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new hands on

http://community.codemasters.com/forum/sho...ad.php?t=377214

http://www.gamerzines.com/downloads/magazines/360Zine_34.pdf

btw, do you guys like the new Subaru Impreza?

its a FAIL in WRC :p

its a FAIL when compared to Evo X (perf. wise)

its a FAIL looks wise

its a FAIL overall :D

& block races in it :rofl:

What? Do you even know who Colin Mcrae is?

crap, i missed this. lol

why dont you enlighten us with your infinite knowledge about colin? :/

since the demo, everybody can understand on what dirt2 is concentrating on.

its more about xgames than rallying.

------------------------------

ontopic

you guys remember what the devs. said in those earlier videos... they were talking about the "crowd" in stadium. lol, something in the range of 40k pixel crowd.

so i think in dirt2 - devs put more effort for

xgames>crowd>>rally :D

Q1- do you guys care for some pixel crowd, eating cpu/gpu?

in RBR, when you are racing, some photographers will take your pics from the middle of the road & when you near them they run away, + when you go off/ roll over, people help you get back on road, very nice touch.

i'm really missing RBR now

----

now since EA has surprised everyone by moving NFS to sim side, i hope they surprise us again by making a NFS or a new series just for rally fans, only better than any other rally game :D

IGN PS3 Dirt 2 Review

For the most part, Career Mode is well-executed, offering the right balance of challenge and a good variety in locations and tracks. But I must admit that I am one of the previously mentioned rally fans who expects a rally game to have, well, rally racing. Sadly, only about 20% of the events in Dirt 2 are pure time-trial rally races. There are a few other time-based races including Trailblazer (rally races without a co-driver) and Gate Crasher (hit gates to add time to your run) that use elements of rally, but if you just want pure rally racing, it's in short supply. There are no hill climb events either, though there is a track in China called "Hill Climb" that amounts to a half-minute of speeding up a twisting hillside. I'd like my rally games to be two-thirds rally racing and other stuff thrown in for fun, not the other way around.

http://uk.ps3.ign.com/articles/102/1021204p1.html

IGN PS3 Dirt 2 Review

9 out of 10?! Are they mad?

Also, their sub-headline for the review:

Is the king of rally still fit to wear the crown?

No, but It's gonna have the crown, nevertheless, as Codies are the only ones making rally games at the moment.

If DiRT 2 is anything to go by, I'm not having high hopes for the F1 game. :(

crap, i missed this. lol

why dont you enlighten us with your infinite knowledge about colin? :/

since the demo, everybody can understand on what dirt2 is concentrating on.

its more about xgames than rallying.

That's exactly my point. Mcrae was a WRC driver, and one of the best at that. He drove RALLY, not any of this BS they've made the game into. Tagging his name onto it is a blatant cash in since it really has s**t all to do with actual rallying.

That's exactly my point. Mcrae was a WRC driver, and one of the best at that. He drove RALLY, not any of this BS they've made the game into. Tagging his name onto it is a blatant cash in since it really has s**t all to do with actual rallying.

Well said, Si_. DiRT has gone the way of the Need for Speed series; turned mainstream and concentrating on luring in the uneducated idiots.

Although credit to Need for Speed with Shift. I played it in GAME last Friday (EA are doing a UK Championship for it, where I won the Plymouth Regional, and I'm going to the final in Thorpe Park! :D ) and it's really improved over the past few NFS games. It's still fairly arcadey and easy to pick up and play, but it's focusing more and more on realism. Unfortunately, we could only play it on the arcade settings (basically all the assists on, and even brake assist), but I'm fairly confident that if you turn all the assists off, it'll play like a proper sim racer; not like RACE Pro (that was just shocking), more like the SimBin games they do on the PC. An added bonus is I don't think there's some stupid storyline anymore! :)

funny thing is IGN UK rated dirt 9/10 & IGN USA rated it 8.4

lol

codeM paid for 9/10? :p

Well said, Si_. DiRT has gone the way of the Need for Speed series; turned mainstream and concentrating on luring in the uneducated idiots.

