Creative "creates" new possible Competitor

[Mem]

Agree with you there, but this discussion(A3D vs EAX) is more of an issue of what existed 3-4 years ago and not what exists today.

Exactly A3D is now dead,whatever you think of Creative you`ve to give them credit for surviving and still being in business after all this time(which means they are doing something right) also their first priority is to look after themselves like any good company,as for competition well it`s always nice to have competition but it`s a dog eat dog world out there, so we shouldn`t forget that.

I think we should be asking what do we want and need in a sound card for today or the future,better sound quality,lower cpu usage,better drivers,price?You`ll get different answers,one thing for sure is that sound cards have come a long way since the old Sound Blaster Pro days.
Do I hate Creative?.....Nope why should I,look at how many other companies that are out of business,should I hate those that`re responsible as well,it`ll be a very long list if I did.

In the end I`ve no loyalty to any company.

I personally think onboard sound will eventually replace the stand alone sound cards,since it`s getting better all the time & one day it`ll be so good that the market for a stand alone sound card will be very small (maybe I`m dreaming but we`ll see ).

 

[thorin]

Originally posted by: Gstanfor

Maybe I'm being unfair (I can admit that) but I see it like this. 3dfx died because they couldn't continue to compete with the big boys (like Aureal and Creative). AMD has managed to continue to compete. It's all about convincing your users (investors/consumers) that you have the superior technology and demonstrating so time and time again.

Yes, you are being unfair.

it was Creative that could not compete, not Aureal - that's why they resorted to slimey legal tactics to eliminate the competition.

As many people have already pointed out it WAS NOT the "slimey legal tactics" that killed Aureal, please go read their financial statements. And obviously creative could and did compete since they're still here.

As for the CPU overhead, at the time Aureal went under CPU's were starting to become much faster than they were when the technology first appeared.

OMFG that's a brilliant comment. Please name a point in history when CPUs weren't progressing while other technologies were evolving.

Also it takes time that Creative ensured Aureal never had to write well optimised and CPU efficient drivers. You don't know that A3D would always have been CPU heavy if driver development had continued.

Nope I don't know what coulda happened down the line becaues they couldn't stay afloat.

Thorin

 

[Megatomic]

Originally posted by: Mem
I personally think onboard sound will eventually replace the stand alone sound cards...

And may that day come sooner and not later. Fortunately many of Creative Labs sound card competitors have markets they are in other than consumer level sound cards. My guess is that Creative's primary source of business is their consumer level sound cards. If that market dries up, oh well.

 

[Auric]

The cost of a soundcard is overwhelmingly less than the relative value lost by using software audio performed by the CPU because their costs increase exponentially for incremental increases in performance. Given that a CPU may cost 20% to 60% more (say $30 to $200+) for an 8% increase in peformance over the next fastest model, a $40 hardware soundcard which has almost no CPU utilization is good value. Of course this applies to performance applications like games where all the CPU cycles possible are required for significant functions not handled by the graphics chip and not necessarily to just listening to error beeps and lossy muzak.

But even so, mainboard real-estate is too expensive to account for the extra room required for quality sound and features. Sound cards aren't just big because it is cheaper, but it would certainly be exponentially more costly to try to make anything remotely equivalent fit on a mainboard even with add-on brackets. The demise of sound cards has been expected for years but has not materialzed because they still have a reason to be. Hardware modems, similarly, took a kick in the goolies from software solutions but likewise they did not dissapear. There comes a point where the cost savings relative to the loss of performance, quality, features and usability are not advantageous to the user.

 

[Mem]

The cost of a soundcard is overwhelmingly less than the relative value lost by using software audio performed by the CPU because their costs increase exponentially for incremental increases in performance

Don`t forget you also have hardware based (DSP) onboard sound like on the Soundstorm and C-Media 8738 HRTF to name but a few.

 

[Mem]

The demise of sound cards has been expected for years but has not materialzed because they still have a reason to be.

It`s only recently you`ve had excellent onboard hardware based 5.1 sound,it won`t be long before somebody makes a 7.1 version(as if you really need it) and then it`ll be all eyes on improving sound quality and CPU usage which at the moment is very low with hardware based onboard sound.

Don`t forget lots of guys are now starting to use onboard sound(especially on nForce 2 ) since the sound quality is very good and CPU usage low.

I for one only need good sound quality and low CPU usage before I`ll take the plunge to use onboard sound(5.1 is fine for me) which will be on my next board upgrade.

Bottom line is onboard sound has come a long way and the best of them can give good quality stand alone sound cards a very good run for the money.

 

[Megatomic]

I love the onboard sound on my Abit NF7-S. It is actually on par with the TBSC I upgraded from and maybe even ahead of it in certain areas. But if I ever have to go back to a discrete sound card, I'd find myself another TBSC and fly the bird at Creative one more time.

 

[Auric]

Well, SoundStorm has low analog quality, limited connectivity, limited game feature support and reportedly dodgey usability.

For these reasons and others NVIDIA has chosen not to continue with such on-board hardware sound. Again, it is probably not cost effective to acheive the equivalent in the smaller space available.

An equally important issue is commitment to the product. I don't see the likes of Realtek, Philips, Cirrus Logic, VIA et alli having the same commitment as Creative where the soundcard is the core of their business upon which all peripheral sales are based. To most other companies it is a sideline and even in the case of C-Media the profit comes from that one hardware sale to another company so long-term support of the end-user, especially through driver development, is not a focus.

 

[buleyb]

Originally posted by: thorin

Originally posted by: sandorski
It ticks me off that Creative has again bought out another competing technology that will likely cease to exist. :|

IMHO if the technology was "all that" then the company woulda been kickin a$$ and creative wouldn't have been able to purchase them.

Thorin

I'm not picking sides, because I've never owned Aureal hardware, and I'm not crazy about Creative's software side...


anyway, we all know technology doesn't make a business. Good ideas only go so far, marketing and business smarts round it out.

<--2cent

 

[thorin]

Originally posted by: buleyb

Originally posted by: thorin

Originally posted by: sandorski
It ticks me off that Creative has again bought out another competing technology that will likely cease to exist. :|

IMHO if the technology was "all that" then the company woulda been kickin a$$ and creative wouldn't have been able to purchase them.

I'm not picking sides, because I've never owned Aureal hardware, and I'm not crazy about Creative's software side...

anyway, we all know technology doesn't make a business. Good ideas only go so far, marketing and business smarts round it out.

Ok I can agree with that but they were obviously lacking in those departments as well.

Thorin