AudioTrak Prodigy 7.1 - Product Overview

Product Overview

I have to say that AudioTrak aren't particularly forthcoming with specs for the Prodigy 7.1, beyond the obvious:

• High-fidelity 24bit 192kHz D/A converter; 106dB dynamic range (this is not SNR)
• High-fidelity 24bit 96kHz A/D converter; 102dB dynamic range (for recording)
• 24 bit 96kHz Digital Coaxial input and output
• 2 analog 1/8" inputs and 8 1/8" analog outputs (that be 7.1 channels)
• Sampling Rates up to 192kHz
• Full Duplex - Simultaneous Record/Playback
• Microphone preamp with +5V phantom power
• Headphone amp
• E-WDM driver
• Advanced-NSP
• Direct-Wire 2.0
• WDM and ASIO 2.0
• Sensaura-3D

You may or may not have noticed the 192kHz sampling rate.  The Envy24HT is cabable of this very high sampling rate, but it's only used by DVD-Audio discs in 2-channel mode.  This does not mean that you can pop in a DVD-Audio disk and listen to some seriously high-resolution sound.  Only the Creative Audigy2 has a true dedicated DVD-Audio player, and none of the software DVD players that I'm aware of fully support the DVD-Audio standard.  This may be considered marketing fluff for the moment.

The other bits of technical info about the Prodigy are standard Envy24HT fare: 24 bit/129kHz on all 8 channels, duplex 2 channel record and 4 channel playback at 24 bit/96kHz, and what's this?  A headphone amp?  Headphone users rejoice!  Well, just rejoice in your own solitary way.  The headphone amp will kick up the volume by about 6dB.  It doesn't seem to alter equalizer settings like Creative's 'headphone' mode does.

Ahem.

Lastly, let's check out the minimum system requirements, which are pretty light:

• Pentium III or above
• 128MB RAM
• Win98SE/ME/Win2000/WinXP

In case some of you were wondering, AudioTrak will not be publishing a Linux driver.  If you're considering Penguin Power there's always ALSA, which has drivers for Envy24HT-based sound cards.