Audio Reviews

I did a great amount of research on sound and video cards, be-
fore I purchased this product at compUSA. I did not immediately
open it, as it was factory sealed, and I did not intend to install it for a while, because I was going to use it with the
computer I was building. Imagine my surprise whe I did open it
and discovered that the "external drive" advertised on the box
was missing. CompUSA refuses to issue a refund or exchange, and
I have contacted creative labs to see if I can get the drive,
but they have not responded as yet. Will contact them by phone next. I plan on posting my results with creative labs by the end
of July.

Yes, the card doesn't work with XP when you install it. It's not brain surgery; In fact, it's rather easy, and you will be up and running in no time. Also the second card isn't supposed to fit into the PCI slot the same way the other cards there do since it does not have a PCI connector! Unlike the main card it does not actually go in the PCI slot.

With the newest audio processor since the days of the Live, Creative has once again outdone itself. With all the power of professional souind boards at hundreds of dollars less. There is no background fuzz while recording from a MIDI input (unlike SBLive!), and the ability to record dual tracks simultaneously makes this board the music creators paradise.

It also sounds remarkable. I hooked up my DVD player, XBox, and even a simple portable discman to the external drive and enjoyed the quality of sound. The DTS decoder works well too. I noticed no distortion after hooking up my Klipsch Pro-Media 5.1 (6 piece) surround speaker set, despite the sound information running from my DVD player to PC, then from PC to Speaker system.

Gaming sound effects are awesome as well. Previous games like McGee's Alice and Deus Ex being high up on the list of games that sound totally awesome. Unfortunately there aren't many games that can fully utilize the new EAX HD capabilities, but the standard regime of FPS games sound great.

This card is by far the best thing to happen to sound cards since the first release of SBLive! Great for making your PC the new household hub for entertainment centers.

This was my first experience with a mega-changer. Though my son found it relatively easy to program, I couldn't see the markings well enough to do so. And after about a month, it began to skip. First I thought it was dust or user error. Then it started to skip more often. After another month, it would play the first CD, then skip, skip, skip. I took it to an authorized JVC repair place in November and it's been there ever since. "It has problems," to quote the repair person.

I bought this JVC to replace my old Optimus 5 CD changer. WOW, what a difference!

This unit holds all my CD's plus room for a few extras. It is easy load the CD's because it has each slot numbered. The remote control is not too complicated to figure out. Also, it comes with a handy binder to hold the CD pamplets and stickers to place on each page so that you know exactly which number CD to choose.

I bought this model chiefly because the older 334 was discontinued. But I was not dissapointed. There is one key thing about this unit, simplicity. It may not have CD text, a keyboard port, or look very flashy but it does just what I need it to do. It is also very easy to use and control, mostly because of the three different playback modes(continuous, one-disc, and program). The output is decent and the disc access is relatively quick, and for some reason, the noise from the rotary spinning doesn't bother me that much. If there is one drawback, however, its loading the discs(or rather, preparing the unit to load the discs.) I found it a little difficult to get it to go in the loading/unloading position. But that was the only cutback I found. In all, its a great unit and a perfect component to the rest of my audio system.

Like so many of us out there who have just bought a new projection HDTV, its time to upgrade the old stereo to an audio visual receiver. I had always heard H/K was good stuff, so I bought this H/K unit because of the controls configuration and the features. I am replacing a 21 year old Onkyo receiver that still works great but doesnt accomodate 5.1 etc. My Onkyo is 45 watts per channel (last of the analog dials made) and the H/K is aprx. the same rating. With tearful unceartantity and that new car smell anxiety I set aside my Onkyo and hooked up my new H/K. The display lit up and it looked better in my house than at the store (you know the feeling). When I turned up the volume I got no sound from the TV or DVD input so I swithed to am/fm and got some "fuzzy music". I only hooked up 2 speakers (JBL 3way 15" woof.) but I tried every mathematically possible wiring configuration that an electrical engineer could conceive and I could not get this unit to get louder than a FIFTH! of what my Onkyo would do ; and the clarity was not as good. So I took back the unit to the store and they hooked it up and what I heard at home was the same thing that we heard at the store. The store people said that the unit is working properly and I should be looking for a 110 amp+ per channel unit to match the performance of my old Onkyo.

I am not deaf and when my wife cannot carry on a normal conversation with me she turns down the volume, she never objected to the H/K untill it was at full blast. Simply put: this unit has no nads.

I have remedied the situation. The store cheerfully took the H/K back and I hooked my Onkyo back up. I ran Y-cables out of the back of my DVD and split the audio between my TV and my Onkyo. I ran my "TV out" leads to my Onkyos' other tape monitor in. I now have 4 floor standing 3-way speakers that sound better than anything at the audio store that is under $1000.00. And it is easy for my wife to use!

