Both PCApex and XYZComputing take a further look at the Razer Barracuda AC-1 Gaming Sound Card. This baby  features a 7.1 channel output, 24 bit audio technology and unprecedented 117dB SNR (output).

After the somewhat disappointing performance with music and movies, I didn't expect the performance in games the AC-1/HP-1 combo provided. I didn't have to tweak, adjust, re tweak and swear a bit to get the HP-1's to work well with games as I had with other cards. They worked very well with little adjustment. And the objections I had to the HP-1's performance disappeared in this setting. I'm still not ready to give up my speakers, but this combo works very well for gaming. 3D positioning is quite accurate and the left to right transitions are not as abrupt as in my previous testing. I suspect the over amplified center channel might account for at least some of that. Music and movie lovers should probably look elsewhere, but gamers are going to like this combination.

The system has a few minor flaws, like that the software might be a bit too much to deal with and that the card can't run speakers at the same time as the headset (unless you use the optical). Another detail to keep in mind is that if you are switching to a video card to get better performance (through decreased load on the CPU) you should not expect much of a gain. Our system only realized a gain of a few FPS, generally fewer than four, so this is not a cost-effective upgrade, at least as far as performance is concerned.

Overall, I would say that Razer accomplished what they set out to do. The AC-1 Sound Card is capable of bringing users a high quality listening experience that offers lots of customization, and is great for gaming. I noticed an improvement in my gaming and general use so was happy with the upgrade, but there are a lot of other options to try, such as the Creative X-Fi series, which has gotten a lot of great press. One thing Razer was able to do, which I really appreciate, is to make this card for gaming. The drivers see that gaming needs are taken care of and ESP and Fidelity technologies both shine through while gaming.