Creative X-Fi Go! mobile sound card set to appear at IFA

Creative isn't showing off too much new stuff at IFA this week, but we should be hearing about the X-Fi Go! mobile sound card, which looks to be an update on the old Soundblaster Play!. The tiny USB 2.0 stick packs in quite of bit of audio-tweaking magic, with Crystallizer, CMSS-3D, EAX Advanced HD and OpenAL support, as well as 1GB of flash storage preloaded with Alchemy, WaveStudio, and other apps. Available now in Singapore for S$79 ($56), we'd guess it'll be similarly priced when it hits Stateside.

[Via Electronista]

[Shoumik @ Aug 27th 2008 9:26PM]

Pretty sweet, didn't even knew this existed.

[cesium @ Aug 27th 2008 9:27PM]

Is there support for 5.1 in any way?

[Bryant @ Aug 27th 2008 9:28PM]

Who cares? Creative stops supporting their products within a few years anyway, so there's no reason to buy anything from them.

I love how people forgot about the driver hacks that got knocked by Creative so soon. *sigh*

[Trent @ Aug 27th 2008 9:36PM]

i don't have any trouble finding drivers for my going on 3 year old audigy zs notebook card...

[Kamokazi @ Aug 27th 2008 9:37PM]

A few things, in defense of Creative:

-For starters, part of the reason it took them so long to get solid Vista drivers out (and why they did not release them for some cards) was the fact the Windows audio stack had recieved a MAJOR overhaul. They still should have had them out sooner, better quality, and for more devices, especially considering a 3rd party managed to do it. That's not ceasing support on products though...that's called not wasting development money on an old product line that hardly anyone uses anymore.

-They made him take down the drivers because he was enabling certain licensed technologies on cards that were capable, but Creative did not pay the licensing fees on those models sold (they sold them as lower-end models). They royally messed up though, by very harshly demanding the driver modder take down ALL of his drivers, instead of politely asking to remove the few offending packs.

All I'm saying is it's not fair to completely demonize Creative for that fiasco. They sure as hell should have handled it better, but there were some very legitimate reasons (i.e. Dolby was probably threatening to sue them or would have soon enough) for what they did.

[Zach @ Aug 27th 2008 9:50PM]

Daniel himself said that the reason Creative moved to have his drivers removed was for the donations he received for producing them, more donations faster releases. Its how Creative handled the matter on informing him thats tarnished there image (further).

[xValentine @ Aug 27th 2008 9:30PM]

Is there even a huge noticeable difference of this compared to the on-board sound card of laptops ?

[Josh Warner @ Aug 27th 2008 11:33PM]

Depends on your onboard sound, but the answer can be anywhere from "a bit" to "very much so."

Particularly in terms of noise; often onboard chipsets suffer from very bad SNR thanks to it being adjacent to many other components. There is a LOT of electronic interference inside a computer case, and audio signals are particularly sensitive to this. The motherboard layout matters, and sometimes engineers take this into account... but sometimes not. I have experienced both extremes.

Of course some laptops are better than others so your mileage may vary. But, the consensus seems to be that _any_ external solution is better than an onboard chip - the difference being how much quality you want to pay for. There are much better options out there, but not at the ~$60 price point.

[Brassen @ Aug 28th 2008 10:32AM]

@Josh Warner

What's you opinion on the MacBook onboard audio? Does it suffer from the problems you mentioned? (I know nothing about this subject).

Thank you!

[Acidak @ Aug 27th 2008 9:33PM]

Very Cool

[1234321 @ Aug 27th 2008 9:40PM]

small device, probably gimmicky like some EQ tweaks or something
creative's loosing ground anyway
I'd rather get an M-Audio or Auzentech then a Creative sound card

[Varuna @ Aug 27th 2008 10:59PM]

First of all, you just can't say that.

Secondly, EQ Smart Tweaks is what Sound Technologies are in the world of sound.
Tellme one Technology of Sound which you cannot base it on EQ Tweak?
EQ isn't just that 5-band Equilizer on your iPod. It's more than that.

Refer to Creative's Patents here: http://www.google.com/patents?as_drrb_is=q&as_minm_is=1&as_miny_is=2008&as_maxm_is=1&as_maxy_is=2008&as_drrb_ap=q&as_minm_ap=1&as_miny_ap=2008&as_maxm_ap=1&as_maxy_ap=2008&q=inassignee:Creative+inassignee:Technology&scoring=1
and then tell me what you exactly mean by Gimmicky.

Another Point that came in my head: Sound is again a bit variable (on personal preference). So companies have to keep that in mind for a general base.

Cheers!

[phanbouy @ Aug 27th 2008 10:04PM]

but can it light my joint?

[Paul @ Aug 27th 2008 10:38PM]

Hah! I also thought it looked like a Zippo-esque lighter when I first glanced at it.

[cDub @ Aug 27th 2008 11:06PM]

I'm sure it can. The people over at creative have been smoking way too much pot.

I am still waiting on a true successor to the ZVM.

[phanbouy @ Aug 27th 2008 11:44PM]

low ranked huh? engadget's populated by killjoys lately, sheeit

[cory3218 @ Aug 27th 2008 10:05PM]

looks like a Zippo lighter

[Varuna @ Aug 27th 2008 11:03PM]

lol very true, a very Handy Lighter ;)

[Gie @ Aug 28th 2008 1:33AM]

All it needs now is a battery and it's an mp3 player!!

[peacefulpony @ Aug 28th 2008 2:28AM]

I just remember creative products as coming with tons of bloatware and having like a half dozen processes running. I will always try to avoid their stuff, although I have enjoyed their hardware in the past. How did they not pull an nvidia and get their shit in more laptops? They totally dropped the ball chasing apple in the iPod market.

[WondrousHippo @ Aug 28th 2008 1:57AM]

Oh, but if only it had a mini-Toslink output on it...

[Joe @ Aug 28th 2008 6:13AM]

After the way they handled the modded driver situation, why would anyone want to give them money?

Check out the HT Omega Claro Plus+ card. Higher quality, better compatibility, and ownership that doesn't suck.

[JohnM @ Aug 28th 2008 8:01AM]

Please explain how that would hook up through USB?

[Saravut @ Aug 28th 2008 6:10AM]

a lighter?

[LimpMan @ Aug 28th 2008 6:26AM]

Creative sux...their customer sevice sux.