Do you use a Creative sound card?

Dark Lord

no audigy for me.

im useing my onboard AC97 optical to my Z-680's and it sounds perfect to me. i see no need to upgrade to a real soundcard when this sounds great to me.

RIV@NVX

I'm not a fanboi, but I have Audigy2 (non-ZS model). I might change it for something better at some point in the future, once I see something worth buying.

Ubergrendle

I have an Audigy Gamer that works for me. Even though I'm a gamer I mostly use a headset, and occasionally a 2+sub speaker setup. I doubt I'll ever buy another audio card as the onboard sound now is probably sufficient for most people's needs.

DiRtBaG

I shifted from Audigy 2ZS to Audiotrack Prodigy 7.1 LT, and will never shift back again, unless creative makes a card that is better than Prodigy 7.1 LT. But i don´t think they can

Audiotrack Prodigy 7.1 LT together with my Creative Gigaworks S750 is fantastic

BWX

Creative cards are nice, Creative software sucks IMO. I use A Fortissimo III 7.1..(with Creative speakers ironically) awesome card but more and more games seem to be using Eax HD and whatnot, so a Creative card might be in my future sometime soon..

Sonata

I'm not a creative fanboy, that doesn't mean I don't like creative sound cards, as I do. But I haven't had a creative sound card since my creative sound blaster live 3 years ago, when I put that in an Asus P4S533 it used to cause conflicts. I found that the onboard sound on my P4S533 was okay, the Asus P4P800 Deluxe with its Ai Audio is pretty good and my current A8V Deluxe with its Ai Audio (8 channel digital audio) is very good. Unless you have a real need for a dedicated sound card (or a budget mobo), I think onboard sound is good enough for the average user.

El Kapitano

That's the sole reason I finally surrendered to the dark side.

dj_stick

Audigy ES
Audigy 2 ZS

JRosenfeld

Audigy 2 OEM came in my Dell. Have not found any reason to change; good sound for a PC card (with 5.1 speakers), though if I want to listen to my CDs I go to my hi fi room. Not really into creating/editing music files, so don't use the software much.

Rosco[CoF]

Turtle Beach Santa Cruz, with their beta 4193 drivers it does everything I need a sound card to do. Even does EAX 2.0 quite well.

Asmoday

Well, since i've not used a creative card since the sb live. It's kind of difficult to rate it against the audigy series. But the fortissimo is a great card for the price, no doubt about it.

>GSXR<mrbusa

i use an audigy2 zs retail and have had no problems and the sound is good.the only problem i have with cl is the driver updates for this series.go to there site and there is 15+ updates and each one has to be installed in the correct order.well the order is not very well organized to say the least.once you figure it out its all good.i will probably upgrade to audigy 4 pro when it is in the 125.00 range so that could be awhile.





peace out

syxx73

Hercules Game Theater XP 7.1

wouldnt swap it for anything , easily the best card ive used


syxx

LuCifer

Man I want a Soundcard...

Judas

2x Hercules Digifire 7.1
Hercules Fortissimo III 7.1
Hercules Game Theater XP 7.1
Creative Audigy 2 ZS


Although i don't have a main rig of my own, i currently have the digifire 7.1 in both my sisters rig (which i use when i can) and the dedicated server. ATM, i have the fortissimo and game theaters still in there package.

Creative Audigy 2 ZS has been put back were it rightfully will stay untill i find someone willing to buy it.

Ran both the digifire and Audigy through it's paces. And overall, found that the preformance was a smidge faster with the hercules cards, sounded better overall in games with and without EAX, and a hell of alot more stable not to mention a much much smoother running system. (By defualt, it starts up 2 applications on boot, one of which is a systray icon for the control panel which uses nill for any cpu time or memory, another is initialization of various MIDI and soundfonts. Both of which can be disable and never really required to run until a program needs it.)

Heres the kicker, it takes 15-20 seconds TOPS to click the "Setup.exe" application, go through the driver installation, and to be playing your games and or music. No reboots, no hard configurations, no waiting period.

Hercules did a damn good job, they have been even with the sound cards before these 7.1s

Reason i'm interested in checking out how well the Hercules Fortissimo IV checks out like considering it's useing Via sound chipset now.

I'm also serprised a bunch of sound programmers didn't jump on the hercules cards due to them having 2 seperate sound chips. With a little work, easily 2 sound cards in one, seperating both to do what anyone would like with them. Course not knowing much on how they would do it, who knows.

Callisto

Audigy 2 Value, for teh win.

Blazer

I use a creative audigy2, and it has served me well through 3 motherboards and 4 processors

calidan

I have an Audigy Gamer w/ the latest Audigy 2 drivers installed. And I have never had any crashes or lockups with any games.
I probably won't upgrade till my next rig.

temeteus82

I use Live 5.1 .....

Mr cairo

I'm currently using the Hercules fortissimo III but may have to switch to creative if hercules dont get off their arses and relase a newer driver for XP64 bit

germanjulian

i use an e-mu which is creative but not they normal cards?!

also what about the other manufacturers?

Grizzly

I've had my Santa Cruz for four years or something now and I see no reason to buy something else.

Vasot

Audigy 2ZS

I do not know what some haters say about Creative\Sounblaster but these card is the best for gaming\performance

Also their latest drivers are pretty good and i am hearing they will become even better with the next driver that Creative has in BETA right now

It's better having a Soundcard like Sounblaster or Terratec etc
than
a onboard weak sound sollution like Nvidia soundstorm or AE97 or some like that which suck in gaming

Audigy 2 rulez and Creative is already planning for Sounblaster ZEN...their Future soundcard sollution
But i here it will be PCI Express Only

There are many companies and software that does not support XP-64
so do not complain

These OS needs to be matured first (these can take from months to even a year)

also it has not yet released in stores

All companies still recommend XP(32) for full support and stability with current software out there

jkayca2

I used to use Creative products exclusively. Soundblaster, Soundblaster Pro, etc. Never thought of going to a different brand. After a bad experience with Creative's tech support I switched. I'm quite happy with my Hercules Fortissimo. It works flawlessly. I don't know how well their tech support is because I've never had to talk to them .

The_Neon_Cowboy

FYI: People don't realize that their soundcard can make noticeable difference in FPS!
Especially when moving from onboard to a sound card....

I've used creative in the past ... they are well known as the best in the business
sound blaster live 5.1 is all "most" people "need"...

People complan about thier driver support/lack of updates but what is there to
complain about when everything works like i said never personally had a problem...

When they where 1st introduced (before Audigy) the live series that is some people had
problems related wich was solved by disabling com 1 or 2, that share are resouce that
card wants to use...

Other then that i've never herd a complaint 1st hand though I read quite a lot of them on
here....But useally from people are useing KX or turn to KX drivers... people doing things
most of us aren't

Sonata

Wouldn't the average Joe be better off putting the money saved on not buying a sound card into a better video card, I think that would make a better improvement in FPS!

I would also like to know how you have worked out that a soundcard can give you better FPS! i.e., can you provide benchmarks with and with out your sound card installed. I can't imagine there would be much difference in FPS.

Gaijin