Friday, May 16th 2008
Creative Unveils X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Series PCI-E Sound Cards
Creative, a worldwide leader in digital entertainment products, today announces the PCI Express Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Professional Series and PCI Express Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Champion Series sound cards, unleashing the full power of Creative X-Fi hardware audio processing for PCI Express-based PCs.
The new PCI Express Creative sound cards each feature a striking design that screams "high performance." Creative will equip the world's best professional PC gamers, who are now competing in the Championship Gaming Series (CGS), with the new PCI Express Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Professional Series, the official sound card of the CGS, the only worldwide professional video gaming league.
"Audio plays a huge factor in professional gaming, where every competitive advantage can make the difference between winning and losing. The Sound Blaster X-Fi Fatal1ty edition sound cards significantly enhance any professional gaming rig, enabling us to hear what we can't see and perform at our highest level," said Johnathan "Fatal1ty" Wendel, world champion gaming legend and exclusive on-air analyst for the CGS.
"I demand extreme performance from my PC, and I won't settle for less than Sound Blaster X-Fi. It gives me the huge advantage of hearing my opponent before they can see me, and finishing them off before they can do anything about it," said Yazan "Clown" Ammari, Counter-Strike Source member of the San Francisco Optx CGS team.
"We've developed the PCI Express models of our Sound Blaster X-Fi gaming sound cards to meet the specific requests that we've received from end users," said Steve Erickson, VP and GM of audio and VLSI for Creative. "We have re-architected our X-Fi processor so we can deliver even more performance and provide the best audio available on the PC today. You'll know why it's worth the upgrade to PCI Express the second you hear it. We've also added Dolby Digital encoding, for connection to a home theater system for an awesome gaming experience. We created an entirely
new I/O drive with an innovative design that can fit either a 3 ½" or 5 ¼" drive bay. Plus, the Sound Blaster Titanium series cards are optimized for Windows Vista with UAA-compliant hardware."
The PCI Express Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Professional Series features Dolby Digital encoding, for single-cable connection to home theater systems. The card leverages the power of the X-Fi processor optimized for PCI Express to deliver accelerated audio for improved game performance, with ultra-realistic EAX 5.0 effects and 3D positional audio. Hardware-powered 3D positional audio and EAX 5.0 effects provide stunning positional audio realism over headphones and speakers, for a much more immersive gaming experience than any motherboard audio solution can offer. The Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Professional Series also vastly improves voice chat clarity in online games where collaboration is vital.
"With its superb audio fidelity, EAX 5.0 support, and 128 hardware-accelerated voices, the Sound Blaster X-Fi is simply the best way to experience the rich soundscape of Guild Wars. Gamers who really care about how their PCs sound should give it a serious listen," said James Boer, ArenaNet audio programmer and Game Audio Programming author.
The new PCI Express Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Champion Series sound card includes all of the features of the PCI Express Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Professional Series, plus an internal I/O drive for quick front panel connection to headphones and headsets. This versatile internal I/O drive design offers the choice of placement in either a 3 ½" or 5 ¼" drive bay. The 3 ½" drive features mic-in and headphone-out connections. This drive slides inside the 5 ¼" drive, which adds RCA line-in connections.
The world's first native PCI Express hardware accelerated sound cards, the PCI Express Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Professional Series and PCI Express Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Championship Series sound cards also feature:
Source:
Creative
"Audio plays a huge factor in professional gaming, where every competitive advantage can make the difference between winning and losing. The Sound Blaster X-Fi Fatal1ty edition sound cards significantly enhance any professional gaming rig, enabling us to hear what we can't see and perform at our highest level," said Johnathan "Fatal1ty" Wendel, world champion gaming legend and exclusive on-air analyst for the CGS.
"I demand extreme performance from my PC, and I won't settle for less than Sound Blaster X-Fi. It gives me the huge advantage of hearing my opponent before they can see me, and finishing them off before they can do anything about it," said Yazan "Clown" Ammari, Counter-Strike Source member of the San Francisco Optx CGS team.
"We've developed the PCI Express models of our Sound Blaster X-Fi gaming sound cards to meet the specific requests that we've received from end users," said Steve Erickson, VP and GM of audio and VLSI for Creative. "We have re-architected our X-Fi processor so we can deliver even more performance and provide the best audio available on the PC today. You'll know why it's worth the upgrade to PCI Express the second you hear it. We've also added Dolby Digital encoding, for connection to a home theater system for an awesome gaming experience. We created an entirely
new I/O drive with an innovative design that can fit either a 3 ½" or 5 ¼" drive bay. Plus, the Sound Blaster Titanium series cards are optimized for Windows Vista with UAA-compliant hardware."
