Feature rich sound card with tremendous OS support
Bought this for the purpose of giving sound to a Windows 98 gaming pc project, because the onboard audio would not work in Win98, regardless of confirming correct drivers... more frustrating when I confirmed that the onboard audio worked in Windows 2000 and XP on the same build. In any case, I was also hedging my bets because at the time, I was wagering that if it didn't work in there still, I would at least have a fall-back of being able to put it in a newer PC where I could take advantage of Daniel K's driver packs for XP and onwards. While the one I purchased didn't come with it, thankfully Vogons' website has an archive of drivers for all sorts of devices, including an archived ISO of the install CD this card would have come with when new.
Long story short, even though the Win98 project was on a VIA KT880 motherboard, the install went flawlessly, and even Doom 2 played correctly on it; DOS era compatibility was another point of concern at first, but I had been prepared for the games I would have cared to spin up on the system. Thankfully, the success of this install meant no worries. The only thing I had to do was make sure the card got the correct IRQ dedicated to it - easy enough in the BIOS I was working with.
Another thing is, this sound card can get LOUD. You will definitely want to pair it up with some good speakers... I quickly found out how crap the set I had were with how strong these output. Between the wide OS support (the aformentioned Daniel K drivers even allow this card to work in Windows 10), solid audio quality and versatility, the only reason you shouldn't get one of these, is if you simply don't have a PCI slot you can dedicate to it.
Verified purchase: YesCondition: Pre-owned