Audigy out, and Revolution 7.1 in
Well, ladies and gentlemen, we have a new sound card rocking here. The Revolution 7.1 from M-Audio.
Lets start from the top. I have owned Live! cards (x2) and then moved onto Audigy 1. I use two different sound systems on my PC.
A Kenwood 6 channel input amp and an Eltax 5 speaker set called Hollywood. This has large towers, small rear satellites and a reasonable centre. There are large bass speakers in the bottom of the towers
I also use Sennheiser 570's
And recently a basic Microsoft headset that came with a Game Voice set-up (boom mic for Voice coms being the reason)
While I absorb the whole "Creative own the gaming world " philosophy, and clearly now have more compatibility than ever before , we still see a large amount of CRAP installed with the cards. Some you can opt out of, but none the less, Creative insist on filling your PC's registry with stuff.....
And the opposition, mainly nForce2 and Hercules, make some incredible cards. So do Philips with their Edge cards.
But Creative have had my money more than most.
The benefits of my Audigy 1 were significant over Live! The sound quality was notably better, and although I am not entirely sure that EAX2 has flown off with the world’s ear'oles in a sweeping victory, EAX of either form does improve games immensely.
And I use my PC for Games and Music. No films (yet)
Task.....how the HELL do you swap sound cards and then try to compare them WITH ONE PC ? It was a recipe for disaster. Un-publishable. Who on EARTH would take a review seriously where you couldn't swap back and forth to compare? No bugger, that's who :(
Sod it.....I was gonna try anyway. Then I asked you all to suggest tracks to play. I used some of the suggested ARTISTS, and some of my own. I wasn't prepared to download stuff....I wanted original CD's.
I listen to some WEIRD STUFF:
Iron Maiden, Two Towers CD, Clannad, Ozzy, Deacon Blue, some Celtic stuff I won’t try to explain ;) and a few classics....then a few dance tracks. I ripped them with Media Player 9 to MAX quality settings.
I also booted up Il-2 Forgotten Battles, set up 3 flights of 4 bombers and then recorded a track of me flying (not crashing you'll be glad to know) in between the bombers high and low, weaving between, all at different speeds. For the un-initiated, you can replay these tracks and go "external" and zoom in and out from the planes and hear the flyby's the engine notes etc. It was the best way I could think of.
I also ran 3dmark 2003 and watched the frame rate drops on the Audio test. One of the tests runs with sound and the identical one without sound, so you can compare the drain on the CPU with sound on.
And that brings me to my biggest worry. This new 7.1 does not have a processor onboard to take the work out of the sound calculations. It uses CPU cycles. Audigy has onboard power to do it for ya. It’s not a prob with music but it’s a worry in gaming.
So what did I do?
1: Go next door and make sure they aint in
2: Take the dogs to someone else’s house.
3: Plug the Senns into the AMP headphone plug so they use the amp built into that.
OK..I am NOT an Audiophile....I love music and I love games. I can hear well. I have moderate priced equipment that YOU LOT could get hold of. Its the real world here.....not a Laboratory.
So if you like hyper tech reviews (as I do) then move on..... Nothing to see here :(
I belted out Maiden at 90% power on my 5-speaker set up. I used Madonna's Vogue to rattle the bass speakers hard as poss...I used Prodigy to further scare the crap out of them.
I switched to Clannad for vocals and used Raintown by Deacon Blue to hear the atmosphere. I then did it all again in Headphone mode (found in Audigy mixer menu).
I flew Il2 and recorded the fly by track and played it back internal and then at set external views. I installed UT2003 and ran about being shot at. I hid a bit, and waited for footsteps....
*takes breath*
I then Add/Removed the 4 million gigs of software on an Audigy set-up, and took it out, rebooted with no card....and searched for files. It did a good job as it goes....
*nother deep breath*
Installed the new drivers (downloaded, only 10mb, surely that aint right) and then powered down, whacked it in the PCI plug and rebooted.....it installed....and worked.
