Originally posted by: buck
Its all fun and games until you use the x-fi in vista 64 playing with a microphone.
Its all fun and games until you have a 13 year old kid screaming in 7.1 glory because you fragged him for the 10th time.
In all seriousness though, just get yourself a USB headset or use onboard w/ headset for voice com. Much better solution overall, only a major problem if you use headphones. Personally I can't stand voice com mixed with game sounds coming out of my speakers, especially with the crappy mics people use.
As for the X-Fi bashing, I wouldn't be shocked if half the complainants are using digital output or simply have their speakers/settings set up incorrectly. Sure there were some driver problems and sure the X-Fi is harder to set-up than it should be, but there's simply no way any onboard solution sounds better than the X-Fi on a decent set of speakers or headphones. I've compared both SoundStorm and now Realtek ALC880/HDA and find SB products are still better overall, especially for gaming.
Also there's a few new developments on the X-Fi front. They're releasing a Titanium version that is PCI-E and also supports Dolby Digital Live. Previously, the only X-Fi that supported DDLive was the Auzentech Prelude. In another very interesting develepment, all
older X-Fi will also support Dolby Digital Live with a nominal fee.
X-Fi Development News
Explanation from Creative is the same reason they pulled DTS/DD support from Vista at first, licensing fees. Personally I will gladly pay the fee as it is functionality that I did not expect when I purchased the card, but will gladly use going forward once its made available.