- May 19, 2006
- 751
- 0
- 18,990
I have all 3 cards in my possession, debating what to do.
I have a Logitech z5300e 5.1 surround sound system with aftermarket speakers.
I have nice SENNHEISER headphones.
I've used same PCI SoundBlaster X-Fi ExtremeGamer since 2005. Every so often it will just stop working and I'll have to reinstall the drivers. Sometimes it's random, but usually it's because the computer was improperly shut down or has crashed. For instance, if I overclock my video card to much, then play BF4, and it crashes, I'll lose sound until I reinstall the driver. Because of this and it's age and lack of support from creative (card was the reason I uninstalled Windows 8 when it was released) I decided to get a PCIe card that was not made by creative. So I purchased the Asus Xonar DX.
X-Fi to Xonar
I received the Asus Xonar 2 weeks ago and was extremely disappointed. It's not even in the same league as the X-Fi, I'd say about even with the Realtec onboard. However, I know that until the X-Fi is properly configured, it doesn't sound all that great either -but at least it would sound much better than Realtec.
After several hours of messing with the Xonar's settings, it started to sound alright. But there's a "fullness" to the sound and depth missing. It seems to be in the way stereo is upmixed to 5.1. With the X-Fi's CMSS-3d tech, it made music sound like you were there. Different instruments has a position in the room and singing voices had locations as well. If a singer was singing to the left you would hear them to the left, if they were in the background you would hear them in the background, and so on.
With the Xonar, all voices seem to just come through the center channel and the other channels are just filled with the same sounds. The general upmixing algorithm seems to be: identify the singer, play it through the center channel, then blend all the other sounds into a mono channel and play it out the other four speakers.
The song that this is most apparent on is "Lorde - Still Sane" on the X-Fi, her voice's position would drift to the right, then to the left, back to the right, and so on. On the Xonar, her voice only slightly changes positions and actually does more of a fade in and out thing.
Regarding background voices and position, using the song "Lorde - Buzzcut Season" as an example. On the X-Fi, at 31sec, there is a few background voices that say, "I remember when your head caught flame" and its position is on your right and slightly behind. Then at 49sec, background voices says, "Well, you laughed, baby it's okay" and its position should be on your left and slightly behind. On the Xonar, the position of these sounds don't really have a position. There is no 3d sound. It just surrounds you with the same sound -except for her voice, that comes exclusively from the center channel.
Listening to music on Sennheiser Headphones:
On the X-Fi, headphones never really sounded that great for music especially compared to the 5.1 surround system. The only time I use headphones is for gaming, where the X-Fi's sound positioning's so good it's almost cheating.
On the Xonar, the headphones sound freaking amazing and are just... so clear. I'm very impressed by how much better music on headphone's sound. This is where the Xonar's high quality parts and high SNR seem to shine. After my experience of listening on the 5.1 Surround system, I was beginning to think the high quality parts and SNR was all marketing that didn't mean squat.
Headphones on the Xonar also don't have the problem with voice positioning, but that's just because it's not upmixing anything anyway, just playing what's given to it. I also noticed that the Xonar can't power the headphones nearly as loud as the X-Fi could. 100% volume is 40% volume on the X-Fi for headphones. Still very loud though. 50% on the X-Fi for headphones causes the headphones to have so much excursion the speakers rattle.I don't like wearing headphones, so overall I was not satisfied with the Xonar. Wanting CMSS-3d back, I went ahead and got a SoundBlaster Z.
Xonar to SoundBlaster Z
I received the SoundBlaster Z 4 days ago. It makes the 5.1 system sound much better than the X-Fi and Xonar for music while sitting at the desk, with the speakers calibrated in relation to where I am sitting (note: they removed speaker angle from the calibration). It's much more clear in the same way the headphones where for the Xonar coming from the X-Fi. However, there are some problems.
