Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Surround 5.1 Pro USB Audio System with SBX SB1095

In this quick write-up I will outline different aspects of the product. After unpacking, this worked immediately upon connecting to my laptop (Windows 7 x64) - no compatibility issues. After loading up the software (took a couple of minutes), the volume control becomes operational, the blue LED on the unit will flash when you have muted the volume, the remote will work (line-of-sight to the sensor), and all software control can be accessed through the control panel or entertainment console. From the entertainment console you can: - Control the levels of the 5.1 analog outputs (although I don't use these in practice) to setup your speaker balance, and also set subwoofer crossover to any frequency from 10hz to 1000hz in the TruStudio menu - Set options between 2 channels or 5 channels of audio (plus sub) and test that they are operational - Control EAX effects, which are basically reverb patterns, nothing I plan to use - Control TruStudio Pro, which can be useful in some situations (I turn the surround option on very subtly when using headphones on a multi-channel source), including noisy environments (smart volume, dialog plus) - Use the graphic equalizer to obtain an accurate response through the passband of your speakers/headphones; I personally use this to compensate for slight roll-off of my headphones in the bass, and their resonance at 1khz and 8khz - Control the mixer, including microphone/line-in, "What U Hear," and pass-through of the line/mic inputs to your speakers for input monitoring - Activate Dolby Digital Live, which will mix all audio into a 5.1 stream for playback over the optical output; note that if you have a source using Dolby Digital or DTS, you will want to set the sound option in your software to bitstream, meaning this is bypassed to avoid additional processing by the sound card. Dolby Digital Live is intended for everyday sound and use, rather than actual Dolby or DTS sources What U Hear allows you to record whatever you're playing without actually patching the output to the input with a cable. I find this useful if I think I hear clipping - simply record the sound and verify that it's clipping. There is a myriad of other uses for this, as well. For DTS-HD or Dolby-HD sources, you will need HDMI, which this sound card will not allow due to bandwidth limits. My laptop has an HDMI output which I use when I want to bitstream these codecs for movies. Pros: This card is much quieter than the internal Realtek solution used on my laptop, one reason I bought it. The noise floor on this card is at least 50dB lower. The output gain on this card is higher than the internal, meaning I don't have to have at 100% for DVD and Blu-ray and STILL not be loud enough. Instead, I can run it around 45% volume and any louder would be uncomfortable with DVD and Blu-Ray. Accurate soundfield placement in headphones - I tested a 5.1 source with discrete channels and can confirm that this card's processing will do a good job with this if you have it turned on (you can deactivate all processing if you wish). The output uses a limiter so that you won't experience clipping, meaning much less distortion if you push things too hard on the EQ. Other: This card claims 24/96 capability. I did tests and found that for both playback/recording, the card rolls off to -3dB at 48khz, on-par with specs. It is a similar case, rolling off slightly in the infrasonics, -3dB at 3hz. As for the 24-bit claim, the resolution is 24-bit, BUT signal/noise ratio is slightly over 100dB, effectively limiting the dynamic range to the equivalent of 17-bit. Due to dither, the psychoacoustic dynamic range will approach 19 bits. This is NOT an issue for most people. You still obtain the benefits of 24-bit, including a reduction in quantization noise, just not through the full dynamic range. In other words, the card will not be the limiting factor in most systems. I intend to use this card to record. I was a bit wary of buying a card directed towards normal consumers, but after testing it looks like it will be a non-issue. I'll have to do further testing to confirm this. Cons: At the price, nothing more can really be expected of this card. It would be great if this functionality were paired with HDMI, though. There might be video cards out with such a connection. My laptop has HDMI, but it is noisy when using it for internally mixed PCM audio. There is one issue that I've had with it, and that is an odd polary distortion when using DirectSound to record. It also has no balanced connections, which I would not expect for the price, anyway... I would recommend this to any consumer that wants an upgrade in functionality and less noise than integrated sound. Programs are available for sound processing, but you will still be limited by the hardware.

