oscen's Full Review: Rio Diamond Monster Sound MX300
Having tested the MX300 OEM in the same computer with a Creative Live Value (OEM), the MX300 has lost favor with me. Unfortunately I cannot repeat what I have stated in my review of the Creative product, but I can paraphrase it. Keep in mind that this is for a OEM MX300 and what I state may not hold true for a box MX300. But it has proven true for two different OEM cards in two different computers.
While having comparable sound output quality, the output of the MX300 is noisier. The microphone input is noisy to the extent that it is unusable for voice recognition. The MX300 has compatibility problems with some operating systems, and is not supported under Linux (Redhat 6.2). I have not been able to get it to work under WIN95 OSR2 either (the install crashes), although this could be a configuration issue. Again let me stress that it is possible that the first two problems would not occur with a box MX300.
While I have been a happy user of this card for some time, having tried a Creative Live Value (OEM), I cannot recommend the MX300. Indeed, I plan on pulling the MX300 from my computer, although I have not determined exactly what to do with it.
Still if you are using the MX300 for playing music, don't do voice recognition and have no OS compatibility issues, don't rush out and buy a Creative, the sound quality is comparable. If it was not for OS compatibility problems, I would keep my MX300.
You can test for microphone input noise as follows. Open a recorder that has an input signal display (the windows one will do). Record with no signal input to the microphone port (I have tried with nothing attached, just a plain cable and a microphone which was turned off). If you see anything but an absolute flat line, you have a problem. In repeated tests on a friend's system, even a little noise degraded voice recognition to the point where it was not usable.
I still prefer Diamonds software, but this is not in itself reason enough to recommend the MX300, at least in the OEM package that I have experience with. Even with the noise problems cleared up as I would hope that they are in the box version, compatibility issues and the questionability of future support would keep me from recommending it.
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