GA-Source heeft een review op het net geplakt van de nieuwe Monster Sound MX400 geluidskaart van Diamond. Het kaartje is gebaseerd op de Canyon 3DTM audio controller van ESS en heeft ondersteuning voor EAX 1.0, EAX 2.0 en A3D 1.0. Hoewel de geluidskwaliteit erg goed te noemen is constateerde GA-Source wel een vrij hoge CPU belasting:
Well there is a downside to arguably having what is the best 3D sound, and that is CPU utilization. Somewhat similarly to the MX300 when it hit the market, the MX400 has a fairly high CPU utilization. In my testing, I did notice that it scaled well with processors. On a 450mhz system, the MX400 had anywhere from 3% to 7% more CPU utilization than the SoundBlaster Live! which translated into a noticeable difference in some games. In Unreal for instance, that meant going from 34 frames per second down to 30, which was enough to tell. The good thing was that on my 600mhz system, the CPU utilization of the MX400 dropped significantly. On it it ran at most with only 2% more CPU utilization, and on that system the MX400 never slower by 2 frames per second in any games that I tried, which works for me.As far as 2d and DVD performance goes, I thought the quality was great. For 2D audio, my only disappointment is that there are only 2 connectors internally, and one of the is mono only got a voice modem or case microphone. The actual sound quality itself was great, and I had no playback or other issues. The included Zoran SoftDVD sounded almost exactly the same through 4 speakers as a dedicated DVD player sounded through Dolby Digital. I ran Starship Troopers, Ronin and The Matrix through it, and they all sounded great.
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