Monday, August 22, 2005
Creative Labs X-Fi
Posted by Chris Gohlke in "HARDWARE" @ 11:31 PM
"The engineers at Creative and their E-MU subsidiary decided to architect an audio processor that could be the core of a high end PCI sound card—but be also usable in more general audio applications. The end result is one of the most sophisticated single-chip audio architectures created to date. We first heard about the X-Fi—code-named "Zenith"—two years ago, even before first silicon. It's been a long road for Creative, as they've had to respin the chip several times in order to fully bake it. After all, the X-Fi processor serves up 51.1 million transistors, versus the Audigy 2's 4.6M, over a 10-fold increase. Now the chip is done and the cards are about to ship. The chip is clocked at 400MHz, versus the 10K-2's 200MHz, and is built on a 130nm process."
These cards range from $130 to $400, and according to the review these are outstanding cards. Just curious though, I have not had a dedicated sound card in years and am wondering about the rest of you, so let's take a quick poll.
These cards range from $130 to $400, and according to the review these are outstanding cards. Just curious though, I have not had a dedicated sound card in years and am wondering about the rest of you, so let's take a quick poll.
