5punk

This reminds me that I need a new soundcard. I bought an Asus Xonar, the cheapest one at the time, thinking it would be a good alternative to the Creative option. Give the competition a chance. But that didn't work out very well as the game support isn't perfect, so I'm using the on-board as it just works.

I think this one looks like a good balance between cheapness and something that'll be significantly better than the on-board: http://www.ebuyer.com/product/121761

/edit
split from headphones thread

spoodie wrote:I think this one looks like a good balance between cheapness and something that'll be significantly better than the on-board: http://www.ebuyer.com/product/121761

Yeah, I think I've got one of those. Works fine.

buzzmong wrote:Yeah, I think I've got one of those. Works fine.

That'll do me, ordered.

Got one too. Never had any problems with it, sound seems perfectly fine to my fucked up ears.

Semi-fail. The sound works in-game, which is good as this is a my gaming PC, but all else seems to have a weird almost complete volume fading and reverberation problem. I've tested flash videos and one mp3 in VLC. I'm using the default Windows 7 drivers from MS. I've tried the ones from the Creative website and those stop all sound, so I rolled back to a restore point.

Any ideas and those with the card, what drivers are you using?

I assume you've cleaned old drivers off? disabled onboard sound in bios?

Might be worth trying another PCI slot if you have one.

Creative try and pimp out their "Crystalisation" and "Virtual surround" technology on their X-Fi cards.
If you install the software for it, can you see any options to turn those off? They're generally a bit pants.

Dr. kitteny berk wrote:I assume you've cleaned old drivers off? disabled onboard sound in bios?

Well I uninstalled the device from the device manager and said yes to uninstall the drivers. Is there more you can do? I have disabled on-board.

Dr. kitteny berk wrote:Might be worth trying another PCI slot if you have one.

I thought of this last night while watching TV, but that was such a long time ago and I'd forgotten. I'll try that now. Ta!

Grimmie wrote:Creative try and pimp out their "Crystalisation" and "Virtual surround" technology on their X-Fi cards.
If you install the software for it, can you see any options to turn those off? They're generally a bit pants.

That, too.

There's a disable enhancements option in the soundblaster tab in soundcard properties thing, use it.

Dr. kitteny berk wrote:There's a disable enhancements option in the soundblaster tab in soundcard properties thing, use it.

That was the key, thanks a lot. And I didn't have to install any crappy Creative software.

I HELPED

I always forget about that fucker.

Mainly because I install drivers, then disable everything I possibly can.

Oh, it might be worth installing alchemy, it's meant to make EAX work on Fista/7, assuming you give a crap about EAX.

Grimmie wrote: I HELPED

Don't worry, I'll be sure to include you in my thank you speech.

I tried the Alchemy software is but it's wants a file which isn't included and sucks like all the other Creative software. Ah well, I'm not too bothered.

Yeah, best to ignore it all if you can. I had a few problems so I installed it and turned everything (one thing) good it did on and everything else off.

I returned mine when it didn't work with windows 7 and got the xonar. Why spend the money for all the bells and whistles when you need to turn them off.

I'm not sure if I had the same problem though, mine would just play 2~3 seconds of a mp3 or video and the just get stuck is loop where it stopped. I tried any driver I could to help and when I found ones that worked I couldn't expand stereo or use any of the features.

The bells and whistles are motly shite imo. They just add weird effects to my music.

I was stuck with stereo sound, that's the main reason it went back. I have a 5.1 setup and that's why I got the card. Wanted a step up from my on board. But you are right, most of them are just dumb reverb effects and such.

It turns out my card was defaulted to 7.1 using 2.1 speakers. The bells and whistles can now be turned on without issue now, if I wanted.