The PCI Express Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Professional Series features Dolby Digital encoding, for single-cable connection to home theater systems. The card leverages the power of the X-Fi processor optimized for PCI Express to deliver accelerated audio for improved game performance, with ultra-realistic EAX 5.0 effects and 3D positional audio. Hardware-powered 3D positional audio and EAX 5.0 effects provide stunning positional audio realism over headphones and speakers, for a much more immersive gaming experience than any motherboard audio solution can offer. The Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Professional Series also vastly improves voice chat clarity in online games where collaboration is vital.
"With its superb audio fidelity, EAX 5.0 support, and 128 hardware-accelerated voices, the Sound Blaster X-Fi is simply the best way to experience the rich soundscape of Guild Wars. Gamers who really care about how their PCs sound should give it a serious listen," said James Boer, ArenaNet audio programmer and Game Audio Programming author.
The new PCI Express Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Champion Series sound card includes all of the features of the PCI Express Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Professional Series, plus an internal I/O drive for quick front panel connection to headphones and headsets. This versatile internal I/O drive design offers the choice of placement in either a 3 ½" or 5 ¼" drive bay. The 3 ½" drive features mic-in and headphone-out connections. This drive slides inside the 5 ¼" drive, which adds RCA line-in connections.
The world's first native PCI Express hardware accelerated sound cards, the PCI Express Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Professional Series and PCI Express Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Championship Series sound cards also feature:
- Creative X-Fi processor specifically designed for high-speed PCI Express slots in modern PCs
- X-Fi Crystalizer technology, which leverages audio algorithms to intelligently and selectively determine how to restore the highs and lows from sound effects, instruments and vocals and voices that were damaged or diminished during the MP3, AAC, game audio or other compression processes
- X-Fi CMSS-3D technology, to create virtual surround sound through speakers or headphones in games or music. In games, you hear your opponents in their exact location. With music, the sound expands so it completely surrounds you
- Dolby Digital support for compelling 5.1 surround sound through a home theater system
- Creative ALchemy to restore EAX and surround sound in DirectSound game titles running under Vista
- Certified UAA compliance for maximum Windows Vista compatibility
- X-RAM dedicated audio memory to boost performance in select games
- THX Certified surround sound for cinematic movie audio playback
- PowerDVD software with DTS-ES and Dolby Digital-EX decoding
- 24-bit audio quality and 109db SNR audio clarity
- ASIO recording support with latency as low as one millisecond with minimal CPU load
91 Comments on Creative Unveils X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Series PCI-E Sound Cards
besides, for the average user . . .
. . . it's sad, though, what has become "restricted" in a locked OEM BIOS. I've seen some where the only thing the end user can set is Date/Time . . . and that's it. :shadedshu WTF even have a setup menu, y'know?:twitch: TRAITOR!!!
j/k :toast:
That's the first low-profile Xonar I've seen, are they new to the market?
damn, it's even got an AC97/Azalie front panel connector as well . . . you lucky dog! What I wouldn't give for one of those headers on my card, instead of this proprietary garbage :banghead:
Kinda back on topic:
Creative offer support for hardware much longer than other hardware manufacturer's do. It was just the end of last year when they finally cut the Live! series, and they were 10 years old.
Audigy was looking questionable, but after Creative decided to make ALchemy free for Audigy users, I get the feeling they intend to continue it's support for some more time to come.
Hopefully, though, after the Dan_k driver debacle, the next driver release will be heaven-sent . . . I've got high hopes Creative will turn their act around <knock on wood>
X-Fi 2 is the same CA20K1 with more software-enabled features, leaves me with no reason to upgrade. Therefore, ASUS.
Only when Creative comes up with something genuinely new, I'll consider it.
Hard to tell from that pic, but that's defi a Cirrus Logic DAC . . . I just can't read the chip number . . . I like how the regulators, DAC, and ADC are on the backside of the board, and how neatly organized the capacitor placement is on the front . . . very professional looking card.
Does it come with a shield like the D2X does?
Yes, I believe Creative would continue to use CA20K1, at best they could modify it to have a bus translation logic on die, call it CA20K{something else}, remember what they did to EMU10K? Made it whore across two distinct generations of cards. So Creative has to come up with an entirely new APU to get my cash, else I think I'll be pretty happy with this X-Fi and the upcoming ASUS card.
