Killer Xeno Pro: Do You Really Need A Gaming Network Card?

Features
By Don Woligroski
published

Hardware-Accelerated Voice Chat

As we mentioned, the Killer Xeno Pro has the ability to offload audio processing on its audio chip and its NPU, thus removing the load from the CPU. To use this feature, the microphone must be plugged into the Killer Xeno Pro and the mic channel must be passed through to the computer's line-in. This can be done with the supplied internal or external audio cables.

Does it work? Yes, the included Xeno Chat application was able to work using Mumble, which is an open source voice chat software. The feature will be more impressive when Teamspeak 2 is supported (as Bigfoot Networks promises it will be on its Web site), since Teamspeak 2 is a much more popular option.

Having said that, even the software version of Mumble showed 0% CPU usage on our test system, so we have to wonder how much of a benefit the hardware-accelerated chat feature will provide.

In any case, let's move on to our tests of the Killer Xeno Pro's core functionality during game play.

Don Woligroski
107 Comments Comment from the forums
  • tryceo
    I won one of these from wowhead.com, but i havent fitted it inside the case yet...

    IMO its a waste of money... I just keep my internet idle when im playing online.. plus you can get a better upgrade for your GPUs if you dont spend money on this...
    Reply
  • eddieroolz
    Wasn't there an article similar to this a while back, and everyone bashed it saying that it was pointless? (It was, but just saying)

    Doesn't seem like its still worth the premium yet.
    Reply
  • ColMirage
    Hah, I've been wondering about how bad of a scam this card was today.
    Reply
  • haplo602
    try a quality server NIC like an intel f.e. and you'll see better results for less money, the killer nic and derivates are just hyped nonsense
    Reply
  • IronRyan21
    eddieroolzWasn't there an article similar to this a while back, and everyone bashed it saying that it was pointless? (It was, but just saying)Doesn't seem like its still worth the premium yet.eddieroolzWasn't there an article similar to this a while back, and everyone bashed it saying that it was pointless? (It was, but just saying)Doesn't seem like its still worth the premium yet.
    When I saw the headline for the articles, I was thinking the same thing....Yes, they did an article before and yes this product is pointless. +1 eddieroolz
    Reply
  • tirzono
    Wow, I have bought this card and it even cured my AIDS!

    Thanks Killer Xeno Pro!
    Reply
  • tryceo
    yep... after about 1 minute of testing(removed 1 9800 GTX) The lagg is still there.

    If anyone wants mine tho... willing to sell it for $90. it just got opened..
    Reply
  • Neggers
    Some important testing is not done here which I would like to see.

    I live in Australia and I am a WoW player on the US servers, so a typical ping for me is 250-300 and 300-400 when raiding.

    Now when you guys are testing with a 60 ping a difference of 10% for you is going to be 6ms and not going to translate into anything noticeable.

    However for someone like me, if this card can improve my connection with the WoW servers by 10%, that could be upto 40 or 50 ms, which could be a huge difference.

    So I would like to see more testing done in Higher ping situations, prehaps if you guys tested connection to MMO server in korea or europe, so you were testing in a 300+ ping enviroment, and see if this effects the results.
    Reply
  • Ciuy
    And i was thinking spending 50$ on a PCI network card , now i wont ...
    Reply
  • cangelini
    NeggersSome important testing is not done here which I would like to see.I live in Australia and I am a WoW player on the US servers, so a typical ping for me is 250-300 and 300-400 when raiding.Now when you guys are testing with a 60 ping a difference of 10% for you is going to be 6ms and not going to translate into anything noticeable.However for someone like me, if this card can improve my connection with the WoW servers by 10%, that could be upto 40 or 50 ms, which could be a huge difference.So I would like to see more testing done in Higher ping situations, prehaps if you guys tested connection to MMO server in korea or europe, so you were testing in a 300+ ping enviroment, and see if this effects the results.
    I never understood why the AUS guys would play on mid-west servers. I knew some really nice raiders from Australia, but they'd lag everyone and either do lower DPS or be unable to tank as a result. Not their fault, but they had way more success playing on Oceanic servers when they eventually swapped over.
    Reply