Listening to music was great, everything was great, then I watched a youtube video... I found that on videos, voices come exclusively through the center channel and pretty much leave the other speakers useless (Kind of like what the Xonar did with music). Now this is technically how it should be because the camera is pointed at the person speaking, but their voice fails to fill the room. Going into the Sound Blaster Control panel and lowering the SBC Pro Studio Surround setting slider mostly fixes this, I found between 20-40% works pretty good. Regardless where the slider is though, it never surrounds you with sound as good as the old X-Fi did. The old X-Fi would put you in the middle of the sound. The SoundBlaster Z disappointingly provides NO OPTION to of speaker fill or even adjustable speaker fill like the X-Fi did. Additionally there isn't a one setting fits all, I have to constantly change driver settings depending on the source for optimal sound on the SoundBlaster Z, this wasn't a problem on the X-Fi except for playing games.
The SoundBlaster Z only allows 3d sound where the back speakers play faint background sounds that add to the experience when you are sitting in the calibrated zone. However, if you walk around the room and happen to hear whats really coming out of the rear speakers, it will be shitty sound. It's basically echos and typical background noises. There is no way to change this due to the lack of a speaker fill option. There are times when having the rear speakers mirror the front speakers is ideal... Like for those times you're not sitting in the calibrated zone. If you want to blare the system at max volume so you can hear the music anywhere in the house, you get like, half the power you once had, because only the front speakers are going all out.
Not having the speaker fill option was pretty much a deal breaker for me. The Z5300e system does have a matrix mode where it will fill the rear for you that does work pretty good and makes the SoundBlaster Z sound much better. However, with the old X-Fi, I would never use that option because it would make the X-Fi sound worse in all cases. The X-Fi has some kind of speaker fill algorithm that doesn't just straight up mirror the front speakers to the rear, it does some kind of enhancement that makes the sound better. If Logitech's Matrix mode makes the SoundBlaster Z sound better, but the X-Fi sound worse, then the X-Fi is a better card for 5.1 setups.
Using the Sennheiser headphones on the SoundBlaster Z wasn't nearly as satisfying as headphones on the Xonar. The Xonar is just leagues ahead in raw stereo quality, but don't expect that quality to be there if the Xonar has to upmix anything.
SoundBlaster Z back to the old X-Fi
Because of the way both the Xonar and SoundBlaster Z handles 5.1 sound, I reinstalled the X-Fi. I now have that excellent 5.1 surround sound back, but there's a very noticeable difference in clarity. The SoundBlaster Z sucked at filling the speakers, but I'll be damned if the sound it did produce wasn't leagues more clear than the X-Fi.
As for headphones on the X-Fi, I'd rather they just gather dust. There was a time when the X-Fi produced quality headphone sound, and that was when the headphones where plugged into the Logitech Z-5300e's volume control headphone port. The Z-5300e has it's own op-amps and such. Sadly that port's been wore out and no longer usable.
Also note that I use daniel_k drivers and put the X-Fi in entertainment mode, which makes a huge difference. I went my first few years of ownership on stock drivers and keeping the card in Game Mode, using that, I'd say it sounded like the Xonar did with the 5.1 setup. After installing daniel_k drivers and learning how to setup the card in entertainment mode, it was like a brand new system. When I made the change, I actually had several friends ask if I got a new speaker system or something because the computer sounded way better.
Summary
Xonar has amazing headphone quality.
X-Fi has the best surround sound and gaming.
SoundBlaster Z is the jack of all trades, and master of none.
The SoundBlaster Z does not have hardware acceleration or speaker fill.
The Xonar sucks at up-mixing 2-channel audio to surround sound.
The X-Fi has the lowest SNR of the 3 and the reduction in clarity is comparatively apparent.
Conclusion
Each card is good in some ways and bad in others. I think I'm just going to return both the Xonar and SoundBlaster Z. But I'm wondering if anyone knows any tweaks and such that would make these cards better? Something like what daniel_k's drivers did for the X-Fi.