I am not H/K bashing here as it is a very beatiful unit. I think that the display is the most attractive on the market. There are a couple of good uses for the H/K thogh. It would be ideal for a powder room or a closet. Or; like they used to do with those beatiful color TV consoles that our grandparents had -- turn that beutiful display into a fishtank (saltwater would blend nicely with the orange letters). Hope this helped.

The HK AVR 125 isn't a world class piece of stereo equipment. What it is is a very competent performer at its price level. It was Harman Kardon's entry level A/V receiver in their line from 2001-2003. I'd originally bought mine as a temporary fix, thinking I'd relegate it to a backroom or a family member after I upgraded.

There are two postive comments to be made about it. First it contains a fairly advanced DAC for it's class [DACs translate cd bits into music]. Not bad for an entry level product. Secondly it shares, along with most HK receivers the fact that it's amplifier is made of discrete electronics unlike the particle board assemblies that other products in its price class contain.

One big negative: The HK receiver line is ugly. Extremely ugly. Cheap looking with some exterior clear plastic molds that don't help, whoever designed the line's looks should go back to the drawing board.

All in all I'm satisfied with the HK AVR-125. It's not cutting edge but it's amp section is good enough that I'm not worried about upgrading until after I purchase a very good universal player.

My first receiver was an Aiwa AV-D55 stereo receiver. It was pretty good but the volume knob stopped responding: If I turned it down at the unit it would go up. The only thing that works on it is a remote. So I bought the Harman Kardon AVR 125. I was immediately impressed with the clarity and while it didn't produce the same bass as my other unit it produced better sound. I could see where adding a subwoofer is a good idea at this point. The Aiwa was much cheaper. Only $$ compared to $$. But I've been very pleased with the features of this model. It does everything I need it to do and has every input/output connection I need. This unit also doesn't have sound fields like rock, jazz, or whatever. It's just a very nice to the point receiver. So far this is the best receiver I've ever owned. The Aiwa sounded muddy by comparison. It had a t-bass tri-level setting which is handy if you don't own a subwoofer. But I've never missed it. And I know that once I add the subwoofer this system is going to be even more amazing. I use JBL speakers and it's very crisp and clear.

I burn about 50 CDs a week in live music trades. I can tell you from experience that these discs do not last. After a year or so, they start to skip more and more and have all sorts of problems. Any scratches that they have only make it worse. I recommend using Sony, Fuji, or TDK. All the others are cheaply made in comparison and just don't stand the test of time. So if you care about preserving your CDs, don't use these ones.

For me these have been the best CD's on the market. I basically used this brand because they were the ones I generally used when transferring my albums to cassette. The same quality continues.

I personally never liked using Fuji or Sony recording media in the past. TDK wasn't bad with cassettes; however, my record with CD-R's with them has been 25 wasted discs out of a spindle of 50. I have so far used hundreds of the Maxells (this line and their others) and have only had one or two discs I had to discard due to errors.

Also, all the ones I made a few years ago still sound great.

These are the best CD-R's for both price and performance.

I was surprised to see the results the prior reviewer had in using these music CD-Rs. I have been using the Maxell CD-Rs for three years and I have never had a problem. The home audio CD Recorder that I use is the Sony RCD-W1 and I get a perfect copy every time with the Maxell CD-Rs. I know some CD burners on PCs can use music/audio CD-Rs to make copies but I know that there are occasional burn/read errors when using them. In that situation, I suggest sticking to regular CD-Rs. I have a stack of burned Maxell CD-Rs that I am alwasys listening to in my car and to date play flawlessly.

It's not bad when it works. I have had the 500 series now for just over 1 year. It broke the first time half way through the warrentee and the second right after it ran out. With only an MMC slot the expandibility stinks as well. On the plus side, the screen is very bright and nice, battery life was good, and the price is now almost half what I originally paid.

Just got a EM-500 and I love it. But I was shocked to learn that no one makes a keyboard for the system - folding or otherwise. I've even called the manfacturers, and they say they have no plans to make one. So if you want to add something along those lines, look for a different pocket PC.

I love PDA's (and computers in general, for that matter) and this is an excellent device. There was a time when I swore by Palm's pda's, but while Windows CE (now known as Pocket PC) has evolved to near-desktop power, the Palm has remained virtually unchanged. Of the Pocket PC's available, this unit is the best compromise of size and power. It packs a 150mhz cpu (more powerful than the HP Jornada, less than the Ipaq), 16mb of ram, and an amazing screen capable of displaying 16bit color. The Ipaq and HP Jornada can both only do 12-bit color at best. All of that is packed in a comfortable, small device that feels extremely solid in the hand.

While I do believe the EM-500 is probably the best unit available, it does have a few draw-backs. The miserly 16mb of ram is hardly enough... if you buy this make sure to get a 32mb or 64mb memory card to go with it. My other complaints are minimal: lack of hardware volume control, location of IRDA port... but none of these minor issues really impact the usefulness of the unit.

