Sound Blaster 128, Live! and Audigy

[chavalin]

I remember years ago the enormous difference I noticed in quality when I upgraded from a Sound Blaster Pro (8 bit) to Sound Blaster 16 (16 bit). Then the Sound Blaster AWE 32 entered the market bringing wave table sintesis and I upgraded from my Sblaster 16 which offered FM synthesis and I also felt a big jump in quality.

When the Sound Blaster 128 came to life I immediately got one, but didn?t feel much of a difference. I have used my SB 128 since then.

I don?t think if I upgraded now to a SB Live! or an Audigy I would feel that much of a diference as when a went form a SB PRO to a SB 16 and form the SB16 to the SB AWE 32.

Is there much support for Eax?
Is it worth getting one of these subwoofer + satellites speakers? Is it worth going for a 5.1 Speakers?

What do yo think?

 

[Oyeve]

<< Is there much support for Eax? >>




<< Is it worth getting one of these subwoofer + satellites speakers? Is it worth going for a 5.1 Speakers? >>



There are tons of games that support eax. Some new ones even support eaxHD (Audigy). I too have owned practically all versions of sound blasters and have found that going from an sb16 to a live value a HUGE difference. Going from a live value to a live 5.1 was a small but noticable difference, going from the live 5.1 to the audigy was not as big a difference as I had hoped it would be but the audigy is a very good card. In you case, going from an sb128 to an audigy would be a huge difference, especially for eax, 5.1 and overall sound quality. As for speakers, yes, a good set of 5.1 speakers are a definate must-have. If you have DVD rom the sound can be pretty fantastic. Just dont get cheap speakers, like those $99 creative ones. Shop around and go to a store that will let you listen to the speakers. The Klipsh 5.1 are excellent, as most people will say, but, IMO, are way too exspensive and over kill. Unless your PC is your primary entertainment sound system, you can find very good speakers for considerably less.

 

[Mem]

<< When the Sound Blaster 128 came to life I immediately got one, but didn?t feel much of a difference. I have used my SB 128 since then. >>



Few years back I was still using SB 128 then upgraded to SB Live and could hear the difference then 6 months ago I installed a SB Audigy in my new PC that I built and it does sound the best and also has the lowest cpu usage .Going from SB 128 to Audigy you will hear the difference for sure.

I`m using just a 4 speaker setup which is good for gaming plus my speakers are real hi-fi type plugged into a hi-fi amp so I`m getting the best sound out of my Audigy.There`re lots of good 5.1 speakers like the Videologic DigiTheatre range and anybody will tell you having good speakers are important to the final sound.

Remember the Audigy has advanced EAX as well.

 

[Watson]

I went from an SB16 to AWE64 to SB Live X-gamer. The EAX capabilities are great and the sound quality is not bad (I'm an audiophile in my other life so from my perspective nothing on the computer - short of VERY expensive sound cards - will rival high quality home components). But - using a sub-satellite system in the front and two small speakers in the back gets me pretty good gaming sound in a "quadophonic" setup, and it even sounds alright for casual CD listening. My recommendation is to go with the Live or the Audigy, especially if you enjoy immersive sound for games like Thief, Deus-Ex, or even Serious Sam 2.

 

[skriefal]

As far as pure audio quality -- noise floor, interference, etc -- is concerned, the SB128 (and it's predecessor the Ensoniq AudioPCI) is generally consider superior to the Live! and Audigy. For EAX or other gaming use, however, the Live or Audigy would be a better solution.

 

[CraigRT]

<< As far as pure audio quality -- noise floor, interference, etc -- is concerned, the SB128 (and it's predecessor the Ensoniq AudioPCI) is generally consider superior to the Live! and Audigy. >>




Are you kidding??? is that for real?? that seems strange.. I believe you, but do you have a link with some info?

 

[AndyHui]

<< noise floor, interference, etc -- is concerned, the SB128 (and it's predecessor the Ensoniq AudioPCI) is generally consider superior to the Live! and Audigy >>

That is something I cannot agree with.

 

[Electric Amish]

<< What do yo think? >>



I think that since the AWE64, Creative sucks.

amish

 

[ssanches]

<<

<< noise floor, interference, etc -- is concerned, the SB128 (and it's predecessor the Ensoniq AudioPCI) is generally consider superior to the Live! and Audigy >>

That is something I cannot agree with. >>



True. However I don't feel that the PCI128 is far away from the Live in it's SNR. In the real world, both cards exhibit over 80db SNR while running loopback tests (it depends on the codec used).
linky

IMHO the PCI 128's noise floor is comparable with the Live (it does not exceed it though). The Live has a very good processor (actually designed by Ensoniq) and it has far better positional effects. It leaves the PCI128 in the dust when you use EAX games.....Plus the added advantage of customised soundfonts from third parties, etc

 

[chavalin]

The SNR of the Audigy is 100 dB but it has a very horrible frecuency response in the audio band region (20Hz - 20kHz).

In an recent review at Tom's they said that the frecuency response (it should be a straight line) had variations of about 5 dB whichs means that some frecuencies approx. atenuated 4 fold respect to others.

So is there any real world noticeable diference between the SB Live and the Audigy?

