Rating: 
Summary: Same problems with my first card!
Review: This card is horrible. I had an SBLive 5.1 X-Gamer. The SBLive sounds way better then this. I put in this card and played a song. It was like comparing VHS to DVD. (SBLive was the DVD) I have Windows Xp and it sounds horrible! I decided to humor myself, so i started GTA3. (The cutscenes had weird problems) I triggered and cutscene and geuss what! SAME PROBLEM! This card was a load ....
Rating: 
Summary: The sound card to buy if you want great audio!
Review: This card is one of the best values out there. It has great sound, uses less resources than any Creative product (I also unfortunately have a Soundblaster Live!5.1), has better software packaged with it, is much less expensive to buy than any of the Creative cards, and is really easy to set up. I can't say enough good things about this card. The sound is great on dvd movies with Dolby Digital sound and a 5.1 sound system. The drivers are very stable and work great on both Windows 2000 Professional and XP Pro. Save your money and get a great value in a product. Buy this card!
Rating:
Summary: Great and Great Value
Review: This is a great sound card and a great value to boot. Sure, you can pay two to four times as much for some other brands (that used to be good, but are now just marketing). But, why?
My Ensoniq got fried by some errant hardware. I bought a sound card that was half the price of this one. It sounded awful. I could not use it for my editing.
I did some searching and got the Santa Cruz. I am very happy -- and I saved a lot of money! The best things are the very low noise floor (necessary for editing) and the incredible seperation (also helpful for editing).
I will definitely be recommending this card to my friends.
Rating: 
Summary: Decent product for an excellent price.
Review: This is a very nice sound card that beats all of cards in the Creative's Soundblaster line in terms of sound quality, even the Audigy 2. It is easily adapts to all genres in music very well. If music is first priority, then there is no better for the given price. But if surround sound placement in games are more of an issue to you, then I suggest that you stick with Creative products. But if music is your priority, and you have a really good set of speakers (something little better than the Klipsch Promedia's, the Altec Lansings of the world in audio fidelity), then might I also suggest that you take a look at the M Audio Revolution, which is available for a slightly higher price, which is going to be my next sound card. Or if you are looking for something slightly cheaper than the Santa Cruz, take a look at the Philips Acoustic Edge as well. The Santa Cruz offers a good trade-off between sound quality in music and gaming support. While the M Audio Revolution is superior in audio quality (excellent DACs and ADCs with real world specifications), its gaming support is easily bested by the Santa Cruz. Santa Cruz also offers solid set of drivers for their product. Make sure to update to the latest drivers from the manufactorers website.
Rating:
Summary: This product is not what is advertised on the box.
Review: This product is not what is advertised on the box. Apparently, in the past, this was a retail version product. Now, the software is unavailable, the user guide is not included, and they offer no support for this product. A phone call to the company left me even more confused when they said the ones being sold now are OEM versions of the card that were packaged in a new retail version box. Don't expect any help in installing the card, using the features, or getting any of the cool software advertised on the box, it's not going to happen.
Rating:
Summary: Finally, a 'creative' alternative
Review: Turtle Beach's Santa Cruz is a welcome alternative to the everpresent Creative line of sound cards. When I first opened the box, I was disappointed. The box is enormous, but there is almost nothing in it. There is a PCI card, a CD in a paper sleeve, a quick start fold-out, and a warranty registration card. I expected at least a dozen-page manual, and its ommission made me cautious. Installation is easy, though it did require at least two reboots to complete. The full product manual is available on the install CD as a PDF. I upgraded to a Santa Cruz from a Creative SB Live! Value. I upgraded for a few specific reasons. My old card had all the features I wanted - it supported quadraphonic sound, had all the inputs and outputs (digital and analog) that I wanted. Technically, though, it was lacking - the Live! line has notorious problems with interrupt sharing, which modern Windows systems use incessantly. Despite driver upgrades, I had popping, stuttering audio. No more with the Santa Cruz. The new soundcard is much more reliable than the old. I did not expect to hear an audible difference in the sound quality, but I did. The Santa Cruz is crisp and clear, with a very low noise floor. The positional audio is also impeccable. A last unexpected benefit is that it runs much, much cooler than my old Live! did. The main chip on my Live! would be noticibly warm to the touch, but the Santa Cruz stays nice and cold. With summer upon us, every bit of cooling in your PC helps. The bundled software is not flashy, but it is definitely adequate. The tools provided are small and unobtrusive. There is one utility that loads into the tray by default, replacing the standard volume control. I haven't tried disabling that yet, but it is hardly noticeable. There is an eq and an effects selector, with the ability to save presets for quick retrieval. Although I have only quad speakers, the Santa Cruz supports everything from headphones (with virtual surround!) to 5.1 format audio. It also supports several environmental effect standards: In addition to the DirectSound3d, it supports EAX 1.0, EAX 2.0, A3D, IA3D, and Sensaura. The bottom line is that this is a great card. Turtle Beach has a good reputation for good sound cards, and I'm glad that I finally made the switch.