Although credit to Need for Speed with Shift. I played it in GAME last Friday (EA are doing a UK Championship for it, where I won the Plymouth Regional, and I'm going to the final in Thorpe Park! :D ) and it's really improved over the past few NFS games. It's still fairly arcadey and easy to pick up and play, but it's focusing more and more on realism. Unfortunately, we could only play it on the arcade settings (basically all the assists on, and even brake assist), but I'm fairly confident that if you turn all the assists off, it'll play like a proper sim racer; not like RACE Pro (that was just shocking), more like the SimBin games they do on the PC. An added bonus is I don't think there's some stupid storyline anymore! :)

thats great

good luck for the finals, i hope you win. :D

funny thing is IGN UK rated dirt 9/10 & IGN USA rated it 8.4

lol

codeM paid for 9/10? :p

It wouldn't surprise me. Eidos might have started a trend! :p

thats great

good luck for the finals, i hope you win. :D

Thanks! :) Even if I don't win, I still get a prize for making it to the finals: a Need for Speed Scalextric set! :D I will definitely be gunning for the win though. The runner-up gets the Scalextric set and a Need for Speed racing jacket. Then a huge leap in prize value for the winner, who gets a Nissan 350Z GT worth ?30k!

Good luck MightyJordan. Neowin will be so proud of you if you win. :D

Thanks! :) The only problem I have is getting up to Thorpe Park. My dad will almost certainly drive me up, but his car (a 2000 Chrysler Grand Voyager) is in pretty bad nick. We're getting a new one soon (a Citroen C3 Picasso), but it won't be ready until October now. :( So I've gotta pray that that Yankee hunk of junk will last until October at the least.

That's exactly my point. Mcrae was a WRC driver, and one of the best at that. He drove RALLY, not any of this BS they've made the game into. Tagging his name onto it is a blatant cash in since it really has s**t all to do with actual rallying.

Uh that's not entirely true. I think you may need a little history lesson on McRae yourself :p

Uh that's not entirely true. I think you may need a little history lesson on McRae yourself :p

Alright, so he did the odd lemans or xgames race near the end of his career, so what your saying is he's more well known for those than his ENTIRE CAREER has a hardcore RALLY driver? Please....

No of course not, but the events are in the games because he asked them to be / he took part in them. He even wanted x-games events, but of course he died before the development on DiRT 2 even began so he wasn't there to advise on the route they went.

he would have wanted 'rally' to take centre stage, then some dakar type races + 5-10% of xgames, coz they are fun to race in.

but codeM have done the opposite :p

codeM almost ditched rally, so why retain CM's name? (si's question)

a question not even codeM answer. :laugh:

as i've mentioned earlier, its more ken block/pastrana dirt2 than CM.

shamefully tho, codeM calls it a "tribute" to CM. *******s

Trust me, it pains me more than most that the games have gone this direction, having always been a dedicated CM fan. Especially being a fellow Scot and he didn't live too far from where I stay either. I was just saying that these events were included in the games because he asked them to be, but you're both right, they were never supposed to ever over shadow the rallying. Tbh I already got that feeling from DiRT 1, it certainly felt like there was less rallying than other race types anyway. I've never actually counted and checked..

Not to mention CodeMasters want the game to have a larger pressence in the US and to sell more copies. Dumbed down controls, fireworks, flashy lights and jumps = moth to a flame.

That's unfortunately the road every game these days seem to take. Mainly because it appeals to a larger crowd and that's basically the business-domino effect that most publishers and developers strive for today - Large appeal, more sales, more money, more milking. It's sad ...

i like all the nfs till nfs 6, hated the UG series, mw, ...

[edit; oops forgot the cops]

for the only thing MW had me playing it was the M3 GTR :devil:, the cops , the superb engine sounds & ofcourse the gfx.

nfs ug2 is still liked by many.

just like the fast n furious makers ran out of idea, so did EA to bring a original. lol

EA have learnt **** all. NFS has been terrible since the very beginning of last generation. It's nothing but a boy racers game with cereal box cars.

Oi, there was nothing wrong with NFS Most Wanted. That was the last great NFS game, and I'm confident NFS Shift will be the next great one in the series.

