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  • sound card? which of the 2 should i buy for gaming?

    Alegria, you're not the only one who has been burned by Diamond's driver policy. Many others have as well, including myself, and I must do whatever I can to warn others that they should avoid any- and everything Diamond makes. Their drivers suck suck suck suck suck suck suck suck. Geeze, man, they suck!

    Creative has many flavors of the SB-Live series, and they have slightly different names and bundles for different countries. In the US, the best one to get for purely gaming purposes is the SB-Live!Value.

  • #2
    Ok. The Diamond board is a bad idea for 2 reasons. Number one is that DIAMOND SUCKS. Mainly their drivers. Number two is that Aureal is out of business, so there will be no new drivers ever.

    As for Creative, all Live! boards are the same, with the exception of the driver bundle. All of them support EAX 2 (and EAX 3 in another month or so). All of them can be upgraded to do all kinds of lovely digital niftiness - except the Platinum, which comes pre-upgraded (and costs $100 more).

    - Gurm

    ------------------
    Listen up, you primitive screwheads! See this? This is my BOOMSTICK! Etc. etc.
    The Internet - where men are men, women are men, and teenage girls are FBI agents!

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    • #3
      Although I've not been burned myself by Diamond's soundcards I still believe that Creative's cards deliver more usability than those made by Diamond. When it comes to decisions I'd always recommend Soundblasters BECAUSE there always was a quite simple way to make them work (examples of not so easy to deal with soundcards: Terratec, Yamaha, Roland, Diamond, AdLib). I hate that because it leaves less to little choice of quality products. So there comes my biased attitude to buy a SB.
      Back then when there was OS/2 Warp on the scene, Diamond let me down on drivers for my old Stealth video card. Nowhere else did I find so much ignorance for user's needs.

      Regards, New MURCer Alegria

      ------------------
      The pump don't work, 'cause the vandals took the handle...
      Bob Dylan

      The pump don't work, 'cause the vandals took the handle...
      Bob Dylan

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      • #4
        It looks as if S3 finally realized how absolutely lousey Diamond Multimedia is. http://www.theregister.co.uk/000329-000016.html

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        • #5
          I'm going to join the Greek Chorus about Diamond. I've seen some bad support in my time, but Diamond takes the cake. I've never owned a Diamond product, but I've attempted to help people who did. Driver support, even if the product desparately needed it, was pratically nonexistant. Getting through to them, even their sales department, was just short of impossible.

          And these are not isolated incidents. Complaints have been pervasive, and this has been going on for years.

          Despite the fact that they are better at getting products out on the shelves than most other companies, they bleed money and have been for years. My boss used to own stock in Diamond, and he had me read their annual report. They blamed their losses, and they were substantial, to instabilities in the chip market.

          No mention was made of what must be a real dearth of repeat customers.

          Paul
          paulcs@flashcom.net

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          • #6
            Gee, people...I understand what you are all on about (I have a Diamond Monster Sound MX300)), but...[list=1][*] blades can use the Aureal drivers (as all we MX300 users do), which are updated often, and of much better quality (leaving aside the issue of the mass resignation at Aureal for the moment);[*] The Sonic Impact supports both 3D positional sound formats, which is not something to just ignore, for Pete's sake!!!;[*] A3D is considered to give better positional sound for games;[*] It's cheaper.[/list=a]
            As I said, I own an MX300, not a Sonic Impact-- which I am not familiar with, frankly-- but aside from the driver issue (which I solved easily by using the drivers from Aureal's website), I have had no problems with the card, certainly no conflicts with the G400 as many have had with the SBLive! series.

            You probably will wind up with the SB, I suspect, blades, and that's not a bad thing--- I just wanted to offer another viewpoint.

            ---------------------------
            Holly

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            • #7
              One more thing to consider, Blades:
              You mention that the S100 supports A3D 1.0 and EAX 1.0. Be aware that there is a very big difference between A3D 1.0 and the current 2.0. I have a SB Live that supports EAX 2.0 and am quite satisfied with it's sound in both games and music. I have no experience with the A3D api, but I've read that A3D 2.0 (not 1.0) is considered slightly better for gaming, and EAX 2.0 is slightly better for music listening. Sound Blaster cards also have less of a drain on your CPU if that's a concern to you....


