Hi

I know there have been some similar threads like this before but hoping for some advice as my knowlegde on audio hardware is not good.
I have a SB Vibra 128, similar to PCI128 I think with only one speaker out jack, which I got thinking it would be a step up from onboard sound. Now I would like to get something better.

Creative are pretty much the only brand available here but I don't want to get a SBLive or higher soundcard. I have read that a few people like Turtle Beach Santa Cruz which for me would mean ordering overseas, then I came upon another thread where someone recommemded a Hurcules Fortissimo 3, which I hadn't heard of before, but to my surprise a quick search showed one supplier here in my country.

I was hoping someone could give me some advice on the Hurcules soundcard (pro's/con's) and if it would be a good upgrade to my present one, and would I notice an improvement in sound quality? Is it as good as a TurtleBeach card?

Thanks for any comments,

Jeff


P.S. next will be speakers, currently Cambridge PC Works 2.1 :-)

Turtle Beach Santa Cruz is limited to 16bit.
I hadn't heard of Fortissimo 3 before either..

Here is a very nice sound card. (right)

What is your country?

btw the fortissimo is from Hercules

Wanted that TurtleBeach too (see the thread in the off-topic forum) but so far wasn't able to get it here. Some shops list it but no one actually seems to have. (I'm from Austria if you don't want to read the other topic).

So if you order one overseas, get one for me too!

New Zealand
anyone know anything good about Hercules?, appears interesting but like I said I'm ignorant on this issue.

haha caligae!
Austria is cool, I visited there once while venturing into the northern hemispere :-)

SK1:
which terratec would you recommend? I expect they would be out of my price range considerably though... approx 2 1/2x US$ value works out to NZ$
:-(

Oh.. The one i gave you a link to (DMX 6fire) is 250 US dollars. Which is better value than the SB Audigy Platinum since it's much better and in the same price range.

And it's better than Audigy2 ?

Well considering Creative is putting Digital Restrictions Management into the Audigy2, of course its better, not to mention creative cards are notorious for delayed drivers and conflicts they cause and poor sound quality compared to most other cards. Creative is just icky icky icky.

Really? Didn't know that

Hmm. That would be too expansive for me. That's more than 2 times (rather 2.5x) the price of the TurtleBeach. Would you expect it to be noticeable better than TurtleBeach qualitywise - I don't care too much about the features. Just the difference if i connect my stereo/headphones counts for me at the moment.

And about the 24bit. I don't think I'll be able to hear a difference between 16Bit and 24Bit.

Could you be more cryptic? , tell us more!, links!.

agree

jeffster,

Look around for the Videologic SonicFury. It's the same card as the Santa Cruz, only sold under a different brand name (it even has "Santa Cruz" printed on the card ). I have one in my PC and I'm very satisfied with it.

Please note that Videologic also develops drivers, based on the Santa Cruz drivers. I recommend that you ignore these and use the "real" Santa Cruz drivers instead (as I do).

Mhhh, I can already smell driver problems.

Hmm. The thing is that it can't seem to get either of those cards. So the only option for me seems to be ordering from www.overclockers.co.uk (Or anyone knows of another reliable shop - one that doesn't rip off me - that ships to Austria without horrifying shipping costs).

Or maybe some wonder happens and one of the shops were I ordered the card finally gets it.

If you are not interested in all kinds of features, just sound quality, the TerraTec EWX 24/96 would also be a great card, it is relatively basic but does have very nice sound quality and is cheaper than the DMX 6fire (it's about 170 USD).

Hmm. $170 is still pretty expansive.

The Sonicfury costs about EUR100 including shipping costs (if I can get it somewhere finally)

Could I expect higher sound quality from the TerraTec than from the Sonicfury?

(Well, any chances that anyone has tested them against each other?)

DRM mentioned at CD Freaks.com
and here Extremetech
I initially read about it at Hard OCP but I can't find the news articles mentioning it because their search isn't good and the normal archive doesn't go back into September. They mentioned that they got a list that was dated earlier this year by Microsoft that listed companies that were going to support DRM with Microsoft; Creative was in the list.

heres the important part from Extremetech


I guess it's not too bad being just the SPDIF and that it is done in software, but still, it's DRM. And DRM is evil as it can not distinguish between Fair Use and illegal copying. Copyright holders don't hold all rights concerning their products. Consumers are guaranteed certain Fair Use rights such as the right to make backup copies ect.

I've also read that creative driver instals take up hundred of MB just for the basic instal, and well over a GB for full installs. Who wants that? And that fact that they don't update their drivers frequently. Again, does anyone really want that?

WHAT? That's nonsense. Creative driver installs definately don't take hundreds of megabytes... Only some megabytes. And it depends on which software you install (if any). And FULL installation, with all the stupid softwares and stuff is dumb (who even uses a FULL installation anyway?) and may take almost a gigabyte maybe (don't know which software they bundle with their cards nowdays).

I must have misunderstood a forum post I read about driver installs for creatives card then or it left out the details. Sorry to pass on second hand info. But, out of the several years I've been online, I can barely remember one or two times reading someone saying they have had a good expirience with creative live or audigy cards, compared to the countless one people who have had bad expiriences because of them. Is it just the noisy minority causing all the bad things I've read? I doubt it seeing as with all the other popular cards out there such as phillips, hercules, and turtle beach have never had extensive news coverage on multiple sites for their problems on the Via chipsets for a time and all the people on these audio boards and others saying that it sounds worse than any of the other cards I've listed, not to mention the pro/consumer cards like the DMX/6fire that sound better.

Those are some of the reasons I just think creative is icky and ask why any informed person would choose them over cheaper or better quality cards.

Why of course Creative is icky , i don't support or like creative..
Well, many choose them because there really aren't many better cards as cheap, or they're not availible where one lives.
Anyway, as mentioned by Jasper, TerraTec EWX 24/96 costs around 170 US dollars and is great for the price. Sonicfury costs 100 euros, but, don't know if it's very good.. need to check.
Anyway, i'm almost certain both are better than Audigy (or Audigy 2)

Thanks PoisonDan,

Unfortunately neither Videologic or TurtleBeach brands are available here, and I'm hesitant to order overseas mainly just because the int. shipping charges they hit you with are horrendous.

I'm thinking now I might go with the Hercules Fortissimo 3 [7.1], as I can source one locally... well, without going outside the country anyway. It has a simliar chip to the TurtleBeach (Cirrus Logic SoundFusion CS4624 as opposed to CS4630) and reading the specs here it may be (almost) as good?

If anyone has experience with them I'd like to hear about it though :-)

Regards
Jeff