any additional power, the PCI slot delivers enough.
The Fatality card has a bay-mounted breakout box with additional connectors. I skipped that because there aren't any free 5.25" bays in my PC. The metal box itself seems sturdy enough though, and the front is a nice glossy black that would match my case well I think, had I actually had room for it. Oh, and there's also a backlit lightningbolt "F" logo on the top edge of the card, undoubtedly so casemodders have some extra bling-bling to brag with through their side window. Unfortunately, Creative didn't consider BTX cases, so the logo is sitting upside-down in my PC. Oh, the HORROR!
There aren't any color-coded connectors on this card by the way, instead one has to make do with a transparent label with a few difficult-to-see splotches indicating which connector does what. Barely. Then again, once the cables are inserted, there isn't any need to fiddle back there anyway. Three connectors are the standard speaker outputs, the fourth is a flexi-jack that is either coax SPDIF out or mic in. Last (but absolutely not least), there's a now obsolete 15-pin D-sub gameport stuck on there as well for some crazy reason that I can't figure out. The only use I'd consider it for today is as MIDI in/out, but there's no adapter for that included. Besides, I have neither a MIDI keyboard, nor any sound modules either so it's all the same really.
I slotted it in and installed the drivers. Was pleasantly surprised that at least the Fatality edition (and likely all of them) has a "maximum performance" lightweight install option where only the essentials are dumped onto the harddrive. Many have expressed concern over the driver bloat of Creative cards in the past, and it seems they have listened. I picked a couple other options as well as I wanted to try things out, but most of the programs and utilities are completely superflous for a gamer and can be ignored.
Considering this, it would have been nice if there'd been an option to install other software components afterwards, sort of like Microsoft does with windows itself. I don't think this is an option, so it would neccessitate an uninstall of the entire driver first.
Anyway, everything installed smoothly, and the soundcard actually took over operation even before the install process was completed while I was voice chatting with a buddy via GTalk! I then ran the web auto-updater also, and everything went really smoothly from there. I fiddled slightly with the options, raising treble using the equalizer and stuff like that and then tried some games.
I was immediately pleasantly surprised by the much crisper sound in Return to Castle Wolfenstein, the venom, which through the SoundMAX software codec sounded bassy and nice, now had an upper-frequency aspect to it as well giving it an additional dimension. In WoW, I was surprised to hear that small environmental details were now much more audible, the X-Fi lifted them out of the background and let me experience them much more fully. I could hear the hooves of my goat clopping away across ground and stone, when I flirted (crudely) with an elf lassie my dorf no longer mumbled into his beard, I could actually hear what he was saying.
Considering that the last (meh) Doom3 patch added hardware sound mixing support for the X-Fi, I also had to install that game as well. No problem! Only four bloody CDs to juggle... Now, it was such a long time since I ran that game now (half a year or more I guess), so I can't actually remember what it used to sound like, but it ran fine now. I only played through Mars City and stopped at the first airlock over to the comm facility, but there were no glitches or anything thus far, so I guess the hardware stuff is working. I dunno if the framerate really increased or not, but I guess at least it won't hurt having a big fat DSP taking care of that stuff!
So, is the added sound quality really worth the rather spectacular price for the X-Fi Fatality board? Naaaahh... I don't think so. But hey, since when did THAT ever stop a geek?
Reasons to buy this card:
* Lowest possible CPU consumption during gameplay
* Newest EAX version supported (if that's of any concern to you)
* Best MIDI playback of any PC consumer sound solution in existence; sound bank size limited only by RAM
* Powerful, user-programmable DSP effects
* Phat sound in games that's audibly better than what on-board solutions produce
Reasons not to buy it:
* Isn't really needed, as on-board sound is good enough for most purposes and situations.
* Very expensive (though there is a cheaper X-Fi version available too, without the breakout box, on-board RAM and glowing LED light).
* Can't think of any other reason right now. If you hate Creative, add "it's made by Creative" here, but really, it seems to be a really good product...
Anyway! The card itself is relatively large with today's standards, especially if comparing to the boardspace consumed by built-in sound solutions, and absolutely packed with discrete components. The X-Fi DSP itself is covered by a passive heatsink, something I didn't really expect seeing as there hasn't been a sink visible in any of the PR images I've seen, but I have also wondered how a 50-million, 400MHz ASIC stays cool during operation. Guess I know now.
