Sound Blaster X7 overkill for consoles??

WhiteHartMart

WhiteHartMart

WhiteHartMart

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Have been using one of these for a while with PS4 and the Creative Bluetooth adaptor for voice comms. Works and sounds fantastic and great for harder to drive headphones.

Thing is 2 things have changed. 1. My gaming time is now mainly Xbox One X based and the cables to get voice chat working are not lounge friendly! 2. I’ve changed headphones (again!!) to a mich easier to drive set - Audio Technica ATH-ADG1X. These sound pretty good even via the controller and are capable of more than enough volume this way. They still aound a tad better via the X7 but would only be used for single player that way.

Question is, would a Mixamp TR offer any improvement sound wise over the pad. Don’t want the Dolby processing the Mixamp offers as happy with Atmos or Wndows Sonic but thought an optical feed plus maybe slightly better Dac/Amp set up might offer an improvment while just keeping one cable for chat and sound??
 
I don't understand the setup guide for using the Mixamp with Xbox, as it shows just USB and optical cable. I thought Xbox required a cable to the controller for microphone use?
 
Marsman said:
I don't understand the setup guide for using the Mixamp with Xbox, as it shows just USB and optical cable. I thought Xbox required a cable to the controller for microphone use?
Click to expand...

The TR Mixamp is one of the few devices where they stumped up the licensing fees so chat can be handled via USB :)
 
Ah OK. Shame things are done that way. Does limit the choice somewhat unless you want extra cables.

I was going to suggest a Creative Soundblaster G5 or E5 as an alternative, but with that you'd need the cable from the controller. Leaves the Mixamp as the only viable choice for Xbox if you want a wireless free controller setup when using a headset.

Anyway; I would expect the Mixamp to offer better quality than the controller audio output both for DAC and amp. Won't match the X7 but when it comes to quality, but if you find there is not a huge difference between using the AT headset with the controller and X7, then I suppose it comes down to how much you miss the extra sound quality the X7 offers and whether it's worth paying £110 to get something a bit better than what you get from the controller.
 
Marsman said:
Ah OK. Shame things are done that way. Does limit the choice somewhat unless you want extra cables.

I was going to suggest a Creative Soundblaster G5 or E5 as an alternative, but with that you'd need the cable from the controller. Leaves the Mixamp as the only viable choice for Xbox if you want a wireless free controller setup when using a headset.

Anyway; I would expect the Mixamp to offer better quality than the controller audio output both for DAC and amp. Won't match the X7 but when it comes to quality, but if you find there is not a huge difference between using the AT headset with the controller and X7, then I suppose it comes down to how much you miss the extra sound quality the X7 offers and whether it's worth paying £110 to get something a bit better than what you get from the controller.
Click to expand...

Yea, the Xbox licencing makes options so limited. Need about 4 or 5 cables and adaptors to get chat on the X7.

Have ordered a Mixamp from Amazon Warehouse for £60 so will test side by side with the pad and X7. With the cost of the BT-W2 adaptor, the X7 setup should fetch about £250 so the Mixamp will be significantly cheaper. :)
 
Well Mixamp turned up yesterday looking pretty much brand new - it actually pairs really well with the ADG1x headphones - all sliders set to neutral on the equaliser and Windows Sonic on the Xbox and (in Battlefield 1) at least, I really like the way it sounds. As the headphones are so easy to drive, really don't think I need the X7 anymore - Mixamp certainly sounds 'cleaner' than controller audio :)
 
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