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    • Creative Sound Blaster AE-X PCIe review: your headphones will love it by Steven Parker If you have been reading Neowin for any length of time, you may remember that I reviewed the Sound Blaster Audigy FX Pro back in April. I found it to be an excellent budget sound card, even though it lacked support for formats such as DTS over the included SPDIF port. Anyway, Creative reached out to me again asking if I was interested in reviewing the Sound Blaster AE-X. It is a card mainly targeted at headphone wearers, which I'll get into a bit later. Before we get underway, here is a disclaimer: Creative Labs provided a free sample without any review pre-approval. Here are the full specs of it: Creative Sound Blaster AE-X Dimensions: 179 x 126 x 18 mm Weight: 263g / 9.28 oz Platform: PCI-e DAC: ESS ES9039Q2M Connectivity Options Side: Rear: 1 x HD Audio Front Panel Connector, 1 x ⅛“ Headphone port, 1 x RCA Line-out (Left) port, 1 x RCA Line-out (Right) port, 1 x Coaxial SPDIF-out port, 1 x ⅛“ Mic in/Line-in port, 1 x TOSLINK SPDIF-in port Surround: No DNR / SNR: THD+N: 0.0001% Dynamic Range 130 dB Recording Resolution: PCM up to 32-bit / 192kHz (Stereo) Direct Mode: Line Out (Stereo): PCM up to 32-bit  384 kHz Coaxial SPDIF Out: PCM up to 24-bit 192.0 kHz Headphone Amp: PCM up to 32-bit / 384kHz (Stereo) Native DSD: DSD64, DSD128, DSD256 Output Impedance: 1Ω, Supported Headphone Impedance: 8–600Ω, IEM: 0.5Vrms, Low: 1.5Vrms, Mid: 3Vrms, High: 6Vrms, Maximum output power: 350mW @ 32Ω (High), Maximum output voltage: 6Vrms (High) Front Panel Headphone Amp: PCM up to 32-bit / 192kHz (Stereo) Native DSD: DSD64, DSD128 Output Impedance: 10Ω, Supported Headphone Impedance: 32–300Ω, Maximum output power: 40mW @ 32Ω, Maximum output voltage: 1.9Vrms ASIO: ASIO 2.3 Total Harmonic Distortion: THD+N: 0.0006% Dynamic Range: 114 dB Scout Mode: Yes EMI shielding: No (but it passed all the FCC emission tests) Operating temperature: 0–45°C Input Power: 12V⎓0.5A Warranty: 1 Year (MSRP) Price: $179.99 / £169.99 The Sound Blaster AE-X was announced at the end of May, and it becomes clear that it is mainly for headphone wearers. I should also note that the card does not support DDL/DTS encoding technology, but it is said to support decoding through the coaxial SPDIF port. I was able to test this working with the classic Windows Sound properties, but I could not get a DTS (decode) signal through my Logitech Z906, it defaulted to 3D sound whenever I played DTS content through Plex or Emby. In addition, this card only supports two channels (stereo) over the speakers. The surround support is limited to the Headphone Amp, so before I get underway, what we have here is a card mostly intended for headphone use, especially with its SPDIF In (Toslink) port where you could connect another device like a console. So what about the highlights of this card? The AE-X is powered by the ESS SABRE DAC (ES9039Q2M), which is capable of a 130 dB dynamic range. In addition, it supports 32-bit/384 kHz playback for deeper detail and clarity. The headphone amplifier delivers up to 350 mW @ 32Ω, which admittedly far surpasses standard onboard audio, offering support for studio-grade headphones. DSD256 and ASIO 2.3 are also supported. What doesn't it have? No support for What-U-Hear, Super X-Fi, or the SmartComms Kit No EMI shielding, but it passed all the FCC emission tests (from the FAQ) I also want to make it clear that I am no audiophile. For me, it's purely subjective and it should just "work" out of the box. First impressions As I said in the introduction, I was a bit sad to see that the AE-X only supports stereo output, meaning it would not be on par with my ALC1220 over my speakers, as I mentioned it seems like this card is marketed toward headphone users. Since I am not an avid gamer that would rule me out as a potential customer, but I can still test its capabilities! The card arrived in a nice-looking box, as shown above. It's quite a bit larger than the Audify FX Pro that I reviewed back in April, and at first I thought the covering meant that it was EMI shielded, but it isn't as mentioned above in the highlights section. What's in the box: 1 x Sound Blaster AE-X PCIe card 1 x 3.5 mm CTIA TRRS to Dual TRS Headset Splitter Cable 1 x Quick Start Guide Aside from the Quick Start Guide, which someone at my age (I guess) needs a magnifying glass to read thanks to the tiny fonts, Creative Labs also has the manual online, which first requires you to prove that you're human in order to access it (so I can't direct link it). Anyway, the box is mostly made up of cardboard, and the only plastic in it is the anti-static bag for the card itself. Design Top Bottom The card itself looks pretty cool and actually wouldn't look out of place in an all-white build. There's only one connector, and for some reason it is awkwardly placed on the side (front-facing) that is for the front panel audio connector, which will let you use the headphones through the front PC audio jack. Since the front panel Headphone Amp has fewer capabilities than the rear headphone port, I decided not to use it. Rear of card PCI-e interface The rear of the card is completely open and is normally where you would find the front panel connector. The PCIe interface side is completely covered, which initially made me think it was EMI shielded. I/O panel Side (front-facing) with Front panel