Creative Sound Blaster Live! Platinum

Pros: Excellent MIDI, expandable, great software bundle; digital audio out
Cons: It naturally doesn't support A3D or Sensaura

Choosing between the original Sound Blaster Live! And the very difficult as Sound Blaster Live! Value Edition has nearly same performance for gamers. The main reason seems to be the lack of a digital audio output on the Value Edition. Now, while Pt. 5.1...

Pros: Best sound, Easy to manipulate setting of existing sounds
Cons: Does not support positional audio

The Sound Blaster Live is one of the most advanced sound cards available for the home user. This card supports everything you could think of and then some. The Sound Blaster Live could actually be used by professional in the music industry; for...

Pros: Features features features!
Cons: Not for those who JUST need a simple PC audio solution.

I will review this product as I would rate the Platinum 5.1 model. I will start with saying Creative has created a monopoly for themselves in the consumer sound card market. This is not necessarily a BAD thing, as I believe if a company makes a good...

Pros: Loud!, Many Options, Great Bundle
Cons: None

This thing is sweet! If you are into having the highest quality parts for your computer, then this sound card is for you. Included with the Platinum version is what's called a Live! Drive. This fits into a 5.25 bay and has easy front access to SPDIF,...

Pros: great sound quality, amazing software bundle
Cons: expensive

The SB Live! Platinum is an amazing sound card package. The sound card itself is worth a lot. The EMU10K1 chipset and EAX extensions make this a very powerful sound card. With every game I've played with my Sound Blaster card, sound quality has been...

Pros: Makes all sorts of audio come alive.
Cons: Worthless if your speakers aren't any good.

There are a lot of precious metals in society today. The Olympics are finishing up, you've got gold, silver, and bronze there. People make lots of money selling precious metals on the stock market. But, some precious metals are better than others....

Pros: plays multiple sounds at once, environmental audio, 3d sound, sound fonts
Cons: none

The soundblaster live is a great addition to your home pc for those who enjoy gaming as well as musicians.

As far as gaming, 3d games that support eax audio come to life! The soundblaster live supports quad speaker settings, so that you can...

Pros: Front panel headphone jack, front panel line in, custom sound FX!
Cons: sometimes the livedrive poops out and i have to disconnect and reconnect power

Definently worth the price!
For what this gadget does, and the amount and quallity of the software it comes with, this baby is worth every penny!

Why I bought this:
I bought the Sound Blaster Live! with Live Drive...

Pros: See Above
Cons: See Above

Being a gamer, You just have to have top of the line products. Being an audiophile, you have to have good sound. Solution? Get a Sound Blaster Live! Platinum Sound Card. This sound card takes a step past ordinary devices, and I must say, it is well worth...

Pros: great sound editing, great sound processing (mp3 and games)
Cons: Live! Drive takes up a drive bay that you may need, price

I recently recieved a SoundBlaster Live! Platinum for Christmas because I needed a new soundcard that could play games well and do fantastic sound editing. The SoundBlaster Live! Platinum more than met that demand.

First of all, the...

Pros: Open source drivers, front panel connectors
Cons: None

I once owned a Turtle Beach Montego A3D. This was a very nice sound card with one of the best analog sections (headphone and line outputs) that i have ever heard. It had one problem: it didn't work in Linux, my preferred operating system. Since I no...

Pros: Live Drive with Dolby Digital Inputs and Outputs, great tech support, and midi inputs and outputs on the front of the computer
Cons: Can slow down older computers with several programs that run in the background

I purchased the Creative Labs SoundBlaster Live Platinum Package ($200) when I built my new computer in Dec. 99. I looked at all three versions of the Live family of soundcards because I wanted the guaranteed SoundBlaster compatibility with all of my...

Pros: 1024 voices and Midi interface
Cons: Lava is buggy, but new release fixes that

Visiting my mother for Thanksgiving I was bombarded with "look at this look at this" calls from her, she eventually showed me her SB Live Value. After listening to it for awhile, I said, "I gotta have it" So I went up to the store to...

Pros: Great 4 channel sound, accessibility.
Cons: price.

I decided on getting the Platinum because I was building my own Athlon 850 machine, and I got a bit overzealous with the budget. Instead of taking a more thoughtful approach and purchasing the excellent SB Live Value for about 45 bucks, I went ahead and...

Pros: Good sound, Good software
Cons: Hardware DOA, Very poor tech. support

I purchased the SB Live to give me better sound quality for DVD playback. The Live Drive feature (front panel cable connections and remote control sensor) looked neat and easy to use. The Live drive arrived Dead On Arrival. The internal sb card digital...