I have a Logitech z5300e 5.1 surround sound system with aftermarket speakers.
I have nice SENNHEISER headphones.
I've used same PCI SoundBlaster X-Fi ExtremeGamer since 2005. Every so often it will just stop working and I'll have to reinstall the drivers. Sometimes it's random, but usually it's because the computer was improperly shut down or has crashed. For instance, if I overclock my video card to much, then play BF4, and it crashes, I'll lose sound until I reinstall the driver. Because of this and it's age and lack of support from creative (card was the reason I uninstalled Windows 8 when it was released) I decided to get a PCIe card that was not made by creative. So I purchased the Asus Xonar DX.
X-Fi to Xonar
I received the Asus Xonar 2 weeks ago and was extremely disappointed. It's not even in the same league as the X-Fi, I'd say about even with the Realtec onboard. However, I know that until the X-Fi is properly configured, it doesn't sound all that great either -but at least it would sound much better than Realtec.
After several hours of messing with the Xonar's settings, it started to sound alright. But there's a "fullness" to the sound and depth missing. It seems to be in the way stereo is upmixed to 5.1. With the X-Fi's CMSS-3d tech, it made music sound like you were there. Different instruments has a position in the room and singing voices had locations as well. If a singer was singing to the left you would hear them to the left, if they were in the background you would hear them in the background, and so on.
With the Xonar, all voices seem to just come through the center channel and the other channels are just filled with the same sounds. The general upmixing algorithm seems to be: identify the singer, play it through the center channel, then blend all the other sounds into a mono channel and play it out the other four speakers.
The song that this is most apparent on is "Lorde - Still Sane" on the X-Fi, her voice's position would drift to the right, then to the left, back to the right, and so on. On the Xonar, her voice only slightly changes positions and actually does more of a fade in and out thing.
Regarding background voices and position, using the song "Lorde - Buzzcut Season" as an example. On the X-Fi, at 31sec, there is a few background voices that say, "I remember when your head caught flame" and its position is on your right and slightly behind. Then at 49sec, background voices says, "Well, you laughed, baby it's okay" and its position should be on your left and slightly behind. On the Xonar, the position of these sounds don't really have a position. There is no 3d sound. It just surrounds you with the same sound -except for her voice, that comes exclusively from the center channel.
Listening to music on Sennheiser Headphones:
On the X-Fi, headphones never really sounded that great for music especially compared to the 5.1 surround system. The only time I use headphones is for gaming, where the X-Fi's sound positioning's so good it's almost cheating.
On the Xonar, the headphones sound freaking amazing and are just... so clear. I'm very impressed by how much better music on headphone's sound. This is where the Xonar's high quality parts and high SNR seem to shine. After my experience of listening on the 5.1 Surround system, I was beginning to think the high quality parts and SNR was all marketing that didn't mean squat.
Headphones on the Xonar also don't have the problem with voice positioning, but that's just because it's not upmixing anything anyway, just playing what's given to it. I also noticed that the Xonar can't power the headphones nearly as loud as the X-Fi could. 100% volume is 40% volume on the X-Fi for headphones. Still very loud though. 50% on the X-Fi for headphones causes the headphones to have so much excursion the speakers rattle.I don't like wearing headphones, so overall I was not satisfied with the Xonar. Wanting CMSS-3d back, I went ahead and got a SoundBlaster Z.
Xonar to SoundBlaster Z
I received the SoundBlaster Z 4 days ago. It makes the 5.1 system sound much better than the X-Fi and Xonar for music while sitting at the desk, with the speakers calibrated in relation to where I am sitting (note: they removed speaker angle from the calibration). It's much more clear in the same way the headphones where for the Xonar coming from the X-Fi. However, there are some problems.