This card did exactly what I hoped it would do and did it flawlessly. I am using a laptop. My main reason for upgrading to this card was so that I would have an Optical out port for use with my Astro A50 Wireless Headset. The card's optical output works perfectly, without any audio crackling or popping as reported by some other cards. The card is true plug-and-play, but you might want to download the drivers and the Creative software for it that lets you manage specific settings with the card. Some users consider this software as "Bloatware", but If you'd like to really take advantage of the more advanced features of this card, I suggest you install it. It hasn't caused any performance hits for me or delayed my boot time, so I really don't see the cause for complaint. It's a small little icon that gets placed in your taskbar where, upon clicking, gives you access to the Creative Control Panel and the Creative Entertainment Console that lets you adjust things on the card, such as your speaker set up, EQ settings, THX Tru Studio Pro features, EAX effects, and the ability to turn on and off the all important Dolby Digital Live feature. ESSENTIAL if you are planning on using the surround-sound feature on your headset or entertainment system. The card comes with a small remote that can be used to do various things like adjusting your volume, pausing/playing/stopping/rewinding the music/video in the active window, and a power button in the upper right corner. The power button DOES NOT turn off the card. Instead, it closes whatever is currently your active window, so if I had iTunes open and pushed the power button, it would close iTunes. I'd say that the remote has a maximum range of about 5 meters, and remote control requires direct line-of-sight to the card. You have to point it right at the card to get it to function. On a positive note, the remote comes with a battery! The card comes with a fairly long USB cable (about 4 to 5 feet long) and should be able to reach wherever you need to put it. It also contains a CD with the latest drivers and Creative software (at the time of this review). By default, this card will play audio 16bit at 48KHz instead of the 24bit at 96KHz that it is capable of. To change this, simply right click the the volume mixer (little speaker icon in the bottom right.), click playback devices, find your Creative card, right click it, click properties, go to the Advanced tab, then changed the playback under Default Rate to something of your choosing. Also, something for iTunes users: If you set your card to 24bit at 96KHz and the iTunes settings don't match, iTunes may completely refuse to play your music. I fixed this by going into iTunes and changing the playback settings to match. Do this by opening iTunes, clicking on Edit in the top-left, moving down to preferences, click the Playback tab, and in the bottom section you will see the playback settings that iTunes is currently using. Simply match them to what you set your card to and then restart iTunes and everything should be fine! A NOTE TO LAPTOP USERS: If you plan on using this as just a sound card replacement without any additional peripherals like speakers, you will be disappointed. With this card set as the active audio device, your on-board laptop speakers will not work because they are wired directly to your on-board card and without risky soldering, this can't be changed. Keep that in mind. You WILL need a set of external speakers or a headset of some sort to be able to utilize this card. As far as disabling the on-board card to avoid driver conflicts? I had originally disabled my on-board RealTek card to avoid driver conflict, but I'm using a headset and as such, don't have any speakers for external audio. I re-enabled the RealTek card so that I could switch the default playback device back and forth between my headset or laptop speakers depending on my need. I have not run into a single conflict yet, so I would say that it seems safe to keep it enabled. If you run into conflicts or Blue Screens of Death, try disabling your on-board card from the Windows Device Manager. Overall, I am very pleased with this card and feel that the price is easily justified! If you are interested in purchasing an external sound card, ESPECIALLY one that supports surround sound do yourself a favor and pick up this card for about $30 more than the competitors. You won't be disappointed!

Bought it to use with my astro a50s on my desktop. I didn't realize until recently that I wasn't getting full surround without dolby digital live. Hook this and your a50 mixamp up via usb to the pc, then run optical cable from OPT OUT on the sound card to OPT IN on the astro mixamp. Then skip the cd and download software package from creative site. All the people who are having driver errors saying "supported device not connected" are downloading the wrong drivers. You have to download X-Fi 5.1 PRO...key word being PRO. If you download X-Fi 5.1 for this card it will give you that error message. Go to playback devices after install and select Spid/f xfi 5.1 pro as default device. Right click it go to properties and then advanced tab. Change bit and sample rate to dolby digital live, click two check boxes below allowing applications to take control (the only issue with this sometimes is skype lowering your game volume, but you can disable that in the communications tab under playback devices). Click apply. Go to creative audio control center then click encoder tab. Check dolby digital live. In the other software from Creative--the Entertainment Center--is where you can change it from 5.1 to 2.1 to headphones. You can also create and apply custom EQ settings here. Take the time to mess around with eq settings. Find one that's close to what you want then tweak it and save it. People make a big deal about EQ settings and how it should be done. I have no idea how it "should" be, I just know what sounds good to me. Play some music you know very