At least not having a shield on that Xonar model, you shouldn't have to worry about PCB component EMI - I figure the PCB itself will provide enough insulation from the OPAMPs and caps to not cause interference with the converters and regulators on the backside . . . but EMI from other SYS components might be an issue, though . . .
I figure you're prob right on the CA20K1, especially considering Creative's current track record; but I don't intend to draw conclusions until we can see what the new PCBs will look like . . . but considering these new cards must've been under development last year, possibly beginning of this year, before the PR blunder, I'm not getting my hopes up.
As it stands, though, I'm getting the impression that the X-Fi series is going to turn out like the Audigys did . . . too many cards, and series "revisions" Which means that a complete new architecture is still a couple of years down the road. My Fatal1ty will serve me well until then, and possibly further after the card is hard-modded beyond it's current audio quality and capabilites. If for some reason I do plan to purchase a new card soon, I've given the D2X some serious thought, and I might even consider the AC-1; but that's if I decide to purchase something else.
Seeing as how I spend more time gaming, I'd like to stick with a dedicated APU over a chipset.
the older live cards pre 5.1 didnt get any real updates, i cant remmber how it went but there i think was an audigy card that used the came chip as the live 5.1, and the live 24bit was basickly a value audigy card(worse then the 5.1 live by a good bit)
creatives got horrible record for acctualy updating drivers or putting out drivers for new os's, when 2k came out i had to use drivers that an OEM company acctualy payed 3rd party developers to creat(the OEM had used awe32/64 and sb16 cards in pretty much eveyr system they sold) because creative was farking around......again other chip makers had drivers out eather along side 2k OR within a couple months they had a full driver, betas earyer then that.
i know my tutle beach card and my old yahama cards had KICKASS drivers for 2k within weeks of 2k going RTM, where my awe64(the highest end isa model) didnt get proper drivers till i found those OEM drivers, then creative put out drivers eventuly, but htey where buggy :(
creatives hardware normaly is good, its the software and support side that suck.
tho they also have a problem not properly testing their hardware designes, as you saw with the sblive and boards of its day, and the x-fi with nf4, the list goes on and on.
oh and no, it dosnt take a high end card to get the x-fi to crackle, i just confermed it with a buddy, he had an x300, then x700, also a 6200 card in that rig, all had the problem even after rma to creative to get a card that was updated, creative blamed nvidia, we blamed creative since if they had stuck to PCI specs that wouldnt have been an issue, he took my turtle beach card( wish i hadent given it to him!!!) it was a 8768 based card, hes still using it, sold the x-fi on ebay.
creative comes out with good CHIPS, the problem is their pcb and drivers.........
its like putting a v8 in a geo metro.........
Yes, we can sail though till a new APU comes up but we have to agree with Muzz, they'll probably estrange X-Fi users once X-Fi 2 comes up. At best they'll just put up drivers for Vista, nothing more.
But, yes, the Audigy series featured a few rebranded Live! cards, as has the X-Fi series featured re-branded Audigy cards.
TBH, if you look at the Xtreme Gamer, is the same as an Audigy SE, and a couple of the early Audigy cards were re-branded Live! offerings. Hell, the Live! 24bit was basically a slimmed-down Audigy Value.
But, as much as it's kinda crooked, I can't blame them either for disabling support in their drivers - audio cards outlive every other component within a SYS, even in terms of service life. Without cutting support or functionality, users would never upgrade, and the company would make no money at all. This practice just hasn't been that apparent, as Creative have been the only major form of audio solution for the last 15 years.push comes to shove, there's always good 3rd party drivers, either Dan_k's or op-pax. Or continuing to run outdated drivers . . .
The problem wasnt that they 'didnt release drives' its that the drivers they released were often hidden inside teh X-fi drivers (you had to unpack then with winrar and manually install them, not something an average user would do) and they rarely got updated on the website.
Even then, as i said before - all you got was a volume slider. None of the advanced features, none of the decoding options. Its the complete lack of effort from the SB live! series all the way to audigy 4 - dont think that they just ditched the older models, EVERYTHING below X-fi got dropped until daniel_k came along.
Present im use Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Driver 2.15.0006 (2008-02-22/6.0.01.1304)
Works on all Audigy X /X-Fi/E-DSP (Windows XP/Vista)
THAT is essentially a headphone jack pretending to be some sorta "break out box"
Im really not impressed with this card at ALL I see nothing but a cheap card in a new suit pretending to be special...