upgrading PC with win 7, should i keep my x fi??

[Azza FHI 50]

hey im builiding a new rig and havent found anything new about the sound issues with arma 2(since 1.05 patch). mainly 5.1 surround. last i heard was it doesnt support sound hardware like my xfi gamer but rather sound software or something, which is more frienly with windows 7. im running xp at the moment and havnt been able to get surround working,only desktop stereo (dual) pfft! when i try 5.1 it hurts my ears with distortion and what not lol

my questions are

-should i bother keeping my xfi, keeping in mind my only goal is to get surround sound in arma 2.

- is it possible to get 5.1 in arma 2 yet? anyone got any advice who has it working propperly?

- is it true win 7 will be better for sound than xp

thanks in advance

[mant3z 1]

my questions are

-should i bother keeping my xfi, keeping in mind my only goal is to get surround sound in arma 2.

Yes

- is it possible to get 5.1 in arma 2 yet? anyone got any advice who has it working propperly?

Yes

- is it true win 7 will be better for sound than xp

Bullshit, works the same like on winXP.

Some people can hear difference if they never update drivers on XP, with W7 they dowloaded new drivers and says bullshit about differences :)

I got xFi Extreme gamer, only problem I've got is to find out how to enable SPDI\F and DTS... bluray movies are not working proper as they should, I think it's my fault... I just need to find out how to set AC3 proper.

[Demiurge 10]

Just so you get both sides: I've had nothing but trouble with my Xfi since upgrading to Win7. From being unable to select more than one input channel at a time in the recording properties, to frequent hangs on shutdown, to the card sometimes not being found by windows at all on start up. Nothing but grief.

[Azza FHI 50]

ah, i suspected it was my card causin shutdown hangs in xp EVERYTIME!!!

ill try both ways and report back here just for reference i guess.

should be mid next week

[Leopardi 0]

It is true that Windows 7 will sound better. If you have an X-Fi. I had a much more clearer audioquality with win 7 drivers.

I didn't have any problems with crashing with an X-Fi card.

[mant3z 1]

It is true that Windows 7 will sound better. If you have an X-Fi. I had a much more clearer audioquality with win 7 drivers.

I didn't have any problems with crashing with an X-Fi card.

LOL :)

I'm quite sure that you've used all the time drivers from CD for XP.

[Alex72 1]

For me personally there is a difference in sound between XP and 7. Im using the rather old Audigy2 however and i dont know if newer cards work differently.

The stereo feels more stereo in 7 compared to XP, but there is also something that makes the sound feel a bit worse somehow. Im not sure i can explain it properly. Maybe the XP sound felt more "solid" kind of if that makes any sense (probably not). But the bass and treble is more powerful and works better in 7 on my hardware as well wich is good.

The bad thing was that it took some more effort to get the microphone to work properly in all programs. The volume was too low for example and raise it plus check microphone boost did not help much. I had to open the speech recognition section and fiddle with my mic there to get it to good volume. Again though might just be my card/system/setup. And i had to do this only once so no biggie.

Another thing that is a bit worse on my system is that everytime i start the computer from cold or reset i have to click the speaker icon and go to the tab "TONE" and just move the bass or treble slider once (just touch either one) to get the sound properly setup. When i do this i get much more bass and treble - without changing the values that is. Somehow touching one of them activates the sound and it gets 1000x more clearer and booming. Anyone with Win7 that never done this can test and see if you get the same result. :)

But when all is set the sound is good in 7. And for other cards it might be a bit smoother than it is/was for me.

[Grizzle 0]

I have an X-FI card and played A2 on XP without any sound issues (5.1 worked fine.) Since moving to Win 7 nothing has changed, still works and I can't tell any difference in sound between the two systems.

[kklownboy 43]

xfi works fine on win7_64, No hardware sound in A2 anyways...

[december 0]

Worked fine for me too.

I have XP and win 7 on separate HD, Change the HD to what system I want to use. Anyway, the first thing I noticed was better sound on Win 7. I had to manually DL the drivers for Win 7 so I don't know if I just got better drivers than I was using for XP. I haven't compared the drivers.

[Azza FHI 50]

well happy to say that arma is workin better than i ever dreamed, upgraded to an i7 with windows 7 64, kept my 5.1 logitech speakers and not using the sound card. finally i can hear shit behind me, im not even gonna bother trying the sound card

[Grizzle 0]

well happy to say that arma is workin better than i ever dreamed, upgraded to an i7 with windows 7 64, kept my 5.1 logitech speakers and not using the sound card. finally i can hear shit behind me, im not even gonna bother trying the sound card

Glad to hear it.

[EDcase 87]

Assuming your motherboard has 5.1 (most do these days) Get yourself a pair of surround headphones (with jacks, not USB)

Its a whole new experience... ;)

[jblackrupert 14]

Sound is a LOT better in Windows 7 for me using an XtremeGamer card.