Do I need a sound upgrade or still good enough?

markymoo

markymoo

markymoo

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Joined
4 Nov 2010
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414
I haven't changed my setup for quite some years now.
Currently have:-
Creative Extreme music sound card
Sennheiser p160 headphones

Is this still good sound compared to what's out there now? Or do I need an upgrade? Think both parts cost me around £60 at the time.
I mainly use PC for gaming and watching YouTube and other media now n then.
My sound card does appear a little buggy over last 12 months where I have to keep reinstalling the software everyone n then.

So has sound moved on a lot like graphics cards or is this still decent sound for gaming etc. if not what would you recommend?
 
Sound cards don't advance like GPUs do. The X-Fi Xtreme Music is still a very good sound card. You'd have to spend £60 again to get any kind of upgrade in sound quality. Xonar D1/DX is a great sound card, but you may only hear a marginal improvement. Creative SB Z, OEM version is also very good. A better headset or headphones would offer a larger upgrade in sound quality than any sound card can, after all, it is they that recreate the sound that you hear. As an example; if you have £100 to spend, you are far better off spending the lot on headset/headphones, than spending £50 on a sound card.

If the X-Fi is giving you hassle, which they can do, then you could try PAX drivers. Quite a lot of people use them when they get trouble with Creative's own drivers. If you do decide to try them out, make sure you use a driver cleaner first to clear out the old files after un-installing the current drivers.
 
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Thanks for that. I tried the PAX drivers, last time I checked for an upgrade am sure the website was down or stopped. Will check again, unless anyone knows where to get them now.
 
The drivers are not designed for any specific card or OS. They are designed for all PCI X-Fi and all OS, just as the Brainbit Unified drivers are for Xonar cards. Try this one.
 
Marsman said:
The drivers are not designed for any specific card or OS. They are designed for all PCI X-Fi and all OS, just as the Brainbit Unified drivers are for Xonar cards. Try this one.
Click to expand...

Great stuff thanks.
So would I uninstall everything creative (drivers and control panel) and install this. Or install over top, or just uninstall the actual drivers and leave the control panel?

Just have to write down my settings otherwise. Thanks once a game ppl :0)
 
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