Sound Blaster Live! Platinum 5.1

Rating:
Summary: Nice sound, but in the stone age
Review: Although I think that this sound card does deliver some of the best sound quality I've heard, plus support for tons of different speaker options, I was really disappointed to learn that creative still has not realized that Windows 2000 is a operating system that quite a few people use, yet still include little software that works with the sound card under Win 2k. Not to mention that the software that doesn't work is the studio software, so if you want to make music, and you run a decent operating system, your out of luck. Creative's response to the issue: not our problem. Although I like the card, think about what you need it for before you buy. Creative likes hiding a lot of important information that would influence your buying decision in extremely fine print.

Rating:
Summary: Works great, but be advised
Review: Has crystal quality sound, adds umph to your speakers, and has lots of ports for whatever you need. But be warned this product is not designed for XPs. It says right when installing the software, that there are compatibility issues with XP. The device for me would keep on going out and I would have to keep on switching between it and my onboard. Finally got rid of it. Can't necessarily use something not configured for your system. But utimately when it did work, it was an icredible piece of hardware. Top of the line quality

Rating:
Summary: The Overhyped, Overpriced Wonder
Review: I bought this card because of all the great reviews I read everywhere. BIG MISTAKE! Nothing but driver problems & bad customer service from Creative is what your in for. Why does this card get such great reviews ? God only knows. Don't live with the regret of buying this card like i did. I'm glad i sold this OVERHYPED, OVERPRICED piece of ... on eBay to some sucker who also fell for the hype. I replaced that ... with a thing of beauty called the Philips Acoustic Edge PSC70617 5.1-Channel Sound Card. You won't regret buying it if you're able to get your hands on it. Don't waste your money, I'm sure you work hard for it. Don't reward Creative for their incompetence.

Rating:
Summary: Good Card but NOT the Best, Pricey
Review: I have a high end dolby digital sound system hooked up to my computer, including full surround and a sub. The Platinum card was easy to install, had a ton of applications and games included, but did not recreate the 6 channels as well as the Philips Acoustic Edge 5.1 card I've since bought. At [$] less, the Philips card was won time and time again over the Platinum because it recreates the sound more faithfully, and can create 6 channels of audio from everything from MP3's to games. Do yourself a favour pick up the Philips card, get some more ram, and if you miss the platinums remote, which was useless anyways, get a Logitech one from e-Bay. Or spend [ $ ] for the second rate card.

Rating:
Summary: This Card is GREAT!
Review: I have been running this card for a year now and I have had no problems. It runs on Windows 98 both editions, ME and XP (i'm using the home edition).If you update to XP you will need to download updated drivers. When I downloaded the newest drivers I had no problems. The one thing I do hate is the software it is all bundled under one package, but when you need to update you have to do so in parts. There is no one time downloadable update that fixes every issue with XP. Which really hurts the value of this card. Creative labs has average tech support it could be better. If I were building a newer machine I would go with a newer card like the Audigy 2. XP users make sure the card you buy is compatible with your operating system. I don't blame Creative for lack of support on this card I blame Microsoft. They should do a better job in supporting popular hardware. I as many before me and many after me have had or will have issues with updating to newer versions of Windows. 4 stars for nothing is perfect.

Rating:
Summary: Which card i should bye?
Review: I have genius 5.1 speakers and i want to bye a sound card 5.1 of high qualite sounds, which card i should bye? A genius (which my speakers are) or a creative card (maybe a sound blaster live)?

Rating:
Summary: driver problem for XP and media player 9, slow the CPU
Review: I have many problems with the driver for my XP. I have tried all the new drivers from the Creative Lab, it finally let it deliver the sound to the 5.1 chanel. Have to turn off the digital mode to heard the sound and only analog mode allowed. Sound quality is kind of poor proabaly due to the driver. Itsignificantly slowed down the performance of my computer, and wont work with the new MS media player 9. After uninstall this product, it crash my system, my computer keeping rebooting. it turn out that I have to reformat C: to restore my system. Also found mnay users have the same problems on the web. Keep away from this card if you are using XP. (my spec:Sony VAIO RX650, P4-1.6A 512DDR). I also found this card wont work with VIA chipset that most of AMD computers.

Rating:
Summary: Excellent Sound Card
Review: I installed this sound card without a problem and as usual always download the latest drivers from creative. Worked without a problem on Win 98 SE and Win 2000. I have a dual boot system. Remote works great and so do the optical outputs on the Live Drive!. All in all great card.

Rating:
Summary: Excellent Sound Card
Review: I installed this sound card without a problem and as usual always download the latest drivers from creative. Worked without a problem on Win 98 SE and Win 2000. I have a dual boot system. Remote works great and so do the optical outputs on the Live Drive!. All in all great card.

Rating:
Summary: PROBLEMS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Review: I purchased the sb platinum 5.1 and have had nothing but problems! I have had problems with IRQs and DMA settings. This card is a pci card but DOES NOT LIKE NOR WANT TO SHARE IRQs. I have tried everything from maually setting irqs, to making the irqs legacy based, but always have conflicts and stablity problems. If you have a motherboard with a via chipset I recomend you do reserch on wheather there are other who have problems, there are some known issues this card has with those chipsets.

....