Review on Creative Sound BlasterX G5 7.1 HD Audio External Sound Card: Enhance Surround Sound on PC/Mac/PS4/Consoles by Jason Paige

I did a lot of research on this product. The DAC chip used is actually used in many good DACs. The amp on this one is quite powerful, which is nice. But for some reason, no matter what I did with all the settings, it never had the "presence" or E1 soundstage. I've tested it on all the albums I know best and of course it sounds very dull and almost dull. Actually that would be acceptable, I could maybe turn up the EQ settings. which is a bad compromise. But then the software for the Blaster X-Series is just terrible compared to the E-Series. It contains a bunch of game presets that I don't even have and that I can't delete. Setup is significantly more difficult than the E-Series software, in addition to the fact that I can't reproduce good sound despite better hardware and the user experience degrades, a window pops up every time I unplug my headphones. Sorry, that's rubbish. I will get it back asap and return to E1. They need to make their new software look more like the old one and figure out how not to make their beautiful DAC chip sound like it's underwater. I don't understand how they did that in 2015 with a lower budget and somehow lost it in 2018 with their higher budgets. Before that I was a pretty dedicated fan of Creative. (Though I still love my E1 and GigaWorks T20 speakers.) I don't blame them, but I'll be very hesitant next time.