well, like the back of your hand. Then start playing around with the sliders. I try to keep a pretty close to neutral balance in the mids (some are <0.0 some are >0.0 but close to neutral. Then bump up the lows a tad as well as the highs. It makes a world of difference. Here's where this thing pisses me off a bit. The "manual" is garbage; atleast when it comes to using the x-fi as a encoder. I've seen better and more thorough instructional guides on the back of a Pop-Tart box. In the entertainment center I have no idea if I need to set it to 2.1, 5.1 or headphones if i'm just running the usb from the computer to the xfi, then running the optical to the A50 mixamp which turns 5.1 into 7.1. Do I have to have 5.1 speakers hooked into the x-fi in order to transmit 5.1 to the astro mixamp? If I'm just using the usb for the xfi is that considered 2.1 and then it encodes that to 5.1? Since I'm wearing 7.1 headphones do I need to set it to headphones or 5.1? Do I need to set Dolby digital live to share with Spidf output as well as speakers even though I'm not using external speakers? The fact that I can't even call them to ask this pisses me off even more(email only, after you fill out a form longer than those you'll find at the DMV). So in the end, I'm not sure if I can reaaaally recommend it whole-heartedly to a stranger without first asking them how they intend to use it. Even though I can tell a difference, I can't tell if its just from my custom eq and the crystallizer, or if its the dolby digital live thing. Either way it sounds better and was still honestly worth the 45 bucks. I disabled my onboard audio and uninstalled Realtek drivers just to avoid issues but may not be necessary. If you ever hear a popping noise in your astros, first check to make sure all the settings are right in playback devices and in the Entertainment center, then unplug the power usb from sound card and astro mixamp and plug back in and double check settings once more. That fixed the issue for me when it happened. Otherwise you might need a higher quality Optical cable than the ones that ship with the astros, which I don't know much about optical cables in terms of quality having any effect on the sound, but those are the poorest excuse for a cable of any kind, ever. FINAL VERDICT: + Don't have to use a pci slot + Dolby Digital live works (i think?? lol) + Custom EQ's and other audio settings + Ability to use with wide variety of audio peripherals + Remote control for lazy people - Terrible instructions/guide - Too many variables in the DDL settings (there's like 4 different places to enable it, WHICH ONE DO I NEEEEEEEED) - Lack of phone support (seriously if there's one thing worse than crappy phone support, its the complete LACK of it) -

I'm a computer science engineering student and entrepreneur. Take my review for what it's worth it to you. REASON for Purchase: Purchased these headphones because my server motherboard audio has always been horrific and has only worsened with the installment of Windows 10 x64 PRO where the headphones don't always give audio and the movies in my speakers were flat and plain dead. Finely researched into alternatives (I've own Creative sound cards in the past) indulged and purchased. Needless to say, I don't regret the purchase. I actually freaked out the first time I watched a movie with this thing. I was dozing off and the audio was so clear I thought people were in my room (of course I picked late at night and a drama with action). I woke up to do battle hahaha! *I think this falls as a PRO paragraph but I felt it should hold its own section. If not for the humor of those wanting a quick conclusion of what I think is a great product. LoL! Godspeed.* PROS: -(1)- Solid Audio Device for PCs running Windows 10 x64. -(2)- Overall, very happy with this thing. It seriously made my ATH-50x headphones come alive on Youtube music videos, games, and movies. I received these headphones as a gift back in January and I really regret not getting this sound card sooner. -(3)- Oh the options. Gorgeous audio under SBX Pro Studio I've set the: -Surround to 30% -Crystalizer at 50% -Bass at 50% -Smart Volume at 74% -Dialog Plus set to 50% CONS: -(1)- Frivolous and weak plastic for the ports regarding the headphone, Line-IN, and MIC IN ports. I can see that if anyone were to constantly roughly disconnect and reconnect the accessorizes that these ports may crack / fall apart. In short, not recommended as gift to children (or sloppy adults hahaha!). -(2)- The remote's battery was dead on arrival (purchased a new one and it's fine now). -(3)- Software does not always detect headphones. Meaning, if my headphones are already plugged into the device and I hit play on a Youtube video. I most likely will only get audio playing out of one of its speakers. A driver issue that I believe Creative will get sorted. As it stands, it only does it for my ATH-50x headphones (i.e. I have the worst of luck) which has me scratching my head even more so - it also doesn't happen all the time (inducing even more head scratching). LoL~! I believe it may be that these headphones are more demanding relative to my cheapo stuff. Overall, the CONS take half a star off for me with a rounding to 5 stars (you be the judge overall). I will update should point 3 in the CONS be sorted but as it stands, I am a bit bummed. Hoping they get it sorted so the software doesn't randomly drop connectivity for my best headphones. In short, if you turn on the SBX Pro Studio settings is where this thing comes alive. It truly immerses you into whatever you are doing and pushes all outside noise away. UPDATE (while writing this review): The problem was ultimately that I had this device plugged into a USB 3.0 port on my PC. As it stands, my PC requires drivers to run its USB 3.0 ports so I can only conclude that was interfering with this device's drivers. Plugging it into a regular port ratified the issue. I may not leave my room now, ever.

