Creative Labs SoundBlaster ZXR Review

Soundcards and Speakers 106 Page 11 of 12 Published by

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Electronics Overview - Shielding and OPAMP modification

Shielding

Copper Sheilding

The ZXR has an internal copper shield, which is similar to a “fence” utilized to separate the sections and keep internal interference between the different circuitry sections down to a minimum. 

Cover Shielding

Upon closer inspection, the shielding is not just for looks; it is metal and is grounded to the main circuitry.  This allows the shield to reject EMI and RFI noise, sending any induced noise straight to ground and away from the sensitive components on the cards. 

Modification Options

Disclaimer:  This section is for informational purposes only.  We do not recommend people that are new to electronics to start modifying their new soundcard.  You can void your warranty and easily turn your new ZXR into a paperweight.  If you are unsure, leave it to the people that have the skills.

Opamps

Considering this card comes with opamps socket making replacement easy, we will start there.  We removed the LME49710NA (DIP8) and installed a set of LME49710HA (TO-99) and noticed a marked improvement in clarity, depth and sound staging.

 

Lm49710has


The HA are metal can opamps and are the top of that family. Using these amps will further refine the sound without changing it.  You can also replace the stock 2114D’s with many different opamps, let’s pop in some LM4562NA’s.  You could also use the LME49720HA modules which are a bit higher end over the 4562NA versions.

Lm4562na

Lm47920has


The LM/LME seemed to increase clarity somewhat at the expense of warmth of signal. If you wanted to go for more of an analog sound you could drop in a set of Audio-GD Earths discrete opamps which are recommended for I/V tasks.

All-710s


You could also get really slick and use a dual mono module for each I /V section, which would further clean up the signals but the price tag would start to add up. If you were real handy you could pull the surface mount opamps and add some sockets.  We would recommend starting with the Center/Sub opamps, allowing you to use a different opamp for sub and for the center.  

Note: if we get enough requests, we may release a detailed opamp swap guide for this product.

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