SB Live! 24-Bit USB External Setup

Here are the detailed steps for setting up the SB Live! 24-Bit USB External soundcard for use with REW under Windows XP.

• Ensure in the Creative Speaker Settings that the "Digital Output Only" box is not checked.
  
  
  
  
• In the Creative EAX Console make sure Audio Effects is not enabled, Equalizer is not enabled etc.
  
  
  
  
• Ensure CMSS is off (the green CMSS LED on the front of the unit should be off - push the CMSS button on the unit if it is on).
• In the Soundcard Preferences configure the controls as shown below with Wave volume, Output volume and Input volume all set to 1.000.
  
  
  
  
• Open the Creative Surround mixer and check that in the Source panel Wave is not muted, Line-In/Mic-In is muted and that in the Rec source Line In/Mic In is selected - the controls need to be set as shown below.
  
  
  
  
• Ensure monitoring is off (click the + by the Line In/mic In symbol in the Source panel and ensure Monitor is not checked in the Advanced Controls dialog this pops up.
  
  
  
  
• In the Creative Device Control program set the Output Audio Quality to 48kHz, 16 bits and ensure you select 48kHz as the sample rate in REW, also make sure Enable Monitoring is not checked).
  
  
  
  
• If a dialog pops up that says to hear audio you must enable monitoring, click Cancel on the dialog.

Sample rate and bit depth settings

Although REW uses 16 bit audio samples at either 44.1 or 48kHz, it is possible to set the SB Live! card to use 16 or 24-bit samples at 44.1, 48 or 96kHz. Changing the sample rate settings slightly alters the internal filtering in the soundcard, example measurements in the different settings are shown in the graphs below. Using 16 or 24 bit settings makes no difference as REW uses 16 bit samples. 48kHz/16-bit is recommended, make sure the REW rate is the same as that set for the soundcard, when the rates are different the soundcard will resample slightly degrading the measurement quality. Note that 96kHz/24-bit may not be possible depending on your USB connection, if so this message will appear:

Measurement Results at various sample rates

Measured with a single 256k sweep at -12 dBFS Sweep Level.

Frequency Responses

Impulse Responses

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