I bought the Creative Soundblaster X-Fi Pro, because I love and still use my six year old Creative X-fi Usb card with great results, as both a sound card and digitizer, but it is only 16 bit 44k. The fact that it is THX certified (I have always have very impressive results with their certification) was another factor. What I wanted was a 24bit, 96k card, to use as a USB digitizer, at the higher rate. As a digitizer, it does a superb job at the 24 bit rate, clean, very quiet, much better than my on board sound card, a VIA, which is also 24 bit, 96k, but the recording quality and playback is pure crap, noisy, distorted, colored and so on. The Sounblaster Pro was an easy set up, simply plug and play, the software which came with the card is also abundant, and updated right after installation. There are several things however that bother me about the card. First, when playing the card for the first time, the bass was tubby, and I had to play with the Creative software for a couple of hours to get what I would consider clean sound, through my M-Audio BX5a 5-inch BiAmplified Studio Monitor Speakers . Once tweaked, the sound was good, but less than I expected, in comparison to my old Creative unit, which has cleaner, tighter bass and mid bass and overall flatter response when monitored with an SPL meter . The old unit has an on board X-Fi Crystalizer, and X-Fi CMSS-3D sound, with switches on the side to turn the effects on and off, and select "button" for adjusting the amounts of processing with the volume knob. The new Soundblaster, has none of this and utilizes, what I believe to be software emulated effects for a couple of reasons. When monitoring the processor usage, it goes way up, where the old X-fi barely used any resources. Also adjustments can only be made with the new Creative software. I could only monitor 24 bit recordings on the new Sounblaster, in true 24 bit, with what I consider "true quality", after a lot of A-B comparison with several 24 bit, 96 k recordings on regular amps, one a Sony, the other an Onkyo TX-NR708 7.2-Channel Network Home Theater Receiver (Black) , and the OLD Creative X-Fi, which actually emulates 24 bit, 96k with the Crystalizer. When all was tweaked, I was happy, but boy, it was more work than I expected. For ease of use, and honestly sound quality, I'm sticking with my OLD Creative X-Fi for day to day use. The NEW Soundblaster, is going to be used as a high bit rate digitizer, which is why I bought it any way, and any high rate playback is going to go from the optical output, through my Sony amp and Aux studio monitors. I believe this new Creative card is good for gamers, maybe less sensitive speakers and those who need an inexpensive 5.1 unit for movies, not for recording monitoring.

major EAX update right here: march 8 , 2014 the x-Fi pro 5.1 supports EAX on windows 8.1 and probably windows 7 too. When I first used it on XP ,..XP does not support Alchemy and I never herd any EAX effects with known EAX programs , on XP. ( Alchemy.exe was never supported on XP ) . I went into the creative folder and saw Alchemy.exe . drag a short cut to the desk top for easy access. Add\verify any EAX programs are on the right side pane in the Alchemy applet. x-Fi supports at least EAX 3.0 and I think possibly 4.0 ,..and maybe even 5.0 . Why ? because the Witcher 1 game only supports 4.0 and in the default alchemy.ini file, the withcer 1 is included in the default list( Alchemy auto detected witcher 1 ). Plus the voice counts are at 129 , and only EAX 5.0 supports 129 voices . So, I guess MB2 or the new MB3 is still usefull,..BUT the x-Fi SB1095 is a USB product . So put in on your note book or desktop PC Windows 8.1 and no need to get MB3 . I only talked about MB2 and MB3 to add\provide EAX 5.0 . But the desktop has only the SB1095 installed and I get all the EAX via the Alchemy.exe applet . And , DDL dolby digital live is there too, for the SP-DIF optic port , provides 4.0 and 5.1 channel audio on the optic port . x-Fi unit version SB1095 retail box dated 2011 CD dated 2010 driver update supports windows 8 ( it also updates w7 too ) *** x-Fi Pro can replace internal x-Fi extreme gamer, minus 7.1 minus EAX *** x-Fi 5.1 Pro has all the I\O features of an internal sound card. *** add MB2 to restore EAX to 5.0 HD( windows 7 ) *** I was skeptical since Creative doesn't advertise it that way, but that's how it is. ***** video editors can pan\edit 5.1 audio , on the notebook ! ***** see MB2 note: below Bass Management: recently found bass management is available in the THX settings: Creative console THX --> Speakers enable it( speaker turns blue ), ignore the slider. Now at the top left, click the "Gear" advanced settings and set the bass management slider to 118 Hz ( I know it works with the analogue jacks, have not tested on the optic out ) XP : games run with 5.1 4.0 2.0 , analogue jacks