connector On the outer rear bracket side we have the TOSLINK SPDIF in, Coaxial SPDIF out, RCA line out (Right), RCA line out (Left), Headphone out, and Mic/Line in ports. On the front facing portion of the card itself is the F-panel connector. Usage Test System Our test system consists of the following: AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D Gigabyte X870E AORUS MASTER (BIOS F12) Corsair RM1000x (2024) Thermal Grizzly Kyronaut (33x33x0,2mm) 2x 32GB Kingston Fury Beast RGB DDR5 6000MT/s CL36-38-38-80 T-Force Z540 2TB (PCIe Gen5) NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 Founders Edition (NVIDIA) Creative Sound Blaster AE-X Windows 11 25H2 Pro I installed the card into the Gigabyte X870E AORUS MASTER which includes the RealTek ALC1220 onboard audio. For our subjective listening tests, I used the Coaxial SPDIF port to my Logitech Z906 speakers. For headphone tests I used the OneOdio Studio Max 2 Wireless DJ Headphones that I reviewed last month. After installing the audio driver, I installed Creative Nexus, which is a relatively new app designed for the latest Sound Blaster cards. Then I discovered the AE-X needed both a driver update from 1.00.15.0001 to 1.01.09.000 and a firmware update from 1.00.06.0000 to 1.00.06.0002, then I was set to go. It should be noted that the card did not work without the driver (not Plug and Play). As you can see above, you can manage the firmware, driver, and inputs via Advanced Settings on the Device tab. By default Nexus enabled "Direct Mode". Upon clicking on Acoustic Engine, the Equalizer can be enabled and set to four different presets, which are: Gaming Music Movies Footsteps Enhancer There's also a dedicated Scout Mode for gamers. I mainly used Tidal and Spotify in the past week to listen to some of my Liked Songs (which now total over 700) in Shuffle mode; there were no pops or interference that I could hear. I also found a 5.1 Surround Music playlist on Tidal that sounded really great over Studio Max 2 headphones. When I reviewed the Audigy FX Pro, I went out and purchased a Logitech Z906 set second-hand for €100 specifically to use with the card, but in this instance all I could get on the AE-X was the 3D output of surround sound through Coaxial SPDIF and although it still sounded great, it isn't quite as good as DTS Interactive via my onboard Realtek ALC1220. Conclusion So what have I learned? The AE-X lacks multi-channel support for 5.1/7.1 setups and drops support for modern surround technologies like Dolby or DTS, functioning strictly as a stereo output device. So to really benefit, you will need Studio-grade headphones to "hear" the benefits of this card. With that being said, I can imagine it will appeal to gamers who are switching between console and PC. By utilizing the SPDIF in port, you could just plug your headphones into the AE-X (front or rear port) and then switch between PC and Console without having to move the headphones to a different port. As I said in the Sound Blaster Audigy review, the EQ in the Creative Nexus app offers safe presets, which allows a user to further tweak the lows, mids, and highs for a personal listening experience. Of course it all depends on the headphones you hook up to it. Speaking of headphones, I kind of wish I had higher-quality Studio-grade headphones to really test this card with; I'm not usually wearing headphones in my day to day duties. The only time I will wear them is if I want to listen to music very late at night and I don't want to disturb my neighbors, so my rating (verdict) is based on this fact. Someone with a PC/Console setup and wears headphone religiously to game, and consume media will benefit much more than I from the high-quality Headphone Amps that are included in the AE-X. Once again, I do feel like Creative could have gone the extra mile to support the S/PDIF port a bit more. Why include it if you're not supporting the main popular digital formats? It seems like the decision was more of a legacy-based one, offering uncompressed 2-channel PCM audio, for users with high-fidelity audio systems and external DACs. Maybe I will be lucky enough to review a card that truly includes all these features in the future. I am sure readers with far more knowledge on audio systems than me will correct me in the comments below. I'll just say I am happy to learn what I don't know! Where to buy The Sound Blaster AE-X is available to purchase now in preorder for $179.99 on the U.S. Creative website, or for £169.99 on the Creative UK website and will start shipping to customers from June 25.
    • $80 or 90%, anything else would be financial suicide one way or another.
    • Or... just use Bitwarden. Free, and has on-prem option as well. Works both on desktop and mobile, wherever you are. The age of local password files is over.
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    • I actually got to use one of those so called "backup codes" once. It was for a customer, I choose the backup code option, and by the grace of god, they actually hade them printed out. Imagine my surprise, when after using the backup code, Google then told use we had to enter a code they just sent to the gmail address we currently did not have access to. I was not amused, Google backup codes should be the end all get out of jail free card, because you had to have access to the account to even get them.
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