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Rating: 
Summary: A top of the line cost efficient card
Review: I bought this card in May of '99. I have never had a dedicated PCI sound card , and after rebuilding my system i was blown completely away at the ease of use and complete fuctionality of this card. If you dont have the cash, get it. This card will be the first and last you buy for years. The software that is included keeps it from becoming dated by easily being updated via the sblive website. I cant say enough good things about this card. If you dont have a dedicated sound card, save the money and hear the difference.
Rating: 
Summary: A quality card for a low price
Review: If you are attempting to build or upgrade a computer on a budget, Creative Labs' Sound Blaster Live! Value card is more than worthy of your consideration. I've recently moved up to a better sound card, but the Live! Value card gave me three years of quality audio on my old computer. It is more than capable of providing true 3D sound depending on your speaker setup. The Environmental Audio options feature preconfigured settings for a number of popular PC games, and they also make for some interesting types of audio atmospheres for your CD music, featuring such options as padded room, forest, hallway, arena, etc. I did sometimes run into a problem playing music CDs in Windows Media Player or Real One Player-sometimes my Environmental Audio settings seemed to override my individual player settings and sometimes they didn't. Overall, though, music CDs will sound quite good with this sound card and will suit the needs of most users. All but the most intense gamers should also be happy with this card's performance. If you want better audio, you naturally need to pay a little more for a more technologically advanced sound card. For the average user, this card will more than meet your audio needs without inflicting significant damage on your wallet.
Rating:
Summary: A quality card for a low price
Review: If you are attempting to build or upgrade a computer on a budget, Creative Labs' Sound Blaster Live! Value card is more than worthy of your consideration. I've recently moved up to a better sound card, but the Live! Value card gave me three years of quality audio on my old computer. It is more than capable of providing true 3D sound depending on your speaker setup. The Environmental Audio options feature preconfigured settings for a number of popular PC games, and they also make for some interesting types of audio atmospheres for your CD music, featuring such options as padded room, forest, hallway, arena, etc. I did sometimes run into a problem playing music CDs in Windows Media Player or Real One Player-sometimes my Environmental Audio settings seemed to override my individual player settings and sometimes they didn't. Overall, though, music CDs will sound quite good with this sound card and will suit the needs of most users. All but the most intense gamers should also be happy with this card's performance. If you want better audio, you naturally need to pay a little more for a more technologically advanced sound card. For the average user, this card will more than meet your audio needs without inflicting significant damage on your wallet.
Rating:
Summary: The best card you can buy for money
Review: The Sound Blaster Live! Value Card is in my humble oppinion the best sound card you can buy for your PC. And it's cheap too... All the major game studios are designing their games to run with all the enhanced feature that the Live! card offers. I must highly recomend this card, and must say that it's the best spend money ever.
Rating:
Summary: This soundcard is amazing
Review: The SoundBlaster Live! is absolutely amazing. It's made me pull out some of my older games just to play them with the new environmental sound. I've encountered zero problems and am absolutely loving this purchase.
Rating: 
Summary: So Much hassle, it must be live.
Review: There is no doubt in my mind that this is one of the cleverest and most delicious sounding cards around, but I honestly think Creative have lost their way with driver creation. I know of at least 4 PC's that have refused point blank to operate using Liveware 3, my own included, yet they all work beautifully on Liveware 2. The interface could be simpler for the not so audio-savvy, and it seems there are too many ways to do (and hence screw up) the same things. A basic graphiv equaliser would have been a nice touch too. Midi is no great improvement over the old awe series, certainly not worth bragging about, but that's no great insult as the AWE's were superb for their day anyway. Games fans will find the environmental audio implementation a welcome bonus, with simulated positional effects and faithful reproduction of sound in various situations (sounds become muted in carpeted areas and echo around in bare caverns etc.), but the game needs to support EAX to begin with. You may find this card doesn't want to play your older DOS based games, and to be fair, Creative claim only partial SB16 compatability. Were it not for the slightly fussy interface, the iffy drivers and the so-so DOS support, this card would have easily earned 5 stars, and if it goes in your system without wanting to fall over the way it did in mine and several PC's I know of, then it's worth every last penny.
Rating:
Summary: INCREDIBLE!
Review: This is an INcredible sound card, supports eax, makes the games sound enviormantal realstic and 3d sound extreme, and is a very realstic and great sound card I'd reccomend for any dvd viewer or musician or gamer!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Rating:
Summary: Amazing
Review: This soundcard is amazing. The sounds you get out of it are so lifelike. From playing games to listening to music, the difference can be heard. Also, if you have a surround sound speaker system, you should definitely get this because you'll definitely be experiencing games and music rather than just listening to them. No wonder Creative says "Sounds so real - it's live!"
Rating:
Summary: One of the best sound cards around
Review: Those of you who are absolutely rabid game freaks should probably fork out your money on sound cards based on the Aureal Vortex2 chipset. However, you can't be faulted for going with the Sound Blaster Live! Value. If you haven't experienced 3D audio then this card is a treat. It's a positively eerie feeling when you can hear enemies creep up behind you in a dark room, or hear a TIE interceptor attack your flank from the virtual cockpit of your X-Wing. The Environmental Audio Extensions are impressive [try Aliens Vs Predator] and the DOS support is second to none - great for playing those older DOS games. The musical reproduction was flawless. And for the money, this is the best value you can get. Aside from a few configuration problems with older DOS games the card installed perfectly in my system. Creative Labs has delivered a great all-around package for the game fanatic.
Rating:
Summary: Don't let the "Value" part fool you!
Review: When I bought this card, I was a little worried that getting the "Value" version of the offering might lose something. When I got it home and installed, I realized that was uncalled for.This sound card is really excellent. Its a piece of cake to install, open PC, (remove old card if necessary), plug this into a PCI slot, connect CD-ROM, and you're off. The bundled software was also easy to install. Coming from older style sound cards (8-bit, or SB-16), this will really blow your mind. The sound reproduction is truly awesome - I can even play MIDI files and get something out that sounds half way decent. The piano voice is also outstanding, considering the price of the card. Drums are faithfully reproduced. Some sounds are a little on the tinny side, but acceptable. The bundled software (as mentioned previously) is easy to install and use. There's the usual kind of hype ("Control your PC by voice"), which I really don't have much time for - it takes too lond to go through all the training stuff for my liking (you might want to take a look at more dedicated software if this what you want a soundcard for, eg. Dragon or IBM products at the lower end). Game players will be delighted - especially with some of the environmental audio (you can make it sound like you're in a dungeon, or a concert hall, or a ... you get the idea). Overall, at this price, you really can't go wrong.
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