Creative Labs SB0886 PCI Express Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Professional Series Sound Card

by Creative

Product Details

• Product Dimensions: 11.2 x 2.4 x 7.9 inches ; 1 pounds
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Shipping: This item is also available for shipping to select countries outside the U.S.
• ASIN: B0018EFGTM
• Item model number: SB0886
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (79 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank:
  • #19 in Electronics > Computers & Add-Ons > Computer Components > Internal Sound Cards
• Date first available at Amazon.com: July 7, 2004

Product Description

Amazon.com Product Description

Step up to the choice of professional gamers with the Creative PCI Express Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Professional Series sound card, and get the ultimate PC gaming audio experience. With support for the latest technologies, the X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Professional Series delivers realistic environmental effects and 3-D positional audio so accurate, you'll be able to locate opponents by sound for a gaming advantage that might mean the difference between a win and a loss. The Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty is Johnathan "Fatal1ty" Wendel's choice for audio.

PCI Express Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Professional Series At a Glance: Powerful audio processing for better game performance X-Fi CMSS-3D creates nine virtual speakers when using stereo headphones X-Fi Crystalizer restores lost detail in compressed music and audio Realistic gaming effects with EAX 5.0 64MB of X-RAM for better performance in supported games

64MB of X-RAM gives you an added performance boost for compatible games. View larger.

Powerful Audio Processing Boosts Game Performance
The PCI Express Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Professional Series sound card employs a powerful audio processing engine. Unlike other motherboard audio solutions that task the computer processor, the X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty performs the heavy lifting and leaves your processor free to work on other tasks. This results in unbeatable game performance while still delivering all audio effects with outstanding 24-bit sound quality.

64MB of X-RAM for Enhanced Gaming Performance
Featuring 64MB of X-RAM, the X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty provides a performance boost to games such as Quake 4, Battlefield 2, Unreal Tournament 3, and more. You can play with all the best audio settings enabled without having to worry about sacrificing performance.

Realistic Gaming Effects with EAX 5.0 Technology
With support for EAX ADVANCED HD technology, the X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty delivers rich environmental effects for a complete immersive gaming experience. You'll hear bullets whizzing by your head, feel earth-shattering explosions, and experience other sound effects that bring you closer to the game.

Positional 3-D Audio
With X-Fi CMSS-3D technology, the X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty delivers outstanding surround sound whether you're using headphones or speakers. When used with a regular pair of stereo headphones, X-Fi CMSS-3D creates nine virtual speakers for exceptional surround effects, letting you feel like you're sitting in the best seat of a movie theater. You'll get an advantage in games, too, with the ability to locate enemies by sound before they see you.

And with multichannel speakers, you'll be able to hear exactly where the audio cues are--even between speakers. Voices will be right in front of you and ambient sound will surround you, just like a live performance. CMSS-3D works with both desktop stereo speakers and full surround speaker systems.

X-Fi Crystalizer Restores Lost Details
Recover lost audio detail with X-Fi Crystalizer technology. This smart technology restores the audio detail that is lost in compressed audio files so you'll regain vibrancy and clarity in your games, music, and movies. Highs and lows that were lost are enhanced, so whether you're listening to cymbal crashes or wailing guitars, you'll hear the sound as it was meant to be heard.

High-Quality Voice Chat
With high-quality inputs and hardware audio processing, the X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty ensures great vocal quality in your voice chats, so your teammates will hear you loud and clear. Plug in your headset or microphone, and you'll hear the difference instantly.

Intense Cinematic Sound for Movies
The X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty delivers THX-certified surround sound for a cinematic experience right at your computer. Cyberlink PowerDVD software is included (via free download) and supports DTS and Dolby Digital-EX decoding for an unmatched DVD movie-watching experience.

The X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty also supports Dolby Digital Live and DTS Connect encoding (Windows Vista only), so you can connect directly to your home theater system through a single digital cable for fantastic 5.1 surround sound.

