While buying components for the computer system I was building, I was very impressed with the Soundblaster Live! 5.1 Platinum kit. I have used Creative products for some time in the systems I have built and repaired over the years. While driver quirks occasionally pop up, in general, I find their products of solid value and construction. The Live! Platinum kit is no exception. The kit includes: a Soundblaster Live! 5.1 PCI card, a Live Drive (5 ¼” bay front panel controls and inputs), an IR remote control, microphone, ribbon cable (to connect live drive and sound card), and software package.

I put this kit into a system that includes a ECS P4ITA motherboard running a Pentium 4 1.7 Ghz processor, 128 MBs of 800 Mhz RDRAM, and Windows 98 SE. The P4ITA already has an Audio 97 CODEC, which I disabled through the BIOS. In all honesty, the motherboard audio was satisfactory for gaming, but I really wanted the convenience of the Live Drive’s front panel inputs. The installation went off without a hitch. I should note that if you are building a system, install the Live Drive underneath any CD/DVD ROM drives with sliding trays, as their movement could potentially interfere with front-loaded hanging cables. The only extra piece of equipment I needed was a power splitter to power the Live Drive. It requires power from the same small adapter that powers a 3.5”floppy drive. Driver installation was a hair trickier, and I did have to install the software twice to make sure everything was working properly.

The Live 5.1 PCI card is compact and powerful. It has rear jacks for a game port (joystick), microphone, digital out, and outs to support Dolby 5.1 speaker systems. At the moment, I am using Yamaha desktop speakers with a powered subwoofer, which gives me sufficient positional audio and power for my needs. In truth, a set of 5.1 speakers is needed to fully appreciate the capability of this studio-quality card, but even with a 3 decent-speaker setup, I can discern a substantial increase in quality from my older AWE 64 card. The Live Drive is the reason I really bought the package. It features SDIF in/out, optical in/out, phono/aux in/out, headphone jack with volume control, ¼” microphone in with volume control, an IR remote control receiver, and MIDI in/out. The MIDI jacks are PS/2 style, but pair of short cables is included in the kit to convert to larger standard MIDI 5 pin. I use the MIDI in conjunction with my Korg 01/W workstation and Cakewalk music software.

Software includes all the necessary drivers for setting up the card and the live drive. Games are included (full versions of Unreal Tournament, MDK2, and Thief II). Utilities included are Creative Play Center 2, Mixman Studio, Sound Forge XP, PixMaker, Creative Mediaring Talk, 3D Future Beat, Kool Karaoke, and Wavelab Lite. I should also mention that the card supports A3D positional audio and EAX digital sound effects, some of which are incredible. These are tunable effects that can add distortion, echo, chorus, flange, wah, and many other augmentations to the processed audio. MP3 playback sounds phenomenal.

I plan to use this sound system for gaming, as well as music editing/composition, and audio playback/ripping/recording. I would highly recommend this for any intermediate to advanced audo/technophile looking for an upgrade or a 5.1 compatible system. The convenience of the Live Drive is tremendous. Creative now sells a more expensive system called the Audigy, but this seemed far too expensive for my needs and budget and designed more to interface with advanced home theater equipment that I do not own. The Live Platinum set me back about $150, but I believe it will pay for itself in convenience and performance.


Recommended: Yes

Amount Paid (US$): 159