Auzentech Auzen X-Fi Prelude 7.1 review

A few years ago, a sound card was an essential addition to your PC if you wanted decent noises to come out when you ran games or music software.

Now, most PCs have reasonable audio built into their motherboards. But newcomer Auzentech is creating a stir among gaming fanatics and audiophile purists. Its previous cards were regarded as a credible alternative to Creative's X-Fi units, and this latest addition combines Auzentech's acclaimed sonic purity with the same X-Fi audio processor used in its Creative rivals.

Audio quality is excellent, although the improvement over a standard motherboard audio chip is arguably quite subtle. It's similar to comparing a CD track and a 128Kbit/sec MP3 file: some people hear a massive difference, while to others they're identical. More obvious is the effect of the digital processing licensed from Creative. The X-Fi Crystalizer is designed to restore detail and vibrancy to compressed formats such as MP3. It's a dubious claim, but it does make music sound punchier. Another feature taken from Creative's cards is 64MB of RAM dedicated to storing sound effects for compatible games, taking some of the load off your PC's main memory and processor so they can work harder on smooth gameplay. Creative's ALchemy driver is included to make DirectX games sound as intended in Vista.

With these great features inherited from the Creative chip, it's disappointing that, unlike Auzentech's previous cards, the Prelude can't encode surround sound into Dolby Digital and DTS formats to send to surround speakers through a single digital audio connection. This feature is 'coming soon', but when buying it's best to judge by existing features, not promised ones.

The Prelude's main problem is that its price doesn't compare well with Creative's X-Fi cards. The nearest equivalent, the X-Fi Xtreme Gamer Fatal1ty Professional, costs around £85, or if you can live without the X-RAM the X-Fi Xtreme Gamer costs around £35. We'd stick with them.