SB Live Snd Card

[CocoPops]

Hi Guys,

I need some advice..........

Should I buy a SB Live or SB Live Value.

I would prefer to buy the SB Live value card as it is half the price of the Full SB Live card, however, are there any major advantages to buying the full SB Live???? The only advantage I can see is that the Full SB Live card comes witha digital IO card addon.

I will be running the card with my AMD k6-3 400 (I want to OC it, help me out with that too!), 16mb RIVA TNT AGP card, etc etc.


Cheers,
Lee.

[Bleeding Edge]

If your not going to use the midi ports to connect musical instruments to or the digital I/O to connenct receivers,amps or other digital recording devices, get the SBLiveV. You can get the Value for $43 US dollars. About the third of the cost of the SBLive. If gaming sounds are what your most interested in, consider the Diamond MX300 for $60.

[augidog]

I use the 'value' for DVD, FM, TV, and games.
I have the Cambridge Four-Point Surround speakers.
I am completely satisfied with the range of features for these purposes.
Make sure you regularly visit Creative's site for updates to features and applications, it happens almost daily.

[kwai]

whichever one you get, there's a few problems some people had with the live:

1) if it won't install right, try changing the pci slot its in.

2) if you try to install windows and you a get mysterious failure, try pulling out the live card til you're finished install win.

then again, some people haven't had those probs with, but better forewarned...

love this card, especially the dreamscape audio environment setting.

[elverado]

I was in the market for an really high end soundcard a while back. I wanted one so that I could connect digitally to do bootleg cd burning off of my Minidisc. Well, I got into a lot of good soundcard review web sites, with a much more professional (Read $200+) selection on soundcards. I was surprised to see the whole Soundblaster line get butchered due to their sound quality, even when put up against cards in their own price range. The site I looked at for more info can be found through www.minidisc.org under the heading "DSP" for digital signal processing. As far as the SBLive card and its digital in/out, it was described as "Worse through the digital channel than through the analog. Digital processing seriously flawed."

For the record, I personally like the Voyetra (Turtle Beach) brand. I now have the Turtle Beach Fiji Card ($177) installed which, with Winamp playing, blows away some very good stereos as it plays through my Altec Lansing Powercube subwoofer set.

Just my $0.02.

-Neil

[Stan]

Hi,

I have the SBLive full version.
What type of cable do you need in order to connect the digital daughter card with an amplifier ?

Thanks

Stan

[Bleeding Edge]

Stan-
If you have digital PCM inputs on the amp, use a 75ohm coaxial cable from the daughter card. See this link to other connections: http://www.sblive.com/experience/general/hometheater3.html

elverado-
(and to anyone interested)
The digital quality of the SBL is actually very good. The problem is the daughter card. For an instance, the digital output from the SB Live is set to 48KHz only, so the recording operation to the MD or external DAT devices supporting 44.1KHz cannot be made properly.

There are third party daughter cards that are redesigned to support the actual digital capabilities of the card. This one has been out ever since SBLive's first offerings: http://www.hoontech.com/amp/sbbracket.htm