Yesterday, Gigabyte announced that the company’s X58, P45, P43 and P41 series of motherboards now support Creative’s Sound Blaster X-Fi technologies. The technologies in question are X-Fi CMSS-3D Virtual, X-Fi Crystalizer and EAX Advanced HD 4.0.
X-Fi support also applies to other motherboard series featuring the ALC889A or ALC888 audio codecs and although software implementation of X-Fi doesn’t quite bring all the goodies you’d get with an actual dedicated card, it’s still a better call than usual integrated audio solutions.
Note that due to changes in Vista’s DirectSound3D implementation, “certain legacy DirectSound3D games will have its audio compromised, resulting in only stereo output without any effects” so Gigabyte advises using Creative ALchemy to restore EAX effects and full surround.
The downside is, however, the $29.99 price, as $15-20 more can buy you Creative’s X-Fi Xtreme Audio with better connectivity and even a couple of software goodies.
You can find the official press release here.