Advanced Features for Audio and Music Creation
For those in the audio- and music-creation business, the X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty offers advanced features and high-quality inputs for outstanding recording results. A dedicated mode supports near transparent conversion between any resolutions, digital-matched recording, low-latency ASIO support, and more.

System Requirements
Microsoft Windows 7, Vista, or XP; Intel Pentium 4 1.6 GHz or AMD Athlon XP 2000+ processor or equivalent; available PCI Express (x1, x4, x8, or x16) slot; 256MB RAM (512 MB RAM for Vista); 600MB of free hard-disk space; CD or DVD-ROM for software installation; headphones or amplified speakers; Internet connection to download PowerDVD player software.

What's in the Box
SB0886 PCI Express Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Professional Series sound card, Quick Start leaflet, and installation CD.

Creative Sound Blaster Sound Cards (Internal)
Looking for external sound cards from Creative? Click here.	Sound Blaster X-Fi Xtreme Audio PCI Sound Card	Sound Blaster X-Fi Xtreme Audio PCI Express Sound Card	Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium PCI Express Sound Card	Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Professional Series PCI Express Sound Card
General Info:
Connection Type	PCI	PCI Express	PCI Express	PCI Express
SNR for Playback	108 dB	104 dB	109 dB	109 dB
Speaker/Headphone Support	Stereo to 7.1	Stereo to 7.1	Stereo to 7.1	Stereo to 7.1
Music and Movies:
24-bit Sound Quality
X-Fi Crystalizer
X-Fi CMSS-3D
THX Certified
Dolby Digital Live and DTS Connect (Win Vista Only) Encoder
DTS & Dolby Digital Decoding via free PowerDVD Download
Games:
EAX Support	EAX 4.0	EAX 4.0	EAX 5.0	EAX 5.0
X-Fi CMSS-3D Headphone Surround
Hardware Accelerated for Better Performance
Hardware OpenAL and DirectSound3D Support
64MB X-RAM
Music Creation:
Dedicated Creation Mode with ASIO 2.0 and 3D Midi Support

Product Description

Creative Labs X-Fi PCI Express Sound Blaster Titanium Sound Card 70SB088600002 Sound Cards

See all Product Description

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

17 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Great Sound, Finicky Drivers, Almost Perfect Sound Card, December 27, 2009

By 

Wavey Davey (Southern CA, USA) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Creative Labs SB0886 PCI Express Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Professional Series Sound Card (Personal Computers)

I've had a Sound Blaster "Fatal1ty" Pro sound card installed in my custom-built Core i7 920 series CPU-equipped PC since April, 2009, so at this point have been 'around the block' with the product, and feel well qualified to comment about what makes it tick, where there are issues, if any, and give an overall view of how it functions.

I am running the card in PCI-Express Slot No. "0" in an EVGA E760 Classified motherboard, the Single-Lane slot (1X) which is right next to Slot No. 1 where my first EVGA GTX 285 1GB SC video card is located. I am running two 285's in SLI Mode, along with a D-Link "Extreme N" PCI-Express network card, plus an Areca 1680IX-8 PCI Express SAS to eSATA/SATA/SAS RAID Controller, so each and every slot is filled, (or negated by the twin-lane video cards) the entire bay packed full of the finest equipment $$ can buy. Cooling and keeping the integrity of the various cards is "assignment No.1" when you are running this much equipment in a PC, and placement of the various cards is strategic, and specific to each one's needs, it goes without saying.

The Sound Blaster card is a piece of work! I have a set of Logitech Z-5300 (predecessor to the Z-5500 setup, today's top line speaker system) speakers, that would be five (5) 28W RMS Satellite speakers, and a 240W RMS sub-woofer driven by discrete amps, with peak power approaching 600W at full song, a most impressive sounding speaker system. The Fatal1ty card drives the speaker system in 5.1 mode (Dolby 5.1 it is more commonly known as), and the sound is full, clear, clean, and can be deafening at any setting past "5" on the Logitech controller. I never have it past 3-4 normally, as that is PLENTY of volume!

