When did you last uprage your sound card?

[Hidden Hippo]

About 5 weeks ago. I upgraded from my motherboard sound to an X-Fi Xtreme Music. Works like a charm in games and actually did increase my framerates slightly, contrary to what I was tole by some people.

[toolsong]

Upgraded a couple of months ago from an E-mu 1212m to a RME HDSP 9632. PC is the source for my hifi.

I was surprised at how much better the RME sounds. Also has very low memory use, much better WDM driver (zero issues in games) and automatically detects and switches the sample rate.

The only thing I have lost is onboard DSP effects which is trivial even though I have done demo recordings for bands and may have need of that feature.

Edit:
RME also has AC3 / DTS pass through on SPDIF for DVD's (1212m cannot) and you can also have multi channel analog out from your PC if you add on the 4 channel analog output daughter card and use PowerDVD. And 64bit drivers that are meant to work on Vista.

[Zak33]

this interests me because my beloved M-Audio Revolution 7.1 still runs a treat, but is suffering rom lack of support for latest games.

I hate Creative.....well.....better define that. Ihate the software/bloatware, and the nightmare ton of stuff that is installed with the cards, but it has to be said, people say nice things about X-Fi (just not the ram )

[billythewiz]

I built a new system back in January and the sound card was low enough on my priorities that I went with on board sound.

I recently heard stories that 7.1 sound "really does work" in games like BF2, i.e. they really can hear you, it's not a wall hack 'onest

Anyway, I bought BF2142 at the weekend and that has specific support for X-Fi cards so I'm about to treat myself and find out if the stories are true.

I try not to hate any companies, whether it's Microsoft, Creative, Intel/AMD, NVidia/ATI, NTL or Scan/etc. Life's too short

The bloatware is annoying though.

[chuckskull]

The creative stuff is fine, just don't install anything other than the plain driver.

I have 5.1, and it has saved me my dog tags a couple of times in BF2142.

[Flibb]

I went from onboard, to a turtle beach santa cruz, then shifted to a SB audigy 2 plat pro ex. Shifted due to driver probs with the old card, and wanted some extra features. Have had that for a year or so and am very happy

[toolsong]

Anyone with an X-Fi should grab the X-Fi Mode Changer utility

http://www.freewebs.com/spectra9/xfmc.html

[kempez]

Oooh useful. Thanks

[notsobig]

Bought my Audigy2 ZS about a year ago. Using realtek onboard sound for my second rig. I also have AWE64GOLD, 2 Sblive, Aureal Vortex1 & 2(Diamond&Turtlebeach) cards some where in this room but haven't seen them for a long time BTW this is old news, but it seems Audigy drivers are updated recently so check creative site if you haven't updated your driver already.(I've just updated mine yesterday!)

[Steve B]

i use intel hd on my conroe rig.

ive never bought a third party sound card in my life!

[kempez]

i use intel hd on my conroe rig.

ive never bought a third party sound card in my life!

You should do - it's worth it

[Thorsson]

Last week for me too. Xi-Fi from Audigy 2. And then I had to delete all the crap it wanted to run in the background (seemed to be using 2-5% CPU time constantly). What is it with Creative and their bloatware?

[amjedm]

I upgraded to a Live 5.1 from onboard sound last year because the onboard sound (Asus A7V333) wasn't 5.1 and I'd just bought Logitech 5.1 speakers.

[mosherben]

i use my onboard card, it took less time to put my rig together and i do get fairly impatient sometimes

[cougarslam]

got a x-fi about a month ago

before that i was temporarily using via hda on board due to my trusty audigy 2 zs being incompatible with mobo. and before tht i had a nvidia soundstorm (nforce 2 ultra chipset).

x-fis by far the best and the quality is noticeably diff over the aud 2 esp in games.

[fredered]

About a year ago when I built my pc, but I need to get a new one as the main audio jack has got a loose connection so if I nudge the cable it sounds like music being streamed down a dial up connection.