Audio & Visual

Creative to Launch Sound BlasterX AE-9 – Audiophile-Grade Sound Card

Music lovers will enjoy this card …

Creative have been relatively dark in the soundcard front, a business for which they were mainly recognized not that many years ago. The company is looking to cater to the highest-end of music listeners with the impending introduction of their Sound BlasterX AE-9 sound card, though. At $300 a pop, these will pack serious hardware for audiophiles. While the audio processing chip remains the same 3D Sound Core as used in Creative’s gaming-focussed AE-5 and AE-5 Pure, for the AE-9, Creative opted for an external DAC – thus removing any digital noises or interference from your system’s electronics.

The replaceable operational amplifiers are a given, then, since we’re talking about a crowd of users that wants to be able to experiment and tinker with sound processing on their audio sources. The operational amplifiers can be tinkered with as well, aiding in reaching that desired tuning. As for outputs, Optical in and out, standard 3.5mm jacks for rear, center, and sub, as well as RCA stereo out make out the card’s rear connectors. And lo and behold – there’s a dedicated 6-pin power connector for the card so as to power all of that sound wizardry.

Creative said the card is rated at a 129 dB signal-to-noise ratio and uses an ESS Sabre 32 digital analog converter – a known quantity in terms of quality. Creative’s XAMP, which amplifies each stereo channel of headphones out separately, is also present. The breakout box, which houses the external DAC, supports both TRS and XLR connectors for microphones and 48-volt phantom power. There’s a switch for what looks like dedicated profiles for high impedance headphones, and support for SBX in a physical button, which lets users control any 3D virtualization technology on the spot.

Source: PC World via TPU

 

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