Let me guess, the drivers are still shit, and don't work half the time.

lol maybe... I don't know, but the external device from Creative tend to work better than internal. Also they have reworked the drivers for new windows build last month.

external is for noobs who suck at cable management

rl66:

lol maybe... I don't know, but the external device from Creative tend to work better than internal. Also they have reworked the drivers for new windows build last month.

I've had a mostly negative experience with both internal audiocards from Creative in the past (driver-wise). Their drivers mostly even didn't want to install XD.

Yeah, the sound cards are awesome, but drivers are shit. Thanks to Daniel_K who fix the drivers I'm still using my X-Fi pro gamer sound card.

Third party drivers save audio hardware in general. My xonar is only useful because of the work of these dedicated folks.

Loobyluggs:

external is for noobs who suck at cable management

External is for enthusiasts who have run out of PCIe slots FTFY

Probably I am the only person on this planet with a X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty with drivers that "just work"..

willdearborn:

External is for enthusiasts who have run out of PCIe slots FTFY

:)

emperorsfist:

Let me guess, the drivers are still crap, and don't work half the time.

Correct!

Loobyluggs:

external is for noobs who suck at cable management

For gaming maybe... Personaly i keep thinking that internal is for those that accept parasite in their output lol (but OK i have external PSU on my amp, on my pre-amp and on my pre-pre-amp and all the wiring that goes with it...)

I've used Creative cards since Sounblaster Live! released sometime in the 90s and have not had a lot of trouble with the drivers. At one point VIA drivers were the culprit and then it took them ages to fix the Vista drivers, but I simply just reverted to XP back instead because it didn't trash the HDD with useless activity.

nhanphan1990:

Count me in as well. Honestly I don't understand the creative-crap-driver bandwagon. I never had any problem with 6 (or 7) creative soundcards that I have for myself and family

Because they have released tons of shit drivers in the first place. Problems ranging from poppin/hissing sound, massive DPC latency issues or stuff just randomly not working. Had 2 X-fi's and used daniel k's drivers until those start giving problems as well with sound disappearing out of nowhere forcing a reboot. Had 2 Asus cards after that but those aren't much better and i am now using an external one and never had any problems.

I ain't exactly a noob, but I do admit I ain't hot when it comes to cable management, but I've restricted audio to an external DAC combo like the Oppo HA-1. One of the reasons for using external instead of internal sound device is due to EMI, some mobos/GPUs really do have issues with EMI. External DAC combo/stack are great for audio appreciation in SE and Balanced mode as well, I use it for music and gaming, and my Philips Fidelio HTL9100 for when I don't wanna use my cans. I also have a Creative SXFI Theater Surround headphone hooked up for gaming, as well as for watching movies (its forte). With regards to Creative drivers, they are okay'ish, had issues with crackling and popping (resolved using Daniel K drivers), while most of the times, Creative drivers had no issue with my rigs.

This is literally THE FUTURE OF SOUND, I cant wait to get one of these. Right now I have the smaller sibling the SXFI AMP, the SB X3 is a better option with tons more options and better DAC, SXFI AMP DAC is 24Bit/96Hz maximum, even in surround. The main deal here is that its not "another" headphone virtual surround, but Holographic Sound, they trying to emulate actual surround speaker setup. IT works by scanning all the popular headphones for their characteristics and human ears and face. So you download an app, choose a headphones from a list [they have all the popular models and always add new ones], then you do ears and face photography, very easy and automatic, no need to press button, just give your phone to someone all he has to do is look at ear outline and match it with yours and it automatically takes a picture. After all is done, its uploaded online and attached to your account, the moment you connect SXFI device to your phone it downloads all of this to the device firmware. SO far in under a month I had 3 firmware updates for the AMP, so they still working on it and tweaking everything everything up, this is new project. SXFI amp, works with everything, PC, consoles, mobile phone, the biggest Minus is that unlike PC sound card it has One input for headphones and microphone, so connecting PC headset like Game One, you need an adapter that joins two cables into one. The surround effect is amazing, ima headphone guy due to situation and never used speakers, but i been using expensive virtual surround solutions all my lifem I usually used Console virtual surround headphones with SPDIF cable from PC and Creative SB Dolby Live Encoders, Tritton AX Pro 5.1, Sony MDR-HW700DS [these have HDMI input, real monsters and wireless], Turtle Beach Elite 800, Different stereo headphones with Creative virtual surround on their Sound Blaster cards [I always had a SB cards since Pentium 100Mhz, always got the latest model], my latest setup is Sennheiser GSX1200 External DAC + Sennheiser Game One Im telling all of this just to show that I used many different virtual headphone setups from simple Headphone Dolby Surround to latest DTS headphone X to propriety like Creative surround and Sennheiser virtual surround to Windows 10 Sonic and ATMOS for Headphones. This Creative SXFI Holographic sound beats all of it, its INSANE They already sell these in USA on creative.com, sadly im not from USA and cant buy one right now, i need them to sell it on amazon or newegg these ship INT, but based on the past, all SXFI devices including the SXFI AMP and two pairs of SXFI headphones, they only sell on their web site, i had to buy second hand from a guy in Germany on ebay P.S. If anyone worried about drivers, the SXFI AMP is like USB DAC, has no drivers

Never had a problem with creative drivers. Way back used to have an Audigy 2 ZS? Thats testing my memory, but no driver issues. Ive had a X-FI Titanium HD since 2012 as intenal PCI-E... still using currently. Never had an issue with the drivers. Though having only just installed the new ones mentioned by someone in the comments above, I have to wonder about the "hissing" noise? I heard it, but just had to mute the unused devices and no hiss at all.