[Todd]

Does anyone know if Apple has plans to catch up to Windows users and support Soundblaster cards?

I know Creative had a short-lived OS9 Soundblaster product that never performed well.

The lack of sound card support seems a big missing piece to Apple's focus on things like their Music Store and iTunes.

 

[monokitty]

Apple will probably never add support for the Sound Blaster card, and neither will the company, I doubt, mostly because the Revolution 7.1 is a kick-ass card and even if the Sound Blaster card supported OS X, the Revolution 7.1 would still kick that card - if you need a card, get the Revolution 7.1 card - full surround up to 7.1 and OS X ready.

 

[Roland]

Why would Apple need to support the Soundblaster card? The built-in audio capabilities of most macs is powerful enough. Plus the new G5's support optical digital audio in/out out of the box. You can hook that right into an amp that supports it and you're all set up.

Soundblaster is even dying on the PC platform.

 

[Todd]

I've read good things about the Revolution sound card. Although, personally, I think wanting to watch surround-sound movies on a computer is rediculous. Surely the couch in your living room is a better place for that. I've no need for seven speakers in my 10 x 10 foot office.

I also won't be buying a G5 Mac for years to come, so it's digital audio outputs won't come to my benefit for a long time.

Like a video card benefits overall performance by taking video tasks off the CPU's back, I would expect a sound card to do the same. All I'm looking for is some sound & performance improvements for when I listen to music while I work or when I play games. Surely a mid-level Soundblaster (or equivilent) is all I need.

To my surprise, the reports I read about the OS9 Soundblaster and some about the Revolution show decreased overall performance with the cards. To me, that's completely backwards to why one would want a sound card.

Roland's observation about the digital audio connections on the G5 probably answers my question, however. Apple doesn't have any plans to support sound cards - why would they engineer a digital audio connections into their new Macs otherwise?

 

[gordguide]

I can't recommend SoundBlasters as add-on cards. The Mac's built-in audio is better; if you want multichannel support go with the Revolution or similar.

Soundblasters don't even support a CD's 44.1Khz sampling rate: they resample all input (from 48 to 44.1Khz) and output (from 44.1 to 48Khz) which is a Very Bad Idea if sound quality is even remotely important.

Neither Apple's built-in audio nor anyone else's card would dare to do such a thing. "Blaster" is a very appropriate name.

 

[Akai]

I havn't used a soundblaster in a while. not since they started bundling their drivers with all that other useless junk. Its also annoying that its not seen in windows XP and they force you to go out and get the drivers from their website. Onboard sound is usually good enough for me anyways.
But that evolution 7.1 does look pretty kick ass

 

[monokitty]

The only downside to the Revolution 7.1 card is that it doesn't take the sound strain off the CPU - all it does is add support for true surround sound decoding, but the processor still has to do all the sound processing work, unlike the Sound Blaster card, which took all the work off the processor in terms of doing the sound.