I’m considering trying out Linux in some not-too-distant future. I’m also currently doing serious shopping for a sound card. That is, I will definitely order a new sound card today or in a couple days (by end of this weekend for sure). I saw one review on newegg that said in passing: “I guess open source drivers is just a problem with Creative products in general.” So, do you guys agree? Should I stay away from Creative if I want to use it with Linux (playing BF 1942 in Linux, in particular)?
well, when i started my Linux journey i was using a crappy onboard AC/97 & 1 even crappier speaker, now i have a Creative SB Audigy SE & sound has always worked by default on any distro i tried (excluding Gentoo), driver support for sound card doesn’t seem to be an issue
BTW: presumably AT will agree but be more technical probably recommending the ALSA sound system over OSS
I have an Audigy 2 ZS card and it works ok in Linux. The emu10k driver works well enough but I don’t tax my sound card much at all so I don’t know how well it works with advanced configurations.
I also have an EMU10k1, and it works wonderfully. But all Creative-brand cards are not alike. They are extremely sneaky about their marketing and branding, which makes it tough to know what you’re getting. For example, a lot of cards labeled as Audigys don’t have a proper chip, but the Creative equivalent of an AC97… and that’s one expensive AC97!