The speakers are hooked up to the Black, Orange, and Medium Green colored ports of the sound card, ie 3 speaker wire output, not 4. Orange and Medium Green are apparently left and right primary channels plus the sub-woofer, while Black is main power, ground, and discrete channels (surround sound), or so I have discovered experimenting with various connections. The Light Green/Grey port is not used with my setup...if you had a 4 speaker cable setup you would utilize the Light Green/Grey port for the 4th channel in a Dolby 7.1 setup, for example, but my system is not that sophisticated...it has left, right, left rear, right rear, middle and sub-woofer channels, which is all there is to a 5.1 speaker setup.

Key to establishing good sound in any setup with the Fatal1ty sound card is disabling the onboard sound from the motherboard, and by that I mean you must go into BIOS and disable it, not just "turn it off" via the Sound Control Panel in Windows. Presently I am running Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit OS. Previously I ran Vista Ultimate 64-bit, with equally fantastic sound output, no issues at all to speak of but the onboard sound having to be defeated 100% for the Fatal1ty card to function correctly.

I also use the Fatal1ty sound card as a "sound in" device for audio recording. I master tapes and records with a DAK PC-2800 Mixer, and the sound card functions as the "line in" through the Blue port of the card, ie that is where you plug in the "line in" from the mixer. One must go into the Sound Control Panel in Windows and choose the "Line in" function to be able to do mastering, and disable the microphone and any other possible "line in" connections for the mixer to function properly, and the same goes for any other type of "line in" into the Fatal1ty card...you must go into the CP and choose the correct input before your "line in" device of any type will function.

As for how the card functions doing mixing, it does great, no issues whatsoever! I don't have distortion, carry-over sound, non-discrete interference, none of the typical maladies that can plague a sound card as the "line in" device, with this card, it just works, as long as you go into the CP and choose the correct input for what you are doing. You can, of course, have the speakers and the "Line in" function hooked up simultaneously without issues also, so no problems there either. In fact, I use a set of Audio Technica headphones, plugged into the Orange and Green ports of the card (leaving the Black port for the speakers alone), and a Rolls HA43 Pro headphone amp so that I have unexpurgated sound control during mixing, ie CLARITY! It all works seamlessly with the Fatal1ty sound card, no problems at all.

What are the difficulties with this setup, if there are any at all? I can think of some issues that plague the system, and you must observe these shortcomings and not go against them or you'll have problems:

1) You cannot "adjust" the Mode of the Creative Sound Control Panel "live"...ie going from "Game Mode" to "Entertainment Mode" with iTunes open, for example, is impossible...you may crash the computer, or you may crash iTunes or the Control Panel may turn white and crash (!), not a pleasant situation ***ADJUST MODE With ALL SOUND Applications TURNED OFF!***

2) The Equalizer in the Creative Sound Control Panel isn't very precise, and will conflict with the Crystalizer (3D Crystalizer) Sound Control Panel if you're not careful, and the discrete control panel segments in and of themselves must be CAREFULLY adjusted, especially if you want to avoid distortion and conflicts within the various panels in the CP ***DO NOT MAX OUT The Various Sound Controls and Expect good sound!***

3) When you are updating the Control Panel (ie going from one software variation to the newer iterations, ie v6.1.5 to v6.1.9)it is a bit complex, and involves a restart to take effect. It is best accomplished by UNINSTALLING the Creative Control Panel completely with Windows uninstaller tool, or the Creative uninstaller tool, then running the updater function, installing the new version "fresh" and 'virgin', so to speak (this reminds me of the nVidia control panels for video cards!!) *** DO NOT install one version OVER the previous version, you will have a mess on your hands!! ***

4) It is said that you may run the Digital (optical) connection concurrently (at the same time) as the analog speaker connection, with good results, but I for one do NOT recommend this tactic, as I have seen poor results from attempting to do this...you can try, and maybe you will succeed without distortion or other problems, but take a good warning where a warning is due, and use analog by itself, and digital (optical connection) by itself, NOT TOGETHER!

