Creative Labs Sound Blaster Audigy 2 Sound Card
by Creative

List Price: $129.99
Category: CE
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Digital Photo Product Details

• The only PC solution to enable the Advanced Resolution era of 24-bit music fidelity with 192 kHz in stereo and 96 kHz in 5.1
• The best Sound Blaster clarity ever, rivaling home-theater audio quality for music, games, and movies
• Experience superior multi-channel audio from MP3s, CDs, 3-D games, and Dolby Digital EX movies with a rear center speaker
• The most exciting features yet with library search, automatic playlist volume matching, and hiss removal for MP3s
• Pure recording path captures the quality and subtle details of your audio creations

• Creative Labs Inspire 6600 6.1 Computer Speakers (7-Speaker, Black)

Digital Cameras Photo Reviews of Creative Labs Sound Blaster Audigy 2 Sound Card

Customer Review: When it works like it should its quite a good deal
Summary: 4 Stars

I'll start with the problem. My problem was the infamous "Squeal of Death" bug that Audigy cards tend to suffer from. This is some type of hardware flaw that occurs depending on your mainboard, operating system, etc. Up till now Creative hasn't managed to toally figure out why it happens, but what it does is simply cause the computer to completely freeze and emit a constant high-frequency tone while its halted (hence the "squeal"). This happens randomly during normal computer use while sound is playing. You cannot predict when it will happen, but it usually happens within the first 30 minutes of use, and its one of the most irritating things, one that can ruin your entire experience. As for Creative's support, it was very lacking. They told me to go over the same procedures again and again without any useful tips.

I've had this problem for nearly a year. Having the latest drivers for all of my hardware didn't help. I also tried formating my Hard Drive and reinstalling everything several times with no help. I did manage to understand what causes the bug to happen more frequently (such as watching DVD movies in surround mode, etc) and tryed to avoid it, but that was surely no fun.

Then one day it passed. Don't ask me how or why, but for a few months it works flawlessly. I know that recent motherboards, though, hardly cause this bug, so if you have a new computer you should not experience this problem.

And now for the card itself (when it works).
What I care about mostly is audio quality (in stereo), and this one delivers very good audio considering its a sound card. The resolution is high (not talking about the technical one), the high frequencies are precise (though a bit harsh), the soundstage is good, and detail is sufficient in audiophile terms.
One minus is that the card resamples everything lower than 48KHz to 48KHz using so-so algorithms that make 44.1KHz sources sound lacking at 48KHz (all your CD, MP3 sources). I found a way around this using a high-quality plugin for Winamp that resamples everything to 48KHz (or higher, I use 96KHz) using the best dithering algorithms and this avoids this little trouble.

I found working with high resolution and high frequency recordings (96KHz/24bit) pleasing and flawless. DVD-Audio also turned well, and surround sound very good if that is what you're into. I am not much into it but whatever surround recordings I tried sounded as good on the secondary channels as on the front ones (i.e. the DACs are the same for all channels).

The EAX hardware effects don't really improve the sound, but they work quite well and the fact they are done on-card (without CPU usage) is a big plus. There is a nice noice-removal option which works very well, especially useful with old films or bad radio reception (using line-in), though there is a slight delay.

Lastly, I'm not a big fan of computer games, but I was quite astounded with the sound it produced in serveral EAX-supported games, so if that's what you're into I suppose it delivers the finest out there.

To sum it up, when it works like it should it delivers excellent sound quality for such a mass-market product (and considering the price), all the needed surround sound support, and advanced EAX effects that work well for games and music as well.
If you're into recording you'll be also pleased to hear that it can record using high resolution 96KHz/24bit and that it does so with a very audiable improvement than the usual 48/16, great for doing analog remasterings or recordings on an amatuer level.

Description of Creative Labs Sound Blaster Audigy 2 Sound Card

Sound Blaster Audigy 2 offers Advanced Resolution DVD-audio playback up to an astonishing 24-bit/192 kHz in stereo, and delivers an ultraquiet 106 dB SNR that's far superior to ordinary CD and MP3 playback. With 6.1 speaker support, your games and Dolby Digital EX movies will sound more encompassing than ever before. The new Creative MediaSource music player will revolutionize your MP3 experience with its intuitive interface and rich feature set, while the Audigy 2 chip with EAX Advanced HD support delivers awesome power for gaming. Get Sound Blaster Audigy 2 for 24-bit/192 kHz audio fidelity--it delivers simply the best audio quality for music, movies, and games. Nothing else comes close.