Definitely a great PDA, and well worth the money

The speakers have a rating of 5 watts RMS, not ten as stated above. The sound is decent only at the lowest of levels - at least on my computer. They can't play loudly without considerable distortion.

The speakers are pretty decent for the money.
I just picked them up because I just wanted a cheap pair to hold me over for a little while. The sound quality is decent. Not a lot of bass obviously, but decent.
However, if you turn the volume up more than halfway, you start hearing a constant buzzing sound which gets louder as you increase volume. A bit annoying.

But again, fo the money they aren't terrible.

I purchased these speaker at walmart for 20$ they sound decent depending on what you want you want to use them for. There not made to be loud although they can sound fairly loud when playing music or dvds, or even games. When you turn the speakers up all the way they tend to make a type of rattling sound/buzzing sound. So if your wanting loud speakers dont buy these. Although they do sound good for instant messgaing music,things that dont require alot of bass or really high pitch. But these speakers are worht the 20$ for your tipical computer uses.

I have a different MP3 from this company, but I need to warn anybody considering a purchase from Digitalway. My MP3 failed within 6 weeks - customer service is impossible to get a hold of, even more difficult to understand than the User Manual, and unwilling to send the return/repair forms. The 120 day warranty is worthless.

This is an excellent product! I bought it based on the experience of a friend of mine using the DMG model. The sound is excellent and the design of the hardware. The only thing it miss is: leather case to carry it around and a rugged case to carry the whole thing when u travel. I do not know any place to buy a case for it. Sound is loud enough (specially in a city like Cairo) the remote is enough for me. I rarly use the main unit. I connected it to cheap pair of amplified speakers and the sound was just perfect. Buy it if you did not do that yet!

I was looking for a good looking, not-too-big not-too-small mp3 player with upgradable memory and most importantly, good sound quality. This player had both, plus plenty of features. Despite it being small and light, really does feel solid and rugged with a nice metallic front.
The player really does run for 24 hours from one AA alkaline battery as it claims, and I got even more from rechargeable 1850mah energiser nimh batteries.
The remote is great, though the joystick is a little fiddly and sensitive, but still felt rugged.
One thing that I felt was missing from the player was the ability to encode directly from an external source.
Overall though I love it and I'l probably buy from MPIO again, though some of the Iriver players look pretty attractive too.

i saw this being sold for 20 bucks and i was a little skeptical cause of the low price. so i went home did a little research on it and decided to buy and try it out. initially i thought i thought i was pretty good. Installation was easy. I didn't have problems with replacing my previous sound card, and there were windows ME drivers on the cd provided. The sound kinda sounded choppy but the surround sound actually worked when i played CS. But I realized i couldn't get two sounds at once anymore. Before i could listen to winamp and play another wav file at the same time.. but it didn't work anymore. Muse also drained my cpu. if i tried loading up a program, while playing a mp3, the song would get choppy. i downloaded the most recent directx drives and i still had all the problems. Running a pentium 3 666 i didn't think i'd have the problems, but i was wrong. After removing the sound card and using my old one, i didn't have anymore problems. I figure if you have a super computer this would work fine. But for me, i returned it. Try it out though, it may work for your computer.

This card is great. For the price you can't be it. Granted it isn't a Dolby 5.1 card, but for everyday multimedia you cannot get a better card for the money.

Supports 4 speakers and all the usual inputs, i.e. Mic & Gameport.

But, there is one catch. Burn a copy of the cd before you do anything. Because God forbid you do something stupid like step on it. After calling tech support and hitting pretty much every voicemail box in Canda, realizing aparently the people a Guillemot don't enjoy clearing out their messages, and then trying email...etc.etc.

Seriously, tech support even during business hours leads to full voicemail boxes. Emails don't get returned and they don't post the drivers for this card on the site. Its been the accepted (well not really, but) 4-6 weeks and I don't see a replacement CD anywhere.

So make sure you know little tricks like driverguide.com because that is the only place you will find Maxi Muse drivers.

I have been very happy with this card. Nothing fancy, but it's fine for my needs ... playing cd's, mp3's, and games.

Installation was fast and easy.

The CD that comes with the card includes the drivers, manuals, and programs such as a media player (not nearly as user-friendly as WinAmp of Windows Media Player) and a karaoke program (a cheesy little midi-based thing). Fortunately, you can deicide which of the software extras you want to install, so you won't be cluttering up your system with programs you'll never use.

I agree with the other reviews about the sound quality (although I find the Logic software rather unfriendly compared to other packages ('The Environment', for instance).
I feel this product is let down by poor reliability & technical support (eg they are not supporting XP/2000 drivers!).
My machine needs frequent cold boots as anything 'weird' causes the card to be missed by W98.
I would say go for one of the alternatives such as Sounblaster's Live Platinum.
Also, if in London, avoid Turnkey.