Listening to music was great, everything was great, then I watched a youtube video... I found that on videos, voices come exclusively through the center channel and pretty much leave the other speakers useless (Kind of like what the Xonar did with music). Now this is technically how it should be because the camera is pointed at the person speaking, but their voice fails to fill the room. Going into the Sound Blaster Control panel and lowering the SBC Pro Studio Surround setting slider mostly fixes this, I found between 20-40% works pretty good. Regardless where the slider is though, it never surrounds you with sound as good as the old X-Fi did. The old X-Fi would put you in the middle of the sound. The SoundBlaster Z disappointingly provides NO OPTION to of speaker fill or even adjustable speaker fill like the X-Fi did. Additionally there isn't a one setting fits all, I have to constantly change driver settings depending on the source for optimal sound on the SoundBlaster Z, this wasn't a problem on the X-Fi except for playing games.
The SoundBlaster Z only allows 3d sound where the back speakers play faint background sounds that add to the experience when you are sitting in the calibrated zone. However, if you walk around the room and happen to hear whats really coming out of the rear speakers, it will be shitty sound. It's basically echos and typical background noises. There is no way to change this due to the lack of a speaker fill option. There are times when having the rear speakers mirror the front speakers is ideal... Like for those times you're not sitting in the calibrated zone. If you want to blare the system at max volume so you can hear the music anywhere in the house, you get like, half the power you once had, because only the front speakers are going all out.
Not having the speaker fill option was pretty much a deal breaker for me. The Z5300e system does have a matrix mode where it will fill the rear for you that does work pretty good and makes the SoundBlaster Z sound much better. However, with the old X-Fi, I would never use that option because it would make the X-Fi sound worse in all cases. The X-Fi has some kind of speaker fill algorithm that doesn't just straight up mirror the front speakers to the rear, it does some kind of enhancement that makes the sound better. If Logitech's Matrix mode makes the SoundBlaster Z sound better, but the X-Fi sound worse, then the X-Fi is a better card for 5.1 setups.
Using the Sennheiser headphones on the SoundBlaster Z wasn't nearly as satisfying as headphones on the Xonar. The Xonar is just leagues ahead in raw stereo quality, but don't expect that quality to be there if the Xonar has to upmix anything.
SoundBlaster Z back to the old X-Fi
Because of the way both the Xonar and SoundBlaster Z handles 5.1 sound, I reinstalled the X-Fi. I now have that excellent 5.1 surround sound back, but there's a very noticeable difference in clarity. The SoundBlaster Z sucked at filling the speakers, but I'll be damned if the sound it did produce wasn't leagues more clear than the X-Fi.
As for headphones on the X-Fi, I'd rather they just gather dust. There was a time when the X-Fi produced quality headphone sound, and that was when the headphones where plugged into the Logitech Z-5300e's volume control headphone port. The Z-5300e has it's own op-amps and such. Sadly that port's been wore out and no longer usable.
Also note that I use daniel_k drivers and put the X-Fi in entertainment mode, which makes a huge difference. I went my first few years of ownership on stock drivers and keeping the card in Game Mode, using that, I'd say it sounded like the Xonar did with the 5.1 setup. After installing daniel_k drivers and learning how to setup the card in entertainment mode, it was like a brand new system. When I made the change, I actually had several friends ask if I got a new speaker system or something because the computer sounded way better.
Summary
Xonar has amazing headphone quality.
X-Fi has the best surround sound and gaming.
SoundBlaster Z is the jack of all trades, and master of none.
The SoundBlaster Z does not have hardware acceleration or speaker fill.
The Xonar sucks at up-mixing 2-channel audio to surround sound.
The X-Fi has the lowest SNR of the 3 and the reduction in clarity is comparatively apparent.
Conclusion
Each card is good in some ways and bad in others. I think I'm just going to return both the Xonar and SoundBlaster Z. But I'm wondering if anyone knows any tweaks and such that would make these cards better? Something like what daniel_k's drivers did for the X-Fi.
Facebook
Twitter
Instagram