Maybe coding a stereo sound into surround without the usual distortion of sound?
But most likely marketing BS
Originally posted by: YOyoYOhowsDAjello
Originally posted by: Excelsior
It just seems like a bunch of marketing BS and hype to me. You can't make an mp3 sound better than it already is...
Yeah, I glanced at the info above and that happened to be the part I randomly read first.
"With the X-Fi Xtreme Fidelity 24-bit Crystalizer, MP3 music and movies are converted to Xtreme Fidelity, which deliver an experience beyond the original CD or DVD recordings." = wtf?
Originally posted by: Anand Lal Shimpi
Late summer or early fall I believe.
Take care,
Anand
After using the X-Fi to listen to audio with the 24-bit Crystalizer, we will have a very hard time going back to plain old 16-bit, 44.1kHz. We listened to several MP3s and CDs using the 24-bit Crystalizer and songs did sound much better with it enabled--like having the equalizer settings optimized, but much better. The 24-bit Crystalized songs became more vibrant, and disabling the feature felt like we were crippling the audio. The X-Fi menu lets you enable or disable the Crystalizer, and there's also a slider setting that lets you adjust the degree of the effect (we kept ours pegged at 100 percent).
Borrowing a page from the graphics manufacturer playbook, Creative will make the X-Fi chip available to other hardware manufacturers, including other sound card companies. Selling the chip to other manufacturers will help make up for development costs and increase the number of X-Fi-enabled devices available in the market.
I would never trust a review like that; it's all too easy to fool people by simply cranking up the treble, which a lot of people equate with better sound. As for selling the chip, you can bet on it not being cheap.Originally posted by: Brian48
I thought this was very interesting.
After using the X-Fi to listen to audio with the 24-bit Crystalizer, we will have a very hard time going back to plain old 16-bit, 44.1kHz. We listened to several MP3s and CDs using the 24-bit Crystalizer and songs did sound much better with it enabled--like having the equalizer settings optimized, but much better. The 24-bit Crystalized songs became more vibrant, and disabling the feature felt like we were crippling the audio. The X-Fi menu lets you enable or disable the Crystalizer, and there's also a slider setting that lets you adjust the degree of the effect (we kept ours pegged at 100 percent).
This is from Gamespot's preview article.
What really caught my eye was this line:
Borrowing a page from the graphics manufacturer playbook, Creative will make the X-Fi chip available to other hardware manufacturers, including other sound card companies. Selling the chip to other manufacturers will help make up for development costs and increase the number of X-Fi-enabled devices available in the market.
Can you imagine X-Fi sound cards produced by Hercules, Turtle Beach, Philips, etc..? Man, the market is really changing.
Originally posted by: ViRGE
I would never trust a review like that; it's all too easy to fool people by simply cranking up the treble, which a lot of people equate with better sound. As for selling the chip, you can bet on it not being cheap.Originally posted by: Brian48
I thought this was very interesting.
After using the X-Fi to listen to audio with the 24-bit Crystalizer, we will have a very hard time going back to plain old 16-bit, 44.1kHz. We listened to several MP3s and CDs using the 24-bit Crystalizer and songs did sound much better with it enabled--like having the equalizer settings optimized, but much better. The 24-bit Crystalized songs became more vibrant, and disabling the feature felt like we were crippling the audio. The X-Fi menu lets you enable or disable the Crystalizer, and there's also a slider setting that lets you adjust the degree of the effect (we kept ours pegged at 100 percent).
This is from Gamespot's preview article.
What really caught my eye was this line:
Borrowing a page from the graphics manufacturer playbook, Creative will make the X-Fi chip available to other hardware manufacturers, including other sound card companies. Selling the chip to other manufacturers will help make up for development costs and increase the number of X-Fi-enabled devices available in the market.
Can you imagine X-Fi sound cards produced by Hercules, Turtle Beach, Philips, etc..? Man, the market is really changing.
Originally posted by: ryanv12
Originally posted by: biostud
Am I the only one who noticed the X Fi tab in the BF2 Demo?
I noticed it too, and I'm pretty excited about the fact that they claim that it'll make even your regular old sounding stuff sound like 24 bit.
Originally posted by: YOyoYOhowsDAjello
Yeah, not to mention making something a little bit louder also makes it "sound better". A little bass/treble boost and an overall volume increase of a dB or two would make a significant difference in how it would sound if it's doing something like that.
Originally posted by: Concillian
Exactly. My BS-meter was off the scale on reading the crap about making MP3s sound better. How about play it how I recorded it. A soundcard's job with digital music is to reproduce what it is told, not to modify it. I hope this 'mode' or whatever is something that can be enabled/disabled.
Originally posted by: Auric
Originally posted by: Concillian
Exactly. My BS-meter was off the scale on reading the crap about making MP3s sound better. How about play it how I recorded it. A soundcard's job with digital music is to reproduce what it is told, not to modify it. I hope this 'mode' or whatever is something that can be enabled/disabled.
Soitenly it will be a toggle option just as effects are now. They are simply responding to the market which favours mock surround effects, "enhanced bass", equalizers, &c. over fidelity.