[nichifanlema]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Creative Restore the details and vibrance that your music lost during MP3 compression Enjoy all your music and movies in surround sound on any stereo speaker system or headphones

Okay, I think the second part is something like Virtual 5.1 channel effect.

But I don't get the first part.

How can you restore a 128kbps mp3 to the FLAC quality sound?

Don't get it...



Oh, and is Creative's presence something like that of BOSE in Headphone?

 

[K2Grey]

Crystallizer is absolute junk.

In regards to Creative, they make consumer sound cards. These are apparently reasonable for their intended purpose, but not appropriate for studio work or the like.

 

[mikechai]

Their marketing team must have live in the matrix. They need to be unplugged.

 

[rreynol]

On the Awesomeness scale of 1-10, the XFi clocks in at a meager 3 trillion.

 

[germanium]

I have the X-FI Platinum & it is a good card marketing aside, but like others have said the chrystalizer is a joke. It does not improve signal/noise ratios at all & it adds distortion to th sound in order to make it sound more impressive but I find it more irritating myself. the finished output from the 24 bit Chrystalizer is far from 24 bit. More like 16 bit with added distortion which brings it down to 12-14 bit.

The DAC's on this card are superb though, better than my SCD C222ES SACD players DAC's by a long shot not to mention I like it's sound better at least with no effects on.

I modified mine to bring out even more of the goodness by D.C. coupling the DACS to the output buffers. A definate improvement here as I can hear farther into the music & pickup details that were either unhearable before or not nearly as clear as they are now with no sacrifice in body of the sound. Better soundstaging all around from this card even to my SACD player when playing SACD's on the SACD player compared to the CD layer of the same hybrid disc on my computer.

 

[YW_Slayer]

I agree that the X-Fi is a good card - I have it and use it mainly for gaming.

People who criticise Creative for their "creative" marketing should also have a real go at Steve Jobs for the absolute BS that he trots out ALL THE TIME about almost EVERY PRODUCT they've ever launched.

I'd like to see him give up a Linn or McIntosh system for his "iPod HiFi".

Though the most hilarious upsell was the "Shuffle = Random = Cool".

 

[Corrupt^]

Idd the Crystalizer and CMSS 3D are crap. CMSS 3D is still usefull when gaming but aside from that it's "Audiocreation Mode - with all the crap turned off" ftw

and omg @ steve jobs, don't get me started about mac's, I freaking hate them. I'm no ms fanboy, I've used them in the past but I just... aargghh... god I hate macs.

my opinion about mac's:

"They're the Dinky-Toy versions of pc's"

 

[hennepin]

THAT GRAPH KICKS ASS!!! had me laughing out loud.

 

[Superpredator]

"Imagine being in the studio as your favorite artist records a new album. The sound is real and live the way it was meant to be heard."

I'm imagining it now. They've got a 32--no, a 64-track digital recording setup. It's amazing. This one guy comes in and puts headphones on and starts playing guitar. I can't hear him, but he's really rocking out, I can tell. I put some headphones on and I can hear what he's listening to. It's just a drum track, but WHOA doggie it sounds real and live the way it was meant to be heard. Some guy throws me a dirty look, like what the hell am I doing there? and I tap my headphones and tell him I can't hear him. He flips a switch and suddenly I can hear the drums AND the guitar. HOLY S****!

By my calculations, the X-Fi is a clear 10% better experience than being in the studio. I'm not sure if Creative's think tank has realized this yet, but if studios start using the X-Fi to record, they're going to get an instant 10% boost to their quality. According to the graph, roughly half of that quality is going to be lost when the studio's final cut is compressed to CD, but if an X-Fi is used to play X-Fi recorded material, a extra 10% boost should be heard, taking the X-Fi squared sound to a full 20% better than being in the studio, which, if you go by my imagination's trip to the studio as described above, is pretty screw*ing amazing.

 

[J-Pak]

Creative marketing; selling water to a whale.

 

[gsansite]

Wow, now there's no reason for me not to buy low bitrate MP3's, wonder if it works as well for AAC?

 

[jerome829]

@ chart

 

[McFortner]

WOW! How did I ever live without one of these before? Why, it's a bargain at twice the price! </sarcasm>

They must be born at a rate of more than one a minute these days....

Michael

 

[roadtonowhere08]

The part that gets me the most is that Creative has the power and resources to make world class sound cards with the gaming features included, but they just blow it by cooking up HORRIBLE drivers/features and terrible implementations of otherwise great hardware.

They are the Bose of soundcards.

 

[flecom]

coming up next is the Creative Videolizer... it makes those crappy VHS tapes look better than BlueRay!