The Creative Sound Blaster Fatal1ty Titanium Professional Sound Card sure beats the dickens out of the OEM onboard sound system in the motherboard, this much is certain! Don't ever let anyone tell you the onboard sound is equal to a setup like this card, because they are full of BS or worse, if they claim this to be a fact. I have seen this subject debated in forums far and wide, and reality is this: a full-featured, and perfectly good functioning sound card is capable of feats with discrete sound application that the onboard sound is just not capable of reproducing. Bottom line? Your $125 (or so) is well spent with a card like this, ie you really can't go wrong if you observe those simple caveats above, and use your head with respect to the Creative Control Panel.

I wanted to give this sound card 5-stars, but because of the small detractions for the issues above, it earns 4-stars in my review, not 5-stars.

There is one further complication that I didn't mention because everyone pretty much accepts this to be the gospel, and very well-informed people don't bother with even trying to deal with it: Creative "Tech Support" is basically NON-EXISTENT! Oh sure, you can write them and get "advice" from the tech department, but that's sort of like a complete waste of time. Please, if you need support with respect to any of the sound card's features, you are best served by one of the forums dedicated to solving problems with these cards, and NOT Creative Tech Support, because IT SUCKS! *** BIGTIME!!!***

I have had exemplary performance from my Fatal1ty sound card, and I don't see where there is any problem with a normal, rational person from getting the same, so don't be afraid of this sound card because of anything in this review. The problems are reasonable problems, and can be effectively dealt with by being prudent, and careful with those features above that need special treatment. Other than that, I highly recommend the Creative Fatal1ty Sound Card 100% over onboard sound...there just is no comparison.

Wavey Davey - 12-27-2009

23 of 28 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Snap Crackle Pop, February 11, 2010

By 

A. Zimmerman (Alaska) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Creative Labs SB0886 PCI Express Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Professional Series Sound Card (Personal Computers)

Sound card started crackling the day I got it due to the Nforce motherboard.
This should be explicitly warned by the company. This is happening to everybody, and not just with the Nforce mobo.
Spending money on another motherboard should be unnecessary.
No fix has been implemented. The official thread even lies regarding the nHancer "solution".

35 of 45 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent Sound Card!!!, September 28, 2008

By 

G. Loera "Med Student" (Dallas-Ft. Worth, TX USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Creative Labs SB0886 PCI Express Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Professional Series Sound Card (Personal Computers)

This is an awesome product. Simple to install. Lots of features. Nice looking. Amazing sound (specially the surround sound created for headphones). Runs all my games with crystal-clear clarity, excellent effects and positional audio without a glitch.

This is not my first Sound Blaster, so I already know that the included drivers CD is outdated and loaded with bloatware. So, for those having problems with the card I suggest that you leave the included CD unopened and instead head to Creative's web site to grab the latest x-fi driver for your card, the latest control panel and the latest alchemy version. Install them in the following order:

1. Driver.
2. Control Panel.
3. ALchemy (Vista only).

Forget anything else included in the CD unless you really need it or want to try it.

I did that and I didn't have to activate anything. The activation is only needed if you plan to use the included software and I think it is because of some Dolby and DTS codecs but I'm not sure. With just those 3 things right now my X-Fi is running perfectly fine under Windows Vista 64-bit edition. I haven't found any incompatibility yet.

***UPDATE***

So far so good. I just wanted to include a few extra tips for those having problems.

I have a motherboard with Intel chipset (MSI X48 Platinum) and I haven't had any problem, but I've heard that people with nForce motherboards are having sound problems so I would like to suggest the following actions:

1. Download the latest BIOS file for your motherboard (if available) and update it. (See your manufacturer's web site for more information on this and be careful. You could brick your motherboard if it's not done properly.)

2. Download the latest chipset driver for your motherboard. It's gonna be either from Intel, from nVidia, from AMD or from VIA. Check their websites for instructions.

3. Download the latest Windows updates.

After you have done that then you can head to Creative's web site and grab the needed files. Finally install them in the mentioned order:

1. Driver.
2. Control Panel.
3. ALchemy.

The previous recommendations can also work for people having problems with this card, but who don't own a nForce motherboard.