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Posted by
Thomas
McGuire on July 9, 2002
Manufacturer: Creative Product:
Creative
Sound Blaster Extigy
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Blaster Extigy prices.
Connected
to a PC/Laptop the Extigy uses an USB 1.1 connection, as stated several
times already. The main problem with this is not one of bandwidth
(12Mbits or 1.5MB a second with USB 1.1), more so one of USB’s CPU
reliance. In periods of high/excessive CPU usage the Extigy will tend to
crackle somewhat, though this depends on what’s in use. An example
of where the Extigy’s playback would begin crackling for this reason
being - Image editing, moving around a
1024x768 bitmap in Paint.
I could go on like this a while, but you get
the point I’m sure. The slower your CPU, or more intensive the
applications you run the more likely this occurring will be. Using a USB
2 interface would not lessen this issue either, merely providing
more bandwidth (480Mbits, or 60MB a second) – the CPU reliance is
still there. As regards bandwidth though it is worth noting that
Creative recommends you use as few other USB devices as possible to
ensure best performance/quality with the Extigy, USB 1.1 bandwidth is
not limitless after all, but still, you’re more likely going to
experience audio problems due to CPU usage rather than bandwidth
problems.
As regards why USB 1.1 the reason is
compatibility, pretty much every PC has several USB ports & USB 2 is
backwards compatible with USB 1.1 devices, as was confirmed by moving
the Extigy to one of the USB 2 ports on my motherboard. As Creative
themselves recommend, if you want performance then a PCI Soundcard
can’t be beaten.
The Extigy comes with Creative’s
RM-1000 Remote Control, allowing you to control various Extigy settings
& other features/applications in both stand-alone operation & when connected
to a PC. When connected to
the PC you’ll need the Remote Center application loaded to use
much of the options available via the OSD (On-Screen
Display), e.g. pressing the Options
button brings up the Options menu (Bet no-one saw that coming).
Remote functionality can be further
customized using the RemoteCenter Manager.
Design wise the remote is nice enough,
though perhaps might have benefited a bit from being wider
rather than longer (It's probably not often you'll hear a
guy say that). But this will also depend on the size of your
hand too of course. Adjusting volume & other options or
using it to control playback with a supported (Or setup)
application is easy enough as you can probably guess -
though again, more suited to stand-alone operation than
using it when connected to a PC.
Overall the remote control's a neat enough
addition, more so for stand-alone operation than if you’re
connected to a PC.
One of the more talked about… features, of
the Audigy & now the Extigy were the 24-Bit/96kHz DAC/ADC. To be
clear though the Extigy can neither record at such rates, nor can it
playback at such rates. One of the biggest changes in the latest Extigy
Drivers is that the Sample Rate Conversion engine has
been improved to allow playback of 24bit/96KHz files through the
16bit/48KHz engine. Make no mistake though, the Extigy, just like
the Audigy, is not a true 24/96 Soundcard & playback wise, such high
fidelity sources can be re-sampled to
16-Bit/48kHz (Though the 48kHz output can be adjusted using the Audio
Control applet for S/PDIF output), though seemingly using the higher
quality DAC still allows for a better quality sound than had Creative
gone with 16-Bit/48kHz DAC/ADCs in the first place. Optical output can be at 96 kHz, alas with no devices with an Optical
connection I can’t test that out too much.
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