              [This message has been edited by Beezer (edited 29 March 2000).]
              My rig: P4 3.0GHz; Asus P4C800E; 1GB DDR 3200; AIW Radeon 9800 Pro; WD 120GB SATA; Plextor DVD burner; Liteon DVD reader; Audigy 2ZS; Logitech Z560 4.1; NEC FE991SB

              Kid's rig: AMD XP 1600+; 512MB ram; GF4 Ti4600; Maxtor 60GB; Plextor CD burner; Sony DVD reader; SB Live; Cambridge 4.1 speakers; NEC FE991SB

              Other kid's rig: Athlon 2700+; ASUS A7N8X mobo; 512MB PC3200 ram; GF4 Ti4600; Maxtor 80GB; SB Live; Cambridge 2.1; NEC FE991SB; Liteon DVD-ROM

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              • #8
                I believe the sonic impact is an A3D 1 card, basically, awe32 class aka old as the hills. By all means, get the Live!, the cheapest you can find before prices rise again. If you are mildly into DVD you might want to consider the non gaming sound cards that have 5.1 outputs in analog format. There's nothing like a card with some support, and an MX300 is nothing like it, especially now without Aureal covering the back door.

                I think my MX300 had better overal sound clarity than the Live!, but no features to speak of and the drivers were NVIDIA-esque.

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                • #9
                  i heard good reviews w/ both cards..but cause aureal is kind out..and the Sonic Impact is only a3d 1.0 ill prolly go w/ the sound blaster ..and cause i only have a 550 celeron(366) cpu it might be my best choice

                  then sb it is

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                  • #10
                    sound card? which of the 2 should i buy for gaming?

                    Sonic-Impact-S100 by Diamond Multimedia supports A3d1.0 and eax 1.0

                    Creative SoundBlaster Live! X-GAMER i think this only supports eax dunno if it supports 2.0 (can someone verify)

                    the Sonic Impact is only 3,900 yen (around 35 bucks US?) and the X GAmer(bulk) is 6,900yen(its on sale, around 65 US bucks?)
                    which should i get huh?


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                    • #11
                      I'd get the SBLive. Maybe I'm just fed up with Diamond's driver policy.
                      I've used SB Cards since the first days of sound in a PC and they never let me down.
                      Just a biased thought.
                      Alegria

                      ------------------
                      The pump don't work, 'cause the vandals took the handle...
                      Bob Dylan

                      The pump don't work, 'cause the vandals took the handle...
                      Bob Dylan

                      Comment


                      • #12
                        Holly, yes, he probably could download reference drivers from aureal to work right with the sonic impact. However, how long is aureal's web page going to be available? I would suspect not much longer with Aureal's current situation.

                        I am very much a fan of A3D & Aureal, and I am really sad to see them go under like they are. I've got a Diamond Monster Sound MX300 as well as one of the very first original Monster Sound (1.0? no real suffix for it, and serial number ...000000003124). And yes, I've had to go with the aureal reference drivers to get them to work right. It really sucks in that the original Monster Sound would even fail the DirectX diagnostic tests with the latest Diamond drivers.

                        What are the odds that the current w9x drivers will work with windows ME? And just look at that w2k support...

                        Blades, I think you are making the right choice to go with the SB-Live. I really like Aureal and A3D, but getting an Aureal card now is just not the smartest decision to make.

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                        • #13
                          Yeh, Holly - you forgot that Aureal is an ex-company. Deceased. Not pining, dead.

                          - Gurm
                          The Internet - where men are men, women are men, and teenage girls are FBI agents!

                          I'm the least you could do
                          If only life were as easy as you
                          I'm the least you could do, oh yeah
                          If only life were as easy as you
                          I would still get screwed

                          Comment


                          • #14
                            AHAHAHA
                            Thundrchez nailed it, and I MUST echo his sentiment about Diamond.
                            "Their drivers suck suck suck suck suck suck suck suck. Geeze, man, they suck!"

                            Creative has been the industry standard since day 1 in sound cards. Every Creative sound card I've run (including my current Live!value) has run without hassle. Every Diamond card I've tried has been a PITA to make work properly. Almost every programmer out there codes for SB first and foremost, and support for others are tacked on later.

                            Go with the Live!.

                            [This message has been edited by Kruzin (edited 30 March 2000).]
                            Core2 Duo E7500 2.93, Asus P5Q Pro Turbo, 4gig 1066 DDR2, 1gig Asus ENGTS250, SB X-Fi Gamer ,WD Caviar Black 1tb, Plextor PX-880SA, Dual Samsung 2494s

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                            • #15
                              Germ:
                              "As for Creative, all Live! boards are the same, with the exception of the driver bundle. All of them support EAX 2 (and EAX 3 in another month or so). All of them can be upgraded to do all kinds of lovely digital niftiness - except the Platinum, which comes pre-upgraded (and costs $100 more)."

                              does this mean that even if i dont buy the
                              x-gamer ...and instead buy a cheaper card(live!value)i still get the same card and the only difference is in the software? so the trick is to just to buy the cheapest Live! card? cause i do see different Live! cards that are cheaper..speacially the bulk ones.

                              and i dont need any more bundled games too..( i got too much of it)

                              once more thing.. is halflife "day one"--halflife full version?

                              [This message has been edited by blades (edited 30 March 2000).]

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