Creative takes sound out of the box
Published: 30 Jan 2002 12:24 GMT
Creative Technology yesterday unveiled the Sound Blaster Extigy, the Singapore-based company's first stand-alone external sound decoder unit for PCs and first of a new generation of living-room entertainment appliances.
Creative founder and chief executive Sim Wong Hoo, who has been trying to broaden its product range beyond its bread-and-butter PC sound cards, said the Extigy marked the company's "getting away from the dictatorship of the box, away from the people who own the box."
The Extigy can operate without a PC, functioning as a living room unit that decodes inputs from hi-fi sets, MP3 portables, DVD players and game consoles. The device contains Creative's Audigy sound processing chip, which is at the heart of the recently launched high-end Audigy sound cards.
About the size of a paperback and weighing just as much, the black console was designed in Singapore and will be manufactured in the Republic in the short term, said Sim.
During the press launch, Creative's chief executive hinted that there will be more PC-home entertainment convergence products to come, based on the Extigy form factor.
While Sim declined to give details, he said a digital amplifier, DVD player and CD-RW are in the pipeline, all with the same look and feel of the Extigy.
"It's a whole new world for us. The Extigy is our Trojan Horse," he said. Sim added that in future, the lines will blur between computers and home entertainment electronics, with users eventually migrating their computers into the living room for both work and play.
Before that happens, Sim expects strong initial demand for the Extigy from PC users who want high-end PC sound without the hassle of installing an internal card.
While there have been external audio decoders in the market for over a year, none are as sophisticated as the Extigy or offer as many input-output options.
The $149 Creative device plugs into the USB port of a PC and takes over its audio functions. The Extigy accepts a range of digital and analogue inputs, both electrical and optical. Besides Dolby Digital decoding for DVD movies, the unit can perform various types of audio processing, including cleaning up pops and hisses as well as creating surround sound modes from standard stereo music.
The Extigy is expected to be available throughout Asia from early February.
Creative was recently in the news for swinging back into the black with a net profit of $26.3m in the quarter ended 31 December.
Have your say instantly, and see what others have said. Go to the ZDNet news forum.
Let the editors know what you think in the Mailroom.
Did you find this article useful?
40 out of 65 people found this useful
Digg
Slashdot
Del.ici.ous
Stumble
Reddit
