Realtek AC97 v X-FI Fatal1ty?

[Kkkk1]

I currently have an Abit-IC7 mobo. It has the Realtek AC97 onboard audio. I'm thinking of upgrading to the X-FI Fatal1ty. I mainly play games at the moment such as Doom3 and Quake 4, BF2 etc. Do you think it is really worth spending the money? Is the sound that much better than standard audio? I have some crappy desktop speakers you know the sort about £10.00 worth but do have some expensive Headphones.

Any advise will be greatly appreciated.

 

[marshahu]

If your Realtek AC97 is one of the new High Definition chipsets then it probably won't bring you that much difference unless you intend on playing games which fully utilize EAX 5 on the X-Fi card - The titles you mentioned, bar Quake 4 can utilize EAX 2 which is handled by the Realtek AC97 chipsets anyway.

If your Realtek AC97 gives too much noise, you play lots of EAX 5 compatible titles, and you intend on upgrading your speaker system to 5.1 or a very good set of headphones then go for the X-Fi. Otherwise if you have a set of £10 speakers that you will be stuck with for quite a while, they will be wasted on the X-Fi despite its awesome technology. Just like buying an expensive High End, £1k, 110W per channel, THX compliant Home Cinema amp and then powering some cheap 50W Eltax Speakers from Department store catalogue - it will work and sound better than a cheap amp, but the abilities of the expensive amp will be VERY wasted.

However, if you are so hell bent on getting yourself the X-Fi, set aside some money for some good Creative 5.1 speakers, preferably the Inspire, I-Trigue or even Megaworks Series if you can afford it, statying clear of cheap sector of their product range. By all means spend more and go for high end companies or even full home theater receivers to put into this soundcard, but if money is tight then the Creative Inspire is a good entry point into the world of Surround Sound :lol:

 

[Santino]

well i wouldn't go for the X-FI Fatal1ty cuz it has a pretty steep price tag 150$ at new egg, but the X-FI Xtreme Music can be found for under 100, and the only difference is it doesn't have Xram, the difference in sound quality is defently worth it, now only does it make music and games sounds better in quality, it alows you to hear things better, like u can hear things like enemys walking about behind you and shell casings hiting the ground that you wouldn't hear with on board sound. also bf2 and bf2142 and have a ultra quality mode that can only be turned on with any X-FI so in your case if you have the money its diff worth it