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IWill KK266 - use onboard sound or stick with SBLive?

M

MCS

Platinum Member
Tonight I will be installing a KK266. I have the very, very original SBLive Value bought back in 1998. I use it really just as "a sound card", eg for MP3s, games etc. If a game has EAX support I enable it.

I have heard that the onboard sound chip on the KK266 is actually pretty good, supports 4.1 sound, EAX etc.

Is it good enough to not bother with the Live? It would completely make sure that the VIA/Live bug doesn't surface!

Also, does the onboard chip support EAX 2.0?

Thanks!
 
I would try out the onboard sound and see how it works; it's supposed to be very good. SBLive! cards have a terrible track record with the Via Socket A chipsets, as you already know. So give the onboard sound a try. If worst comes to worst, you can always disable it and try the Live! card.

Good luck!
Nick
 
I just did a system yesterday with this board and the sound was fine. It will only do one stream at a time though. So you could not run an application that has sound and then have something like winamp playing sound in the background. Your best bet is to just try it and see if you like it.
 
Also, I have a soundblaster live card in my system which is a via chipset (abit kt7) I have never had any problems with my soundblaster live value. I did hear about people having problems but I was sure to put it in a slot that did not share an IRQ. That is the key. I do not know how it compares to the sound on the kk266 because I did not listen to the one I built and the soundblaster next to it. Good Luck!
 
Thanks guys.



<< It will only do one stream at a time though. >>



- this worries me a little.

Any idea about EAX 2.0? Or when it says &quot;Supports EAX&quot; does that encompass all version of EAX do you think?
 
I upgraded to an EPoX 8KTA3+ mobo a couple of weeks ago and that has onboard sound. I gave it a try and thought at first that it was okay. I'm not a gamer, so I can't comment of it's capabilities in that regard but I was extremely disappointed with the way it handled mp3's. Lots of skipping. So for now, I'm using my SB Live! card with a planned upgrade to a Santa Cruz.
 
The SBLive/686B problem is fixed with the latest 4-in-1 service pack, so that's not a factor. It just depends whether you'd like to try to sell the SBLive and keep the onboard sound that has almost as many features.

Modus
 


<< and keep the onboard sound that has almost as many features. >>



- so despite my Live being 3 years older it is still the superior sound chip?
 
I think it sounds just as good as my sb live! value did.

It does support more than one stream. The first time I tried it, for whatever reason it only did one stream and I thought it just couldn't do two (weak). But I formatted and put on win2k and now it does two streams (er probably more I never tried) so that's good. Must have just been the drivers.
 
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