Review: Creative X-Fi Xtreme Audio Notebook

If you're fed up with poor quality audio from your laptop, Creative’s X-Fi Xtreme Audio Notebook might be what you’re after.

It fits in the Express Card slot of compatible laptops (older machines with PC Card slots aren’t supported) and includes much of the same X-Fi technology found in the company’s desktop soundcards.

The card and software is very easy to install and you get some bundled applications such as Creative’s Mediasource software for managing your media and Power DVD for playing movies.

Once the card is set-up you’ll find that it has two multi-function mini-jack sockets on the front. One acts as both a headphone jack and an optical output, while the other can be used as either a microphone input or optical input.

If you want to output analogue surround sound you need to invest in the optional speaker dock module. This connects to the card’s breakout connector and provides mini-jack outputs for feeding 5.1 or 7.1 speaker systems. In some countries this module is included with the card, but in the UK it will set you back £20.

The X-Fi Xtreme Audio Notebook is certainly not a multi-purpose card - instead, Creative aims it squarely at those who use their laptops for listening to music or watching movies. Indeed, the lack of certain features may put some potential buyers off. For example, there’s no Music Creation option available in its control panel. This also means it lacks a low latency ASIO (audio stream input/output) driver for use in music applications, so you can’t address the surround outputs individually in applications such as Cubase SX.

If you’re buying the card for music listening rather than music making, tho ugh, you’ll be more than happy with the sound quality. It can record and playback 24-bit audio at sample rates up to 96KHz.

But what’s really impressive is the audio processing features. As with the desktop range of X-Fi soundcards, this model includes support for Creative’s Crystalizer and CMSS 3D audio enhancement technology. The former attempts to kick some life back into music that has been compressed using formats such as MP3.

Usually these types of effects initially sound good, but become tiresome with prolonged listening. However, that’s not the case at all with the Crystalizer. It really does add extra oomph to your audio, making bass sound deeper and cymbals sparkle again without cause ear fatigue.

Similarly, while most 3D surround effects tend to blur the boundaries between instruments and make vocals sound woolly, the CMSS 3D effect doesn’t suffer from such annoying artefacts, even when working at its extreme settings. Instead it adds a pleasing amount of extra ‘space’ to music and movie soundtracks.

The card also supports EAX 4.0 and Open AL for surround sound in games and while the surround placement isn’t quite as good as you’ll get from a desktop X-Fi card, the effects in titles like Doom III were still pretty decent.

However, we still have a few issues with the card. Firstly, despite the name, it doesn’t actually include an X-Fi chip (the EMU20K1). Unlike Creative’s desktop cards, which off-load audio processing onto the card’s audio chip, this Notebook model relies on your laptop’s CPU to do the grunt work.

This means that turning on the 3D CMSS and X-Fi Crystallizer effects while listen to music will add some processor overhead. Secondly, it seem a bit odd to produce a card that’s aimed a audiophiles and movie lovers, yet only offer analogue surround sound via an optional adaptor.

Still, if you really do feel that your laptop’s built-in audio is below par and want something that will make your music tracks shine and movie soundtracks come to life, this card is a reasonably good, if hardly ground breaking option.