only. In the creative console, leave the creative console speakers set to 5.1 . Un-sync speaker config check box( do NOT check ). now if needing 4.0 , use windowsXP audio applet to set to 4.0 and the quad will now work. If going back to 5.1 , use the windowsXP applet again. For XP, always keep Creative's speaker sync Un-checked. windows 7 : games run with 5.1 4.0 2.0 analogue or optic, our choice. *** the volume knob on the box only works with analogue setup *** MB2 note windows 7: I no longer have the MB2 feed the x-Fi Pro device( selected devices ) I disable the MB2 device, from playback devices, I also disable MB2 in device manager. the installed EAX gadget and EAX 5.0 HD are still avialable to the x-Fi Pro box. The reason for disabling the MB2, it was interfering with the Direct Sound 5.1 audio editor. four configurations for a notebook to get 5.1 , 4.0 and 2.0 support with the: x-Fi surround 5.1 Pro usb box: 1. pair with the turtle beach Z6A ANALOGUE 8 speaker headphones( windows 7 or XP ) 2. pair with the turtle beach DSS2 box OPTIC( windows 7 only, as XP can only ....do 2.0 here ) 3. pair with a Dolby home theater OPTIC( windows 7 only, as XP can only do 2.0 here ) 4. pair with a Dolby home theater ANALOGUE discrete 5.1 speakers ( windows 7 or XP ) ALL windows 7 configurations may add MB2 to get full EAX 5.0 HD ALL XP configurations, EAX may NOT work . ALL XP configurations, No version of Dolby Digital Live will install onto XP ....for this x-Fi Pro box . ....( amusing because creative has Dolby Digital Live for XP with many different ....internal x-Fi sound cards ) XP: software DVD player that has Dolby built in, can play 5.1 on the optic. windows 7: may not have EAX support either, but Creative's MB2 software ............can add full EAX support. *** my configuration on the windows 7 notebook is: 3 items,.... x-Fi Pro box, MB2, turtle beach DSS2 gives: 1. Dolby Digital Live "DDL"( allows 5.1 4.0 2.0 Dolby audio onto the SPDIF optic out ) 2. 5.1 4.0 positional audio on the SPDIF optic and on the analogue jacks, my choice. 3. full EAX 5.0 HD ( 2.0 3.0 4.0 5.0 with 129 3D channels, all via MB2 ) 4. IR remote control 5. creative update supports windows 8 6. its usb so it's portable 7. the x-Fi box acts as a dongle, so No activation is needed for the "DDL" . And the hauppauge 950 Q usb TV tuner using player 2.4c it's the only release that ever worked right. The TV tuner is on the fastest usb port( shares the IRQ with the SATA harddrive ) The x-Fi Pro is on the next fastest usb port The usb mouse is on the slowest usb port the 2.2 Ghz single core Celeron does pretty good, 4 gig DDR2 800 Mhz mem. intel graphics, regular series 4, NOT the 4000 HD, oh that would have been good. actually the x-Fi Pro sound card is kinda light weight. CD audio 16\44100 at 1,411,200 bits per sec. 1.44 Mbs . Next, studio quality audio is 24\96 at 4,608,000 bits per sec. 4.6 Mbs still should be easy for 2.0 usb Dolby 5.1 audio at 448,000 bits per sec. is even easier. Plays 1920 x 1080 TV crap really nice with this config. Don't need a quad core. tweak tip: I did backup of windows 7, then reinstalled as a bare min. install, ............that was an option to do so. It did help the machine run better. This was the best windows 7 tweak for the pre-installed machine. Out of usb ports: TV tuner, sound card, mouse, DSS2 box ...................that's 4 devices and the machine only has 3 ports. ...................DSS2 box only needs USB power, powered via external USB . *** final comments: 1. Full set of output options. Analogue 5.1 jacks( No Dolby ), ......optic output( Dolby ) , headphone output( No Dolby ), line in , mic in 2. IR remote control( with battery ) 3. external volume\mute knob( only works with analague configuration ) 4. No power button( speakers may pop during re-boot, power up\down ) 5. Uses 400 ma on the usb port, usb ports max at 500 ma 6. Plays and records up to 24 bits per sample at 96,000 samples per second . 7. works good for games , movies , music. 8. Allows video editors( on a notebook ) to pan\edit 5.1 audio star rates 5 max: 4 stars for XP features , No reasonable working EAX , No MB2, No Dolby Digital Live 4.5 stars for windows 7 features , MB2 may be needed to get good EAX 5 stars for Creative update , software download supports windows 8 EAX : programs detect the 64 3D channels, but it never works on XP. Playing music, the EAX presets sometimes work, most the time not. That's my experience with the EAX on XP. For windows 7, MB2 was already installed, and the x-Fi Pro box has good working EAX . The x-Fi 5.1 Pro box is the total usb sound card for a notebook, it totally trumps the Recon3D. I would have gone for the Recon3D if it had the same I\O and features of the x-Fi Pro. I also passed on the x-Fi HD usb box . Creative needs to redo the x-Fi 5.1 Pro with the new Recon3D engine to make it the new Hot item.

