Like other more advanced sound cards recently released by Creative, the Sound Blaster X5 is controlled through the Creative App, which is available both in desktop and mobile form. This is a nice feature of the Sound Blaster X5, as it allows you to control the device even when you're connecting it to your PlayStation 4/PlayStation 5 console, although the rich front panel, with a dedicated button and dial for every important feature of the X5, makes the mobile app somewhat redundant. Still, if you don't want to get up from the comfort of your couch to change the output from headphones to speakers or to switch an equalizer preset, being able to do so with a smartphone comes in very handy indeed.

Creative App (PC)

The Device screen is split into different categories where we can access and configure various features of the Sound Blaster X5. 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 Sound Blaster X5 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 and re-pair the device and to upgrade its 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, 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 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 the dynamic range), Bass (expands low frequencies), Smart Volume (minimizes sudden volume changes) 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 filters and effects. The Noise Reduction feature aims to reduce the static background noise, while Smart Volume tries to keep the volume of our voice constant. The Voice Morph feature alters your voice in real-time to make you sound like a dwarf, emo, a demon, a robot, a person of the opposite sex, and so on. Finally, there's a microphone equalizer with 11 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.


When activated, Direct Mode turns off all forms of digital signal processing and delivers the audio signal in its "purest" form, directly from the DAC to the headphone and/or speaker output.


According to Creative, "Scout Mode" is designed to help you hear beyond what you see. When activated, Scout Mode significantly boosts the audibility of quieter sounds, such as footsteps and reloading guns. This should (and will) help you hear them much easier, but it comes with an obvious drawback: you will lose the ability to accurately determine the distance of your targets. You'll also be more paranoid than usual since you'll constantly have a feeling that someone is close by. This is one of those features which you simply must try for yourself and decide if you like it. In Call of Duty, especially in its non-Warzone modes, where there's constant chaos happening all around you anyway, using Scout Mode felt almost like cheating. In Apex Legends it made me too twitchy, but it also definitely helped me hear my enemies sooner than I would otherwise be able to. In Rocket League and other games outside of multiplayer FPS territory, using Scout Mode yielded no noteworthy benefits.


The "Mixer" category is where you can individually adjust the volumes of every output and input that the Sound Blaster X5 has to offer. This includes the microphone monitoring feature, which will surely interest anyone using an analog closed-back headset.

Creative App (Android, iOS)

As I already mentioned, the Creative App is also available on Android and iOS devices. The connection between a mobile device and the Sound Blaster X5 is established via Bluetooth.


The mobile version of the Creative App, available for Android and iOS devices, contains several menus of its desktop variant. You get access to the Equalizer, Direct Mode, and Mixer categories, and you can use them to upgrade the firmware, adjust the screen brightness, and change the output between headphones or speakers. What you can't access through the app are the Sound Mode, Acoustic Engine, and CrystalVoice categories, as well as the Scout Mode feature.