At least it doesn't require any additional power, the PCI slot delivers enough.The Fatality card has a bay-mounted breakout box with additional connectors. I skipped that because there aren't any free 5.25" bays in my PC. The metal box itself seems sturdy enough though, and the front is a nice glossy black that would match my case well I think, had I actually had room for it. Oh, and there's also a backlit lightningbolt "F" logo on the top edge of the card, undoubtedly so casemodders have some extra bling-bling to brag with through their side window. Unfortunately, Creative didn't consider BTX cases, so the logo is sitting upside-down in my PC. Oh, the HORROR!
There aren't any color-coded connectors on this card by the way, instead one has to make do with a transparent label with a few difficult-to-see splotches indicating which connector does what. Barely. Then again, once the cables are inserted, there isn't any need to fiddle back there anyway. Three connectors are the standard speaker outputs, the fourth is a flexi-jack that is either coax SPDIF out or mic in. Last (but absolutely not least), there's a now obsolete 15-pin D-sub gameport stuck on there as well for some crazy reason that I can't figure out. The only use I'd consider it for today is as MIDI in/out, but there's no adapter for that included. Besides, I have neither a MIDI keyboard, nor any sound modules either so it's all the same really.
I slotted it in and installed the drivers. Was pleasantly surprised that at least the Fatality edition (and likely all of them) has a "maximum performance" lightweight install option where only the essentials are dumped onto the harddrive. Many have expressed concern over the driver bloat of Creative cards in the past, and it seems they have listened. I picked a couple other options as well as I wanted to try things out, but most of the programs and utilities are completely superflous for a gamer and can be ignored.
Considering this, it would have been nice if there'd been an option to install other software components afterwards, sort of like Microsoft does with windows itself. I don't think this is an option, so it would neccessitate an uninstall of the entire driver first.
Anyway, everything installed smoothly, and the soundcard actually took over operation even before the install process was completed while I was voice chatting with a buddy via GTalk! I then ran the web auto-updater also, and everything went really smoothly from there. I fiddled slightly with the options, raising treble using the equalizer and stuff like that and then tried some games.
I was immediately pleasantly surprised by the much crisper sound in Return to Castle Wolfenstein, the venom, which through the SoundMAX software codec sounded bassy and nice, now had an upper-frequency aspect to it as well giving it an additional dimension. In WoW, I was surprised to hear that small environmental details were now much more audible, the X-Fi lifted them out of the background and let me experience them much more fully. I could hear the hooves of my goat clopping away across ground and stone, when I flirted (crudely) with an elf lassie my dorf no longer mumbled into his beard, I could actually hear what he was saying.
Considering that the last (meh) Doom3 patch added hardware sound mixing support for the X-Fi, I also had to install that game as well. No problem! Only four bloody CDs to juggle... Now, it was such a long time since I ran that game now (half a year or more I guess), so I can't actually remember what it used to sound like, but it ran fine now. I only played through Mars City and stopped at the first airlock over to the comm facility, but there were no glitches or anything thus far, so I guess the hardware stuff is working. I dunno if the framerate really increased or not, but I guess at least it won't hurt having a big fat DSP taking care of that stuff!
So, is the added sound quality really worth the rather spectacular price for the X-Fi Fatality board? Naaaahh... I don't think so.
But hey, since when did THAT ever stop a geek? Reasons to buy this card:
* Lowest possible CPU consumption during gameplay
* Newest EAX version supported (if that's of any concern to you)
* Best MIDI playback of any PC consumer sound solution in existence; sound bank size limited only by RAM
* Powerful, user-programmable DSP effects
* Phat sound in games that's audibly better than what on-board solutions produce
Reasons not to buy it:
* Isn't really needed, as on-board sound is good enough for most purposes and situations.
* Very expensive (though there is a cheaper X-Fi version available too, without the breakout box, on-board RAM and glowing LED light).
* Can't think of any other reason right now. If you hate Creative, add "it's made by Creative" here, but really, it seems to be a really good product...
