Creative Sound Blaster Audigy PCIe RX 7.1 Review

Nowadays, the built-in sound found on modern motherboards is usually really good. The problem though is that motherboards have limited space for the sound card. As a result, onboard audio is unable to produce the same quality of audio as a dedicated sound card, because many of the features needed to produce clear and crisp sound are not implemented.

If you use your PC for music production, you need high sound quality. So you should be interested in features like signal-to-noise ratios, harmonic distortion, and audio fidelity. Don’t forget, that you’ll need a good set of speakers or a quality headset to truly hear the difference.

Creative Sound Blaster Audigy PCIe RX 7.1 is a mid-priced sound card that’s ideal for all your music,  gaming or movies needs. Some of the most notable features of this dedicated sound card:

• The signal-to-noise ratio ( 106 DB ) gives you the best audio quality without the interference commonly found on onboard sound devices
• The depth of bits and maximum frequency of reproduction – audio fidelity ( 24-bit 192khz stereo )
• A headphone amplifier ( 600-ohm )  gives you the ability to power even the best studio headphones on the market.

Other great features of this soundcard:

• Karaoke functions and great quality effects are hardware accelerated on the chipset
• Very low-latency audio recordings with the support of Audio Stream Input/Output (ASIO) drivers
• Dual microphone inputs allow you to grab a friend to sing simultaneously or use the second input to record the musical accompaniment while you sing
• You don’t need to purchase additional software to meet your recording needs, because the package includes recording software: Creative WaveStudio and Creative Smart Recorder. You can create your content immediately.

The Sound Blaster Audigy Rx sound card has an advanced chipset, the Creative E-MU, that maintains the reverb engine EAX (Environmental Audio eXtensions) hardware sound acceleration. You can fine-tune your EAX settings using the powerful EAX Studio software, that lets you control and perform detailed adjustments to all of the EAX Advanced HD settings. You can add environmental effects to your music, movies, and games.

If you consider buying it for your gaming experience, because the programming of last generation games has been using the CPU for the sound effects for some time, the Creative Sound Blaster Audigy PCIe RX 7.1 is for those nostalgic players, who enjoy the list of games that used hardware EAX effects that this card still supports. This ensures you get great quality effects and audio, without affecting your computer’s processing power.
As for your movie experience, supporting up to 7.1 multi-channel speaker output gives you an immersive, cinematic audio experience.

System Requirements

• Intel® Core™2 Duo or AMD® processor equivalent (2.0 GHz or faster processor recommended)
• Intel, AMD or 100% compatible motherboard
• Microsoft® Windows® 10 32/64-bit, Windows 8 32/64 bit, Windows 7 32/64 bit, Windows Vista™ 32/64 bit, Windows XP 32/64 bit
• 1GB RAM
• >600 MB of free hard disk space
• Available PCI Express based 1.0a compliant slot
• CD or DVD drive for software installation

Sound Blaster Audigy PCIe RX 7.1

$39.99

9.1

Product

8.4/10

Price

10.0/10

Overall quality

9.0/10

Pros

• Audio Fidelity
• Dual microphone inputs
• A headphone amplifier

Cons

• Could be better shielded for poor motherboard layouts
• Does not include advanced software from other Creative cards
• No S/P-DIF input