[benbenkr]

I read that Evshrug has gotten the SB Omni, how is it doing thus far?
 
Been thinking about it for a while now and considering I might switch to a full ITX/M-ATX PC build soon... the Omni doesn't seem like such a bad option.

 

[NCSUZoSo]

  Why did you change them and what do you use the card for mainly? I'm a gamer.
 
Cheers
 
Motorwayne

I changed them to find a better sound signature than stock and I definitely found it.
 
I have better sound separation and clarity/transparency with the setup I am running now along with the bass being tamed more now (tighter instead of louder).  The 2 main (LME 49710NA) left/right aren't bad, but the JRC 2114Ds are definitely not the greatest.  Also if you did like I did you can use two mono chips converted to Dual DIP8 for better separation.  I threw the MUSES01 in there just to see if it was really as great as everyone has said and it definitely didn't disappoint, so I decided to leave it.
 
I use my card for a variety of things from movies to audio creation and music, gaming, movie editing, etc.

 

[DJINFERNO806]

Did some more testing with the sbz and the mic.

Clicking the "listen to this device", option under the mixer tab in the sbz panel has only a portion of the delay from when you speak to when you hear it in your headphones. Half the delay in comparison to clicking on that option I'm the windows sound panel.

I'd say windows option is about a 300ms + delay and the sbz option is roughly 100ms delay. Definitely much better and less annoying. Easier to speak at a fluent speed. So it seems to me that the sbz option uses the soundcore3D to process the mic effects. As advertised. This is good news. While the windows option just does it in software using the windows audio stack. Efficient for cpu cycles but slow.

The other interesting thing is, when I disable crystal voice, there is no delay at all. My voice is heard instantaneously in my headphones. Seems that any processing adds some delay even if it is small. Much better than windows for sure.

 

[MaxKohler]

Can someone who has experience with the Zx or ZXR say whether the beam mic on the ACM can be set to not pickup my fairly loud mechanical keyboard noise? The mic placement of the Z (on top the monitor) actually seems preferable to trying to find a place for the ACM on my desk somewhere that won't get in my way and can still be aimed to pick up my voice only.
 
How picky is the ACM as far as placement and beam adjustment?

 

[Radical_53]

There isn't much you could do I'd say. It's a fairly loud noise, it's not constant and it's not somewhere in the background. That's why I love my Logitech desktop mic, it has a button  
 
I never liked the quality of the ACMs mic anyhow. In comparison the quality was much worse and, due to its positioning, it picked up far more noise.

 

[MaxKohler]

  There isn't much you could do I'd say. It's a fairly loud noise, it's not constant and it's not somewhere in the background. That's why I love my Logitech desktop mic, it has a button  
 
I never liked the quality of the ACMs mic anyhow. In comparison the quality was much worse and, due to its positioning, it picked up far more noise.

But according to this it sounds like you should be able to set up the beam forming mic to only pick up your voice.

 

[DJINFERNO806]

Ya regardless of what mic you use its not going to matter if the mic is always on. But I will say it depends on which game or program you are using. Meaning if they have the chat feature activated automatically with your voice, depends on how sensitive they make it to activate. BF4 i dont get any key sounds when I speak. And Dead Island Riptide, when I press the voice key, and I move around, I still cant hear my WASD being pressed or mouse clicking. With noise cancelation on and the mic pointed at my face upwards and wedge angle at a minimum, my cherry reds are not that obvious. I actually have my mic on my keyboard.

And to be fair, the z mic and therefore the zx and zxr(they are the same mics just in a housing) are decent mics. It just seems people tend to place them in the worst spots or not play with the settings enough. Or they expect yeti performance from a $10 mic.

The ACM is at a disadvantage since it can't be angled at all. So it probably suffers the most and explains why people say its worse.

Trust me I was going to buy a separate clip on until I started using this one.

I'm still thinking of picking up the thermaltake Chao clip on to make comparisons.


