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[Xstatic]

Was browsing through soundcard manufactorers, and stumbled across
the soundblaster extigy external usb card...looks interesting,
do anybody know this or have experiences with this "card"?

[Trelane]

I wouldn't waste money on the Extigy (or any other Creative Labs product). Especially if you already have a decent internal card or quality USB device.

Good about the Extigy:
- It's portable and easy to hook up

Bad about the Extigy:
- It's based on the defunct Audigy (which has numerous problems, all of which are documented here: http://forums.winamp.com/showthread.php?threadid=76742)
- Multichannel output is ADPCM compressed

Mike
Listening to: 'Witchhunt' from 'Razing Eden' by 'LUXT' on Media Jukebox

[Xstatic]

ok - thx, I'll avoid it then :-)

[Figaro]

Hold on there! I'm using Extigy and it producers excellent sound, really superior to my internal card. Plus the fact that it's portable and can go from my desk top to my lap top in a snap. It can even be used as a stand alone without any connection to a PC.

[DocLotus]

I'm using an Audigy Platinum on Win XP & love it.  It produces the best sound I've heard to date.

Most of the PC Mags rate the Audigy as the best sound card out there.  Are they all wrong?

[Poison Dan]

Most of the PC Mags rate the Audigy as the best sound card out there. Are they all wrong?

If they're saying the Audigy has the best sound quality of all sound cards out there, they're clearly wrong. Don't tell me the Audigy beats the top cards from this overview (Event, DAL, Midiman, Lynx):
http://www.pcavtech.com/soundcards/compare/index.htm

Too bad the Audigy isn't included in the list, but it will give you a general idea of how e.g. the SBLive! compares to higher quality cards, like the Santa Cruz.

In this review, Roy (who does know a thing or two about PC audio) compares the Santa Cruz to other popular soundcards, including the Audigy.

The Audigy is still the best card for gaming, though...

[Trelane]

DocLotus:
If you haven't done so already, read the link I posted. You'll see that the Audigy is effectively a 16 bit/48 khz card with all the same problems as the Live. All marketing. A lot of PC magazines are also selling WMA as the best audio compression format. And look at how much play MusicMatch gets in PC magazines compared to MJ (when MJ is the clear winner). It's all about who is advertising with that magazine.

Poison Dan:
After reading that the SB Live! and Audigy both effectively waste 30% of the PCI bus, I'm not so sure they're the best at anything anymore. The Hercules GameTheater XP supports just as many 3D audio technologies as the Audigy, and it uses the same DSP as the Santa Cruz (stated in your review from Roy ). Not to mention that the Santa Cruz/GameTheater both have built-in hardware-based equalizers.