Guillemot Maxi Studio ISIS is total cool .... would you believe that the BeOS community is developing an application which runs on BeOS. Since BeOS is the operating system of choice for many of us in the recording industry this is truly a Godsend.

The ISIS card is a godsend to those who want an inexpensive multi-channel audio interface for their PCs. It will allow hard-disk recording of up to 8 mono or 4 stereo tracks at a time only at 16-bits 32/44.1/48khz (even though the A/D converters are 20-bit). Sure there are better converters out there, but not at this price.

The total amount tracks available at mixdown is only limited by your CPU/HD/RAM capacity. In other words ISIS is quite capable of playing back say 100 audio tracks - if your PC and software can handle it.

Bear in mind that the 8 analog inputs on the external interface are LINE only, not mic. You will need mic pre-amps or a mixer with direct outs if using microphones. There is however a mic input on the ISIS PCI card itself which uses a 1/8" mini-jack (audio quality is good, but more like your average Sound-Blaster).

In addition the ISIS sports both an optical and co-axial S/PDIF in and outs. The MIDI sounds on board use the DREAM chipset, same as the Roland Sound-Canvas. Your 4meg sound library can be further expanded using a 32M/byte SIMM.

WARNING! Be sure your motherboard does not use VIA chipsets (this has nothing to do with AMD or Celeron/Pentium CPUs). Use boards with Intel chipsets only. Preferably BX. Consult your computer dealer if necessary. Avoid Seagate EIDE drives when using Logic Audio.

Oh! And don't forget to have some fun. Good luck!

I tried this thing out for two weeks.
4 weak points:

1. It takes soo long to transfer music to it.
30 minutes per 1 hour of music. This is a drain on the batteries and your time.

2.It's buggy. It Hard-Reset (losing everything on my handspring) my Handspring twice, the thing soft-resets my Handspring soo often, either by taking it out of the springboard slot before it's good and ready, or it just freezes. The User-interface could be much better.

3.It sucks batteries like you won't believe.
It suggests you get special "NiMH" batteries that are $$$ for two, plus you have to get a recharger, so that it can play longer. Using normal Alkaline batteries, you need to stop listening every bit of time so the batteries don't kill too fast. Otherwise it'll die without warning.

4. Serious design compromises. Not being able to put the cover back on the handspring sucks. Also, it really adds to the size and weight of the Handspring.

There is one minor element: Compact Flash cards are still very expensive, although the price will down with time.

To sum it up: it's not a bad little player, just disappointing in almost every way! Get yourself a stand alone module with more memory.

I'm returning my InnoGear module. What a disappointment. I listened to music for about 10 minutes and wiped out almost a third of my battery. The file transfer can only access the 2 MB section of the module, not the removable (and expensive!) media. Data transfer is slow and I'd recommend no less that 128 MB storage for reasonable listening. I had planned to keep this module in all the time but when it is in you can't put on the protective cover. The photos in the photo album are awful on my b/w screen-- not worth the time it takes to load them.

It simply doesn't live up to the hype.

I just got a MiniJam and attached it to my old handheld (Prism) for workouts at the gym. When I got the new Treo, my Prism threatened to become excess. Repurposing it for entertainment seemed to be the thing to do.

Intuitive Operation / Reasonable Setup
This is only the second Springboard module that I have used (Eyemodule was the first). I was pleased to find that MiniJam works intuitively. I am typically put off by set up procedures involving disks and devices, but it was painless. I would have been less daunted by set up if the instructions were printed as a simple 1, 2, 3 on the outside of the box instead of the junky graphics. The unit is a lot less junky than the pictures on the packaging seems to indicate. Once it was set up, it couldn't be easier to use. It is intuitive, taking advantage of the familiar icons of traditional products like a cassette tape player and (browser-style)juke box.

Function in the Gym Environment
OK, I wouldn't say that the earphones would never fall out; running on the treadmill would require a different listening apparatus. For my workouts, though, the MiniJam worked great. I am substituting it for a Walkman tape player, so the key benefits were being able to switch to songs that I felt like hearing without winding and longer battery life -- no more droning tape. The drawbacks were losing the earphones once during weightlifting and initially getting the Prism situated on me so that I didn't inadvertently bump the buttons.

Key Observation
When I got my first handheld, I didn't feel compelled to use module expansion. However, it's amazing how when I have two of them the primary one does all the calendaring and traditional functions and -- with the Springboard platform -- the second one gets used more as I imagine Handspring had intended: sort of a Swiss Army Knife of electronic products. I would have still kept the Prism for playing games (any Wordlet enthusiasts?), but it has a lot more life left in it than that.

I recommend the MiniJam. It's just what you'd expect your Springboard MP3 player to be.