Rating:
Summary: Who needs SoundBlaster?!
Review: Way back in the day, when SB 8-bit was the coolest thing around.. everyone had one, cause thats what was out. Then a few years back there was some good compition in the sound card market. Creative Labs, and Aureal to be specific. I went Aureal (rip)when I built my last system... and it has lasted me for these last few years. I was never a fan of SB or SB Live! price vs performace, or features for that matter. A3D (i think, and most will agree) kicked EAX right in the pants. My last card, Aureals Vortex SQ2500, I absolutly loved. Music, 3d gaming, all rocked. Matched with Klipsch ProMedia 4.1 I have been totally happy until I upgraded my system (2.4 P4) and to Win XP Pro. Since Aureal went belly up, support for XP just isn't there. I lost quad sound, the great Aureal control panel. Time to upgrade, and i figured SB was going to be the only choice. But I searched around, and found the Santa Cruz. Familiar with the Turtle Beach name, and what info I gathered, seemed wise to purchase one. Awesome. Easy to install, new XP drivers right off the webpage. Music sounds even better to me now. I really like the control panel layout, and a real EQ, like my old Aureal card. Effects sound great, and none of that system hogging, useless software that SB crams on your computer. I reccomend this card for anyone, music lover, gamer.. doesn't matter. Solid card, lots of features, can't go wrong. To top it off, cheaper than SB cards. Only gripe: no games bundled :) Haha, but i can't live with that for sure.
Rating:
Summary: "Clearly The Best"
Review: Well, I now make a partial living from building high end to Mid end cpmputer gaming systems. On the motherboards that do not have the C-Media 8738 onboard sound, or the N-Force Dolby (c) sound, I always use the Turtle Beach Santa Cruise, never a Soundblaster of any kind. The SB series do work great on Intel chipset motherboards, and they sound nice, but not as nice as this TB Santa Cruise, and the TB card works on so many more game titles and motherboard chipsets -- Via, SIS, ...and gives hardly any problems---if any at all. Mostly I build with Soyo, Biostar, And Epox motherboards for thr AMD XP 1600-2800. On ther Soyo boards, the C-Media is fairly nice, but on Epox and Biostar, they usually have the AC97 onboard sound, which I replace with the Santa Cruise. Fistly, the interface is simple and has many options--but not TOO many, like the SB series---so many that you are overwhelmed, and most of them you will never use, but on the Santa Cruise---you will use most of them, and it's a true digital card, and you can create so many cool sound effects, like using the "sewer pipe" effect while playing Half Life. The SB Audidy cards would be nice if they actually worked on all chipsets, and did not have so much "bloatware" that you will never use. You want clean-clear-crisp--no skipping--no popping, and want it to work on all your game titles? -- and you want it to be perfect for music? Look no further.......... < This is the card to get> :)
Rating:
Summary: I'll NEVER buy another Creative Card
Review: Wow! I love this card. Easy to install. Setup on XP was no problem at all. Deep, rich sound (Naked Music has never sounded so good). Played Counter-Strike, footsteps were crisp and clear. I recently purchased a Creative Audigy card; after install somewhat random system crashes plauged my heretofore fine system. I call the crashes somewhat random because they occurred randomly while playing counter-strike and always when I tried to play sound from two different programs. Driver updates didn't help at all. The first thing I did before writing this review was to check those old problems. All gone, simply with a Turtle Beach install. Problem solved and with better sound! Can't beat it. Great card, great price. I love it.
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