Posted 02/24/09 at 01:15:06 PM by Paul Lilly

Tuning and tweaking cars and PCs are two hobbies that are often likened to each other because of the many parallels, and thanks to JC Hyun Systems, the two even share some of the same DNA. That's because the South Korean car audio supplier has just developed the first automobile infotaiment system using Creative's X-Fi technology.

"I believe all motorists seek to enjoy music and videos of the highest quality when traveling in their cars," JC Hyun Systems said. "They expect the same high standards of entertainment experience they enjoy at home, something which most car audio or car infotainment systems in the market have been unable to match so far. By integrating the state-of-the-art Creative X-Fi audio technology to the RUNZ CI-7100, I am confident that we can propel car infotainment enjoyment to the next level and set the standard for next generation systems to come in the near future."

The svelte looking RUNZ CI-7100 Dash-Car Navigation Device comes with a 7-inch display with an 800 x 480 resolution, an Intel dual-core 360/300MHz processor, MMSP2 MPEG video hardware engine, SiRF III GPS chipset, and Creative's X-Fi audio processor with support for CMSS-3D and 24-bit Crystalizer. Other features include an SDHC card slot, Bluetooth, iPod 30-pin socket, USB host, and support for a variety of media formats, including MP3, WMA, OGG, WMV, MPEG4, DIVX, and XVID.

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Posted 11/07/08 at 03:45:04 PM by The Maximum PC Staff

I finally took the plunge and built my own rig. Everything worked fine until I plugged my Boston Acoustic Digital BA735 speakers into my EVGA 680i motherboard’s onboard outputs: Nothing happened. I received no sound at all. I tried the same speakers with a Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi XtremeGamer card and got the same result: zilch. Am I missing something here?

The answer to Rich's question, after the jump!

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Posted 09/22/08 at 12:21:57 PM by The Maximum PC Staff

I used to be able to connect my Xbox 360 to my Audigy Platinum and have it decode the 5.1 signal. However, in my new X-Fi Platinum Fatal1ty Champion soundcard, it looks like Creative disabled this feature in the drivers. Is there any way around this to get my computer to decode 5.1? This feature was supposed to be one of the card’s selling points.

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Posted 09/17/08 at 12:12:24 PM by Paul Lilly

Creative this week unveiled its Sound Blaster X-Fi Notebook, which as the name implies is an add-in soundcard for (cue the drum roll) notebooks. But wait, doesn't Creative already offer an X-Fi geared towards road warriors? The answer is yes, and the X-Fi Xtreme Audio Notebook has been available for some time now, but this re-release sports a slimmer profile, a new color scheme, and the ability to transmit wirelessly.

That's right - when paired with the optional Creative Wireless Receiver, the X-Fi will have the ability to beam music to your speakers rather than remain tethered. The new soundcard supports up to 4 wireless receivers, and each one can be placed up to 100 feet away from the notebook.

The slimmed down peripheral fits into both ExpressCard 34 and 54 slots (previous version is 54 only), and brings the usual assortment of goodies to the table, including CMSS-3D, EAX Advanced HD, and Creative's Crystalizer technology. You get a pair of headphones bundled in, along with a free download of PowerDVD with full DTS and Dolby Digital decoding support.

Look for availability by the end of month, with the X-Fi Notebook priced at $80 and optional receiver commanding $70.

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Posted 07/31/08 at 02:05:11 PM by Paul Lilly

We were beginning to wonder if Creative would ever update its X-Fi soundcard drives to work properly in Vista, and after the whole Daniel_K fiasco, we were about ready to throw in the towel. For those that stuck it out, Creative has finally released a new driver package that fixes the hardware Dolby Digital and DTS decoding in its X-Fi cards running under Vista. The company also added DVD Audio playback, a feature that previously went by the wayside when upgrading from XP to Vista.

The new driver also addresses a niggling bug that causes system crashes when switching to an unsupported sampling rate in the Audio Creation Mode while Dolby Digital Live is enabled.

All X-Fi soundcards except the Xtreme Audio version are supported with the driver update.

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Posted 03/31/08 at 01:22:04 PM by The Maximum PC Staff

Our consumer advocate investigates Camera Addict, Creative ALchemy, and EZVideotools

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Posted 03/04/08 at 12:47:30 PM by Gordon Mah Ung

Who’d have thunk it? Long considered a dead zone, soundcards are making a resurgence. Driven by an outcry for audio that doesn’t sound like a box of snap, crackle, pop every time you access your USB ports, manufacturers are releasing new soundcards that surpass the free audio that comes with your motherboard. This month, we test an Auzentech card that uses a Creative Labs chip and Asus’s new entry into PC audio.

Click Read More for more. 

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Posted 12/05/07 at 08:00:48 PM by David Murphy

Where are my front-panel connectors? Where is my audio? What the heck is going on, Creative?

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