Diamond MX400 Monster Sound PCI 3D Audio Card
Diamond's Monster Sound MX400 rocks your PC audio world by integrating groundbreaking technologies by ESS and Sensaura for scorching 3D positional audio, enhanced DirectSound3D, TRUE quadraphonic playback, and Dolby Digital surround sound. Plus, create, play, download, store and manage the hottest digital audio formats from the Internet or rip tracks from your CD collection to build your own high quality MP3 files. So Up Your Audio with Monster Sound MX400!
It's amazing how much a new sound card can add to a multimedia PC, especially if the computer is already tricked out with a nice video card and some thumping speakers. The MX400 can add life to your games and music CDs with its crisp output and robust 3-D audio support. It isn't necessarily the best sound card on the block, but it's an exceptional value for the money. This card is obviously aimed at gamers and computer users with DVD drives looking to set up a relatively cheap home-theater system. Gamers will love the card because of its hardware support for popular 3-D audio APIs like DirectSound3D, EAX 1.0 and 2.0, and A3D 1.0. Although there's no hardware support for versions of A3D above 1.0, the card does provide acceleration for the emerging I3DL2 standard, which more games in the future should support. Computer users with DVD-ROM drives will like the card's S/PDIF output jack (a rare luxury for a sound card in this price range), which can send Dolby Digital signals to their home theater system. For those of you without expensive Dolby Digital decoders and multiple speakers, the included SoftDVD software can convert the six-speaker Dolby Digital signal to play on two speakers, emulating some of the surround effects in the process. There are two standard output jacks on the back of the card (for front and rear speakers), along with line-in and microphone jacks for recording audio. We connected our four-speaker setup to the card and played games famous for their 3-D audio support. With titles like Unreal Tournament and Quake 3 we were able to locate our enemies and dodge fire more easily due to the convincing surround-sound audio. We only wish the configuration software were more robust, as there's no way to adjust the front and rear channel output levels. Minor faults (and lack of A3D 2.0 and 3.0 support) aside, this is one of the better sound cards for users with four- or five-speaker setups. Those of you who use two speakers or headphones will likely be better off with a sound card with complete A3D support, as that audio standard is best at creating superb positional audio from two speakers. --T. Byrl Baker Pros:
- Supports many 3-D and surround sound formats
- S/PDIF output jack
- True quadraphonic output
Cons:
- No hardware support for versions of A3D beyond 1.0
- Configuration software has limited functions
Diamond's Monster Sound MX400 is a PC sound card that turns your PC into the ultimate acoustic gaming environment by integrating technologies by ESS and Sensaura for 3-D positional audio, enhanced DirectSound3D, true quadraphonic playback, and Dolby Digital surround sound. Designed specifically to enhance the industry standard Microsoft DirectSound3D API, this card produces rich audio and features an advanced 320-voice DLS wave table engine. Monster Sound MX400 supports up to 64 simultaneous hardware voices and 2 MB and 4 MB high-quality sample set sizes. The Diamond Monster Sound MX400 also enables you to bring DVD movies to life by connecting your PC home theater system to the Monster Sound MX400's standard coaxial S/PDIF connector. Combined with an external Dolby Digital decoder and surround sound speaker system, the Monster Sound MX400 delivers full six-speaker (5.1-channel) audio support. Or, with Zoran's Soft DVD 5.1-to-2 speaker virtualization software (included), you can experience the quality of expensive Dolby Digital home theater systems for a fraction of the cost. You can record to any S/PDIF (RCA coaxial) compatible device for true digital clarity. Plus, use the Diamond Monster Sound MX400 to create, play, download, store, and manage the hottest digital audio formats from the Internet or rip tracks from your CD collection to build your own high-quality MP3 files. The Diamond Monster Sound MX400 comes bundled with Slave Zero (seven-level OEM version), Demolition Racer (trial offer from Diamond and Channelware NetActive), Mixman Studio FX, RioPort Audio Manager, Liquid Player, Yamaha's Soft Synthesizer S-YXG50, Adobe Acrobat Reader, Zoran SoftDVD, and Soft Karaoke Lite software.
Diamond MX400 Monster Sound PCI 3D Audio Card Accessories
Diamond MX400 Monster Sound PCI 3D Audio Card Reviews
(it wont work in XP now either). This was a complete waste of money. There are no good drivers for them. It's now a Legacy card. Don't buy, because they are trying to get rid of a stockpile.
No words can describe how much fustration the lack of good drivers.[It'll take] aloot of pain to buy the half functional sound card. This card stinks.
Well, considering I have a windows ME that came with soundmax, this card rocks. I am a major gamer with playing First person shooter games like "Soldier of Fortune" and it helped the sound tremendously.This thing rocks.
I've had 3 Diamond modems, the Rio mp3 player, and the MX400 sound card.
None of them lasted over a year.
Last week I put in a new hard drive, and after that, the MX400 no longer worked.
It had pretty good sound, but I was always adjusting the volume level because it was different with each device I used, and this came to be really annoying.
Windows didn't recognize it at all even when i tried disconnecting the new hard drive.
Never will a buy another Diamond product again.
I built my computer in February of 2000, and I decided to use this sound card.
This is the last one that gave up on me.
I'll tired of Diamond products, and i'll never buy anything from them again.Can you imagine that I used to think Diamond was the best.
Excelent sound card that works with everything. 3d games. Very good sound in f.eks.
|