I used to have the Creative X-Finity PCMCIA sound card, but my new computer didn't have a PCMCIA port. I found this one online. First of all, it's a huge improvement over the old one because it doesn't require any additional hardware accessories to connect 5.1 surround speakers to it. The sound quality is very rich, and I can hear the full range of audio when I have music playing. The included software is essentially the same as the software for the old sound card, which was plenty good already. It allows you to balance the surround in general, or each speaker manually. You can also use the Crystalizer to increase sound crisp-ness. There are further effects such as opera-house/ movie-theater/ etc, but I don't use them so I can't comment on their quality. There is also a full equalizer for those who want to use it, though I myself don't find it necessary. The hardware itself is quite compact, and having it as a USB is extremely convenient. I have a laptop, and since I don't really move my speakers ever, I can just plug the sound card into a USB hub and leave it there. Whenever I come home, I can plug in the hub and that's it, everything works great. The audio control knob on the sound card is an added convenience that I find very useful when I'm watching movies in full screen, for example. There is also a remote control for the sound card that comes with it, which I think will be pretty convenient if I ever remember to use it. In terms of functionality, the remote works well, but usually requires a clear contact with the sound card, without having big items between them. Overall, this is a great unit, and at ~$60, it is fully worth its value. Creative always makes good products, and this one did not disappoint.

UPDATE (3-28-2023): I tried a Creative GC7 because of the button presets but they removed the +/-24dB range of adjustment! I am horrified that this is gone. That's the only reason I buy these. Let's hope future versions of Windows support this SB1095 because I will never let mine go if possible. Creative needs to bring that 48dB range of adjustment back! I absolutely love this thing! Where else can you get something with a 10-band EQ that allows up to 24 dB of boost at 31Hz? I don't always use it at +24 dB but when I want it, it's there, and that makes me very happy! You can save several EQ settings. If you are a basshead, be sure to lower your preamp slider to -12dB. That will prevent distortion. It actually has a built-in limiter but it makes it sound compressed if you add too much boost, so lowering the preamp slider is the solution. I'm actually surprised at how much bass it can add without distorting. I chose this model over their HD version because that one doesn't come with a software equalizer. Actually, the main reason I bought this was for the equalizer. My motherboard already has built-in sound. Software equalizers can't do what this does! Please Creative never lose that 31Hz band and +/- 24dB range of adjustment! But if you could add the option of a 1/3 octave EQ and maybe even a self-adjusting automatic EQ (like what the Behringer DSP8024 does), that would be a dream come true! One thing to note is that it can pick up noise from other electronics nearby, so if you're hearing strange things, try moving or rotating it a little. Creative, please make it more immune to noise. I don't use any of the sound enhancements or effects because I'm not a fan of that kind of stuff, so when you install it, be sure to turn all that stuff off. It comes with the Crystalizer and Surround turned on by default, so at first I was wondering why it sounded so strange. I use it in 2-channel mode to listen to music, so I can't say anything about how it performs in surround mode. I like how it has a headphone jack, and when you plug something into it, it disables the main RCA output, HOWEVER, it causes my speakers to emit a slight hum, so I end up turning my home stereo off when I use the headphone jack. Please fix this Creative. Overall, I am extremely pleased! I've used it for over 28 months!