Software

The speakers can be configured and updated through the Creative App, available for desktop computers and mobile platforms.

Creative App (Windows/macOS)

If you used any of Creative's newer sound cards, the options available in the desktop version of the Creative App should be familiar to you. The Device screen is split into different categories where we can access and configure various features of the Pebble X Plus. You can navigate to the Playback, Recording, and Settings menus on the left side of the interface. Here you'll also find quick toggles for output selection (headphones or speakers), as well as sound volume and microphone gain sliders. The main purpose of the Playback and Recording menus is to set the Pebble X Plus as a default playback/recording device. Of course, you can also change the input and output resolution here. The Settings menu is used to reset the speakers and to upgrade their software and firmware.


The Sound Mode section is where you configure and select your sound profiles. Creative offers a ton of premade profiles, such as Gaming, Music, and Movies, but also many other game-specific ones, such as Apex Legends, Call of Duty Series, Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, DOTA 2, League of Legends, Overwatch, Fortnite, Cyberpunk 2077, and so on. You can, of course, create your own and add them to the mix. The sound profiles are essentially a combination of your equalizer and Acoustic Engine settings (more on those in a moment). You can apply different settings (including equalizer) to the headphone and speaker output.


Acoustic Engine is essentially what Creative previously called "SBX Profile." Here you can play with various DSP parameters which span far beyond regular equalization, such as Surround (aims to create a perception of being surrounded by speakers), Crystalizer (tries to enhance higher frequencies), Bass (expands low frequencies), Smart Volume (minimizes sudden volume changes and offers Night mode, which subdues bass for nighttime usage, and Loud mode, which makes all sound cues louder than intended), and Dialog+ (enhances voice audibility). If you're not a purist, you'll have a blast experimenting with all these settings and their combinations. All of them can be adjusted on a scale from 0 to 100, and you can easily assign different Acoustic Engine settings to the headphone and speaker output, which is a nice touch.


The Equalizer section contains a system-wide 10-band equalizer with an additional preamplifier, bass, and treble sliders. All sliders work in a ±9 dB range. There are no special DSP effects added to the sound, like in the Acoustic Engine category of the Creative App. Creative gives you 10 frequency bands to play with: 31, 62, 125, 250, 500, 1,000, 2,000, 4,000, 8,000 and 16,000 Hz. Equalization applies to headphone and speaker outputs separately.


The CrystalVoice menu contains the microphone equalizer with nine different presets, which can help you sound better if your voice is otherwise problematic (very high-pitched or exceptionally deep and boomy, for example) – at least in theory. There's no way to tune the microphone equalizer manually.


The Lighting menu is where you can control the RGB effects (colors, speed, brightness) and assign them to six available memory slots, which then you can cycle through by using the appropriate button on the right speaker.


The Mixer menu lets you quickly adjust the playback and recording volume.

Creative App (Android, iOS)

The Creative App is also available for Android and iOS devices. It communicates to speakers via a Bluetooth connection and its feature set is limited to the lighting section of its desktop counterpart. In other words, you can select and configure RGB effects and assign them to six memory slots.