 

[skriefal]

<< That is something I cannot agree with >>



It appears that my information was a bit out of date. According to the testing at PCAVTech, the SNR of the Ensoniq AudioPCI and the Soundblaster Live! is roughly comparable -- in the 77-80dB range. Also, the Soundblaster 64/128, albeit almost the same as the Ensoniq AudioPCI, may have used some cheaper parts after Creative bought out Ensoniq -- thus lowering the SNR on those cards.

And testing of the Audigy seems to show that it's effective SNR is around 82dB. Not bad for a non-pro sound card, but also not the 100dB that Creative claims.

 

[chavalin]

Is there much support for Eax?
Is it worth getting one of these subwoofer + satellites speakers? Is it worth going for a 5.1 Speakers?

 

[chavalin]

Is there much support for Eax?
Is it worth getting one of these subwoofer + satellites speakers? Is it worth going for a 5.1 Speakers?

 

[FuManStan]

EAX gets wide support. Satellites+Sub are great. 5.1 is unnecessary unless you watch dvds on your computer.

 

[BFG10K]

I have the Creative Labs Soundblaster 128 PCI and I have absolutely no desire to upgrade because it's simply a superb card. If it's not broken, why fix it? Quite simply this is the best sound card I've ever owned and I'm 100% satisfied with it.

The sound is crisp, clear and packs a nice punch and the drivers are absolutely flawless.

 

[Kingofcomputer]

sb pci128 is rebadged ensoniq audiopci.
there is also sb pci512 which is live with liveware disabled.

 

[gunf1ghter]

The big beef that I have had with any of the newer Creative boards has been thier crappy resource management and high cpu utilization. I don't know if they have improved this at all. I ditched my SB Live! for a TB Santa Cruz and have been very satisfied with it.

I don't have a beef with creative but I would love it if someone can point out why the newer Creative boards might be superior to the TB board I already own.

 

[Mem]

<< The big beef that I have had with any of the newer Creative boards has been thier crappy resource management and high cpu utilization. I don't know if they have improved this at all. I ditched my SB Live! for a TB Santa Cruz and have been very satisfied with it. >>




The Audigy has lower CPU usage then any other sound card for gaming,sound wise in a recent review in April`s magazine of PC Format the Augidy had a slighty higher mark then the Santa Cruz and and said about the Santa Cruz (Sonic fury) "it`s sound quality is very close" to the Audigy ,my point is both the Santa Cruz and Audigy are close to each other on sound quality.

BFG10K,
having owned a SB 128 myself for 2 years,noway I`m going back to it after using a Audigy,the Audigy is far superior to it in many ways.If you`re happy with your SB 128 fine but it`s no longer in the big sound card league.



<< Is there much support for Eax?
Is it worth getting one of these subwoofer + satellites speakers? Is it worth going for a 5.1 Speakers? >>



Yes lots of games use EAX, gaming wise you only need 4 speakers however if you are buying new you might as well get a good 5.1 speaker setup.

 

[AA0]

I went from 16bit, to a pci64, to a live!, to a santa cruz. All were big improvements over each other, the smallest would be pci64 to the live!, but the live just had a lot of options. I'm using a 128 card in a cheaper system now, and can honestly say the sound is superior to the live! crackle and sound. Even my onboard sound is better than live!

As for the audigy's 100 snr, that is not right, its been proven time and time again, most features on the audigy are grossly imbelished.

The santa cruz is the best sounding card I've owned, and the cpu% is coming down with newer drivers, so I would recommend it to anyone except extreme high end sound, where the audigy doesn't fit either. If you are going to get good speakers, get a santa cruz. I personally don't see the point of 4 or 5 speakers unless you have a nice set up for DVD.

 

[Mem]

<< I personally don't see the point of 4 or 5 speakers unless you have a nice set up for DVD. >>




It helps in CS a lot when you`ve a T behind you trying to sneak up ,anyway Audigy or Santa Cruz are both excellent cards .

I did find it ironic in PC Format (April) they said the Sonic Fury(Santa Cruz) drivers supplied did not work with WinXP so you had to download a 19mb file from the net,I must point out I`m talking about the UK version here anyway I regard both sound cards good choices along with the Philips AE which actually got a higher mark then both of them and PC Format said it was the best sounding card of them all for music so you see everybody has different opinions.

 

[AA0]

my 2 speaker set up works fine in RTCW, nobody sneaks up on me... well, unless I assumed my teammates were competent and actually looked before they ran through a door, and 2 enemies just didn't follow them up a ladder, but thats not a speaker issue.

The morale, teammates are incompetent.

My santa cruz cd drivers worked with XP, I believe. Unless I downloaded them directly, I can't remember.

 

[chavalin]

I'm not at all an expert in sound card hardwaqre but I know a bit about general sound theory, frecuency analysis and so on. Now I'm starting to learn DSP programing (with a Texas Instruments DSPs of course) and find it very enyoing. Basically I'm programing diferents efects right now, efects like eco, multiple ecos, chorus, flanger, delays, etc.
I know as well how wave table synthesis works and have programmed simple forms of for TI DSPs.

Now I'm trying to learn a bit more about sound card hardware software like Reason and fruity loops to be able to record guitars and stuff at home.

At Tom's thay say that Terratec DMXfire sound card is much better for sound recording than the audigy.
I have no idea if i need any special hardware to be able to record a guitar using "Reason" from Proppelerheads??

Help!!