This is how my mic is placed. Funny enough being on the keyboard helped with not picking up the keys. The wedge angle is so narrow and its to the right of the main keys, it actually misses a huge amount of the sound.



@maxkohler, there are limits to how much noise gets omitted. Also I think Creative overhyped that a bit.

 

[Radical_53]

As you said, the ACM can't be pointed anywhere. It just sits there. In my example the ACM was on my left hand side (as my mouse is on the right), right above the keyboard. I'm always using voice activation as additional key presses, during gaming, just don't work for me. This worked fine for gaming, even with the ACM, but it can't work for typing while chatting. It's just too much noise.
 
The overall quality of the mic is something else. I can't say too much about this, as I only heard what people told me, but they noticed immediately when I wasn't using my Logitech and said the quality was much worse. It might be better than some other "cheap" mics but it wasn't great either, not in my case. 

 

[SoFGR]

omni has no  host open / ALchemy mind you 
 
 
dat  mic position is freaking  genius  btw !!  
 
djinferno do you mind posting a screenshot of your crystal voice settings ?  

 

[DJINFERNO806]

Here you are.
 
 

 
 
The position is so perfect.  its directly looking at my head and in line with it.  So I can set the wedge angle really narrow and only capture my voice and light typing.  But for gaming, I don't hear my mouse or keys at all.

 

[SaLX]

The x1 slot is wedged between my GPU and my NH-D14 HSF. If I remove the GPU I could probably test with the x1, but the fit is awkward.

Surprised you can't fit it into the x1 slot without removing the GPU, mind you that Noctua is a big person.
 
http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2703676)?  Saw some guy turned off multicore rendering in the game options and I is not having the sound problem anymore (FPS hit). What's it like over TS or Skype whilst running 3Dmark but before you run CS? Seems like that game farts around with windows settings.
 
Got to ask though, (you'd be surprised) - your onboard audio is disabled in the BIOS?

 

[EarwaxDAC]

If this fellow with the Omni could report back I'd love to hear about it.
 
Quote:

  Surprised you can't fit it into the x1 slot without removing the GPU, mind you that Noctua is a big person.
 
http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2703676)?  Saw some guy turned off multicore rendering in the game options and I is not having the sound problem anymore (FPS hit). What's it like over TS or Skype whilst running 3Dmark but before you run CS? Seems like that game farts around with windows settings.
 
Got to ask though, (you'd be surprised) - your onboard audio is disabled in the BIOS?

I think in terms of absolute clearance the x1 will work, it's just awkward and will require me to remove the GPU. The open and obvious first choice was the second x16... it always seems I get myself into trouble when I take the path of least resistance though.  
 
That forums link is about volume control within csgo, not sure what happened there.
 
I don't think disabling onboard audio should make any bit of difference. Were this a PCIe NIC refusing to link I would not expect to have to disable the onboard NIC as part of the troubleshooting process.
 
That said, since I am trying to identify the source of EMI noise it would make sense to disable any unused things in the BIOS as part of the bare-bones'ing process. To that list I will add the SuperIO chip and things like that. 
 
Due to social obligations my next available opportunity to work on this wont be until Saturday. I'll test with a different game, perhaps test with CPUburn and GPU stress test as well, barebones the system down, and report back.

 

[SaLX]

Disable onboard audio always if you've got a soundcard. A USB headset or soundcard is OK, but not a soundcard. Catch you next week!

 

[MaxKohler]

Dang it!! This is such a hard decision.....
 
I want the better quality (SNR, DAC, amp, headphone jack) of the ZXR, but I won't use the ACM or daughter card, and I really want the Z's mic!!!
 
I really want to use voice detection for ventrilo/mumble and I'm pretty sure that the Z's beam forming mic would allow me to do so (I'm only barely unable to do so currently). Currently I'm using my webcam's mice, which is good quality but it picks up everything at equal volume .__.

 

[GrowAPear]

If you want to run a test with my Z's mic on mumble, let me know. I actually haven't used it yet.