Straight off......:) I don’t normally get lucky. But it seems that M-Audio like clear concise drivers.
Dear M-Audio...I want to have your babies. :) Except for the click and pop noise (only mild, not speaker damaging) on boot up, it was all in and done.
*third deep breath*
Media Player on....amp cranked up......
OH this is NOT FAIR
I have wasted HOW MANY YEARS thinking there was only about 5 instruments in each of those tracks?
This card is sharper and clearer than a crystal glass. It defies belief. And I have to say......I am NOT..repeat...NOT an Audiophile. I have £400 set up..not big dough....
Its just blossomed like a new rose bud opening in the sun.
CLANNAD is a different band. Enya's relative is a different woman.
BRUCE DICKINSON sounds the same....but Maiden don't ...behind him.
And as for Deacon Blue's "Dignity"....
I am now at work....writing this from memory. Not Scientific. I have a note pad full of notes.....what word keeps coming up....?
Breathing.....I can hear some of them BREATHING.
OK...I am prone to exaggeration....it makes good reading. I am not inflating this.
NEXT: Drivers...and user interface.
Lovely book....beautifully laid out....chuck it away. My Jack Russell could use this card.......
You click on the picture of the speakers (either front or back or sub or centre)....the menu changes to those speakers. Link or unlink them (joint or separate volume) Choose the SIZE of the speakers, and the distance from your head in feet. Then click TEST and hear the tone. Adjust.
Click next speaker group....(rear next) and do same...distance, size, test)
Then name the set-up ("Music Home Trial 1" for example) choose an icon (2 speaker, 4.0, 5.0, 5.1, 6.1 Headphone etc) and click save.
Then play music :) Job is a good un...mute individual speakers OR all BUT ONE speaker to hear the results.
It is fantastically easy.
Change to a Bass Management that reroutes the Sub to the 2 fronts instead (ideal for my speakers)...1 click.
These menus are SO EASY they make Audigy look like a degree in Astro-Physics paper.
Choose Centre channel being redirected to the stereo speakers...or the other way around and activate Tru Surround XT and get really really good surround from Stereo. I mean really good !
And then if you choose GAMING, then you have Sensaura's excellent 3d positional calculations ...in fact you get Sensaura, EAX, DirectSound, and A3D. Only EAX 2 is missing.
And it all WORKS....first time. Its like going to heaven :)
Dolby Digital, DTS, EAX, A3d, 107dB signal-to-noise ratio and 0.003%THD.its a long and complex list....and it REALLY DOES IT.
No bull.....this beast delivers.
GO READ THE WEB SITE
OK....the game drain. How much power disappeared? Well...quite a lot. I was seeing drops in frame rate of about 5fps.( PC specs: nforce 2, 2x512 PC2700, Athlon XP2400, Radeon 9800Pro.)
But frankly, in game....I didn’t remember. I totally forgot, so it mustn't have shown up.
What DID show up was a DIFFERENT EAX EFFECT.... not worse, but more subtle. My LA-7 (ww2 fighter) and my TB3 (ww2 bomber.... old and clumsy) sounded TOTALLY DIFFERENT. Just as loud...but less...harsh. I don’t know if that is better or worse. It was still clear......it just sounded like a different plane.
UT2003 rocked......the Music for the first time, HIT ME, Impact. But the direction of the shooting took me a few times back into the Set-up and a few volume readjusts.... my rear speakers are too small for this sound card. It wants (correctly) 4 equal sized speakers......
Anyone with 4 satellites will love it.
OK..I'm done...I've run out of steam. This card is quite the most impressive thing that I have done to my PC since my Rad9800Pro upgrade.
Too many people spend monster money on vid cards, huge speed memory and a 5 kilogram heat sink...and then use a Live! OEM that is way out of date.
If you have a half decent vid card and a processor in the XP2200 and above league.....think HARD about the sound card next.
Think really hard. It’s like getting a new digital camera and noticing STRAIGHT AWAY how bad the old one was. This is audio heaven.
Promise :)
