Mixed feelings on SoundBlaster Live Value from a MIDI musician
Written: Mar 31 '01 (Updated Apr 02 '01)
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Great sound, great price.
Cons: The usual Creative fudge duplex problems.
The Bottom Line: If you listen to other people's music, nothing's better. If you want to make your own music in a home studio, perhaps you want another card.
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| darksentinel's Full Review: Creative Labs Sound Blaster Live! Value Sound Card |
The folks at Creative may not appreciate my opinion of the SoundBlaster Live Value PCI soundcard as much as some of the others. This card sounds great, but in the past I have not been pleased with SoundBlaster cards. I’ve returned two of them: first the Wave Effects for being a leap backwards in technology with a delayed software synth that was impossible to synchronize with digital tracks, and then the AWE 64 for not being full duplex despite its misleading claims. Actually, I’ve returned three SoundBlasters! The one that came with my new computer was defective. The line-in was dead. My major misgiving with the SoundBlaster Live Value lies in this same area of full duplex recording. I remember feeling that somehow my SoundBlaster’s sounded better than my other cards. Indeed, this soundcard is the best sounding I have used, but functionality in my midi setup forced me to shop elsewhere in the past. www.mp3.com/rj/ is chock full of music that I couldn't have mixed down with SoundBlaster Live Value.
The SoundBlaster Live can indeed record its own live performance, the essence of full duplex, but from only one of its sources at a time. Most full duplex cards allow you to record the system mixer, which includes any waves playing, line in, and MIDI sounds your sound card is generating -- basically, WYHIWYR (What you hear is what you record). This is my test for full duplex, despite what anything says on the side of the box.
Of course this is something I do only when I’m mixing down a song. I have my sequencing software perform the song, with all vocals, outboard synths, etc, and my sound card recorded it all, allowing me to use the system mixer to balance the line in, Aux in, MIDI and wave. With SoundBlaster Live, you had better be satisfied with only one recording input at a time. Of course this might only be a software design oversight on Creative’s part. Are you reading this, Creative? You’re so close to perfect here.
Dammit, Jim, I’m a musician, not a gamer! I could care less about all the game mumbo jumbo associated with sound cards these days, and I think that fine sound card manufacturers are missing the boat when they don’t let audiophiles (skeptical of audio products by nature) know that they are producing a quiet card with great separation. And, Hey, the name is a bit weak, too. Move on.
When I buy a new sound card, it’s a music production choice. The card came with next to no documentation that would mean anything to an audiophile. I don’t go out and buy “the best sound card for games.” For a game, most any sound card will do for me. Let’s face it. Most sound cards sound great with greater fidelity and lower noise than our cassette decks and TVs and VCRs. So why do I find myself reporting that this soundcard is better than others?
From the start, I began hearing things I never heard before in my multi-gig 70s-80s mp3 collection. My SoundBlaster let me know that my previous soundcard, while powerful, suffered from poor stereo separation. What’s more, the SoundBlaster has an incredible signal to noise ratio, partially because the SoundBlaster is so loud. My wife and I normally play an eight-hour playlist of soft music on our Music Match player. It’s plugged into the stereo system in our bedroom, and for years now we’ve had the Music Match volume at 13 and the stereo at 2. Perfect. Now, it’s actually difficult to turn it down enough without hitting zero.
I was somewhat perturbed that when recording a bass line MIDI performance to a wave, I couldn’t get anywhere near a saturated recording. It sounded loud enough live. It made me wonder if I was revisiting improved “fudge-duplex” recording like AWE cards used. Fudge-duplex in that incarnation was where the AWE cards recorded at 16-bit quality, but if they had to play back while they recorded, they played back at 8-bit. Any previously recorded digital tracks sound horrible and noisy and scratchy when you’re singing into a microphone.
The SoundBlaster does not perform with my MIDI instruments the way I am accustomed with other sound cards. If the card is controlling my MIDI keyboard and tone generator, the sound card is mute – and vice versa. Oh, I can duplicate the track and have it set to perform on a separate port, allowing the card to chime in, but that’s another step I feel I shouldn’t have to do. Of course this opens up my creativity, allowing my computer to perform tracks independent of my outboard synths. Somehow I see this as a nuisance, not a blessing. On the rare occasion I want my sound card to go solo on a track, I’d rather go through the trouble then. Of course there may be some way around this annoyance, but all Creative seemed interested in telling me about was my gaming experience.
I’m working on ways to route the performance back to the soundcard from my stereo without generating feedback. If it doesn’t work, I’ll have to drag my daughter’s computer into my room to record mix downs. It appears that full duplex and SoundBlaster will always mean drama and suspicion. I love this sound card, but I wouldn’t buy it. It came with my Dell Dimension 4100. I’ll likely not ever purchase another SoundBlaster again unless I hear, from someone other than Creative, that the full duplex barrier (with all its trimmings) has been crossed. These days, that shouldn’t even be in question.
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): OEM
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Epinions.com ID:
darksentinel
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Location: Shreveport, LA
Reviews written: 29
Trusted by: 0 members
About Me:
I arrived on earth, ten blocks from then toddler, Michael Jackson. He's somehow eclipsed me.
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