ricsim78

After I basically boycotted Creative products after their deceptive practices, the X-Fi2 has been talked about since a few leaked drivers DVDs surfaced.

What is the feeling on the X-fi 2? Will it be just another rehashed X-fi with actual working drivers and a couple more software bells and whistles, or new hardware with an even more powerful audio processor and EAX 6?

I used to be a HUGE Creative fan going back to the SB-16, later I purchased the SB-Live and next the Audigy. My girlfriend ended up getting me a SB X-fi Xtrememusic for Christmas a few years back and I used to love the card.

Once I ended up using Vista the card worked but sounded muffled compared to Windows XP. Lots of the features disappeared and have yet to return even to this day. I feel that should be an illegal practice but Creative seems content to disable features on purpose just so you buy a new one. My friend is currently using my X-fi and in my computer sits a Bluegears B-Inspirer. It may not have all the fancy modes and such but it does not take 2 gigs of hard drive space just to run a sound card!

I posted a Poll, if the X-fi2 comes out how many of you will be interested in buying one?

JTD92

Since you hate Creative you could give me your X-Fi XtremeMusic.

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ricsim78

Give no, sell yes lol :P

Gunderman456

I personally own a Sound Blaster Audigy 2 (works perfect with Vista as they continue to support and upgrade their drivers) and I've always used Sound Blaster sound cards from the days of the 486.

My MP3/Video Player is the Creative Zen 30 Gig Widescreen and my computer speakers are the Creative Cambridge 5.1 - they know all about sound.

The SB X-Fi, was rated against the other best on the market by PC Gamer and it won best sound card. I expect that the X-Fi 2 will follow same suit!

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ricsim78

The X-fi was amazing when it came out, but it's not the best sounding card out right now (actually for just music my sound card sounds better, and IMO DDL sounds better than EAX 5.)

The problem was Creative and Microsoft apparently butted heads with Vista and disabled OpenAL support and also thanks to changes in the audio stack for Vista you will notice a difference with the card when used with XP compared to Vista.

I have both XP and Vista and while the X-fi was connected to my Pioneer Receiver and using XMplay to play Midi, Mp3, and Wave files using the same settings for everything XP sounds so much better. Clearer and better fidelity, especially using ASIO.

Plus, just because a magazine rates something as the best does not make it the best.
The X-fi is great for gamers with EAX 5 and the audio processing engine. Yet, why would I want to buy from a company that apparently does not care about it's customers and purposely disables software on Vista so you upgrade to new hardware when you just recently purchased the "most powerful soundcard in the world"?

Daniel K hacked Xfi-2 drivers to enable full functionality that Creative disabled, proving that they still could enable the features if they wanted. Instead, they blamed MS for how the audio stack in Vista was handled and claimed it could not be done. In short, they apparently lied. If a hacker who reverse engineered their driver could get it working, the software engineers they pay big bucks for could easily do it.