Auzentech was a

Korea Korea ( ko, 한국, or , ) is a peninsular region in East Asia. Since 1945, it has been divided at or near the 38th parallel, with North Korea (Democratic People's Republic of Korea) comprising its northern half and South Korea (Republic o ...

n computer hardware manufacturer that specialized in high-definition audio equipment and in particular PC

sound card A sound card (also known as an audio card) is an internal expansion card that provides input and output of audio signals to and from a computer under the control of computer programs. The term ''sound card'' is also applied to external audio ...

s. Auzentech has its origins in March 2005, when under the company name HDA (HiTeC Digital Audio), the company launched the X-Mystique 7.1, the first consumer add-in sound card to feature

Dolby Digital Live Dolby Digital, originally synonymous with Dolby AC-3, is the name for what has now become a family of audio compression technologies developed by Dolby Laboratories. Formerly named Dolby Stereo Digital until 1995, the audio compression is lossy ...

. Initially only a manufacturer, HDA's products were commercialized worldwide by a network of local distributors, including BlueGears as their vendor in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...

. In 2006 the company took distribution into their own hands, ceasing relations with BlueGears, and subsequently changing their brand name to Auzen (a name which originates from "Audio" and "Zen") and their company name to Auzentech. Since that time the company continued to incorporate new sound cards into their lineup in an effort to compete in a market dominated by

Creative Labs Creative Technology Ltd. is a Singaporean multinational technology company headquartered with overseas offices in Shanghai, Tokyo, Dublin, and Silicon Valley (where in the US it is known as Creative Labs). The principal activities of the compa ...

. Auzentech sought to provide customers with features not present in Creative's sound cards at that time, such as real time multi-channel audio encoding and built-in

TOSLINK TOSLINK (from ''Toshiba Link'') is a standardized optical fiber connector system. Also known generically as optical audio, its most common use is in consumer audio equipment (via a "digital optical" socket), where it carries a digital audio st ...

connections. These features enable users to have multichannel realtime audio (like that originating in PC games) over a single digital line, instead of the previously unavoidable three analog lines running from the PC to the speakers. Also present in all Auzentech sound cards are user-replaceable

OPAMP An operational amplifier (often op amp or opamp) is a DC-coupled high- gain electronic voltage amplifier with a differential input and, usually, a single-ended output. In this configuration, an op amp produces an output potential (relative to ...

s, which offer the possibility to further improve the out-of-the-box quality of

analog Analog or analogue may refer to: Computing and electronics * Analog signal, in which information is encoded in a continuous variable ** Analog device, an apparatus that operates on analog signals *** Analog electronics, circuits which use analog ...

outputs. Eventually expansion led Auzentech to broaden their range of products to include items such as

speaker Speaker may refer to: Society and politics * Speaker (politics), the presiding officer in a legislative assembly * Public speaker, one who gives a speech or lecture * A person producing speech: the producer of a given utterance, especially: ** I ...

microphone A microphone, colloquially called a mic or mike (), is a transducer that converts sound into an electrical signal. Microphones are used in many applications such as telephones, hearing aids, public address systems for concert halls and publ ...

s and

PC case A computer case, also known as a computer chassis, is the enclosure that contains most of the hardware of a personal computer. The components housed inside the case (such as the CPU, motherboard, memory, mass storage devices, power supply unit an ...

s among others. Auzentech has recently switched from the

C-Media C-Media Electronics, Inc. () is a Taiwan computer hardware company that manufactures processors for PC audio and USB storage, and wireless audio devices. Products ISA audio * CMI8328 * CMI8330 PCI audio * CMI8338 * CMI8738-SX * CMI87 ...

audio processors used in their earlier cards to the X-Fi audio

DSP DSP may refer to: Computing * Digital signal processing, the mathematical manipulation of an information signal * Digital signal processor, a microprocessor designed for digital signal processing * Yamaha DSP-1, a proprietary digital signal ...

, licensed from their competitor, Creative Labs. Since late 2013, Auzentech's official web site has been directing to a park page, and their technical support department ceased to provide any service.

Products

Based on C-Media chipsets

* X-Mystique 7.1 Gold
Based on the CMI 8768+ chipset. Launched in June 2005. First PC consumer add-in sound card to feature

. * X-Plosion 7.1 DTS Connect
Based on the CMI 8770 chipset. First PC consumer sound card to feature

DTS Connect DTS, Inc. (originally Digital Theater Systems) is an American company that makes multichannel audio technologies for film and video. Based in Calabasas, California, the company introduced its DTS technology in 1993 as a competitor to Dolby La ...

certification. In June 2009, the card was re-released, with its name changed to X-Plosion 7.1 Cinema (discontinued). * X-Meridian 7.1
Based on the CMI 8788 chipset. Launched in February 2006, it was the first card launched with the Auzentech brand. * X-Meridian 7.1 2G
Based on the CMI 8788 chipset. Launched in December 2010 * X-Raider 7.1
Based on the CMI 8768 chipset. Launched in July 2009, the X-Raider is a 24-bit, 96 kHz PCI 2.2 compliant card, supporting

bus mastering In computing, bus mastering is a feature supported by many bus architectures that enables a device connected to the bus to initiate direct memory access (DMA) transactions. It is also referred to as first-party DMA, in contrast with third-party ...

modes.

Based on Creative Labs' X-Fi chipset

* X-Fi Prelude 7.1
Launched in August 2007, the Prelude was the first time the X-Fi chip was used in a product not manufactured by

. * X-Fi Forte
With all previous Auzentech sound cards being PCI cards, launched in January 2009, the Forte was Auzentech's first low-profile native PCI Express 1.1 sound card. DTS Interactive support was added through a later driver upgrade. * X-Fi Home Theater HD
Released in August 2009, it was the first HDMI 1.3a compliant sound card and the first

Dolby TrueHD Dolby TrueHD is a lossless, multi-channel audio codec developed by Dolby Laboratories for home video, used principally in Blu-ray Disc and compatible hardware. Dolby TrueHD, along with Dolby Digital Plus (E-AC-3) and Dolby AC-4, is one of the i ...

compatible sound card. PCI Express 1.1 interface. Seeking to provide the best possible performance, Auzentech and Creative Labs collaborated to modify the X-Fi processor to optimize it for operating over the PCI Express bus. The Home Theater HD was conceived to work with future video card offerings from

NVIDIA Nvidia CorporationOfficially written as NVIDIA and stylized in its logo as VIDIA with the lowercase "n" the same height as the uppercase "VIDIA"; formerly stylized as VIDIA with a large italicized lowercase "n" on products from the mid 1990s to ...

, providing what NVIDIA and Auzentech call the "ultimate in audio and visual entertainment". * X-Fi Bravura
Launched in January 2010, the X-Fi Bravura is a PCI Express x1 card. X-Fi Bravura has 5x user replaceable OPAMPs.

Others

* X-Studio 5.1
Launched in July 2009, alongside the X-Raider, the X-Studio is based on the VIA High Quality ICE 1723 audio processor. The card is capable of outputting 24-bit, 96 kHz audio and is presented as a PCI 2.2 card.

References

External links