13. In Practice

Since there are numerous USB and FireWire cards that can be connected to a laptop with no problem, you might ask what the advantage of a PCMCIA card is. If you compare it with an external card for truly nomadic use (meaning with headphones), the Audigy Notebook has a clear advantage, since you don't need any external accessories - no cable, no power supply. The question then becomes whether the difference in sound quality between your laptop's built-in sound and the Notebook will be that significant under actual use conditions, since mobile use is rarely synonymous with ideal conditions. Outside noise may well make the difference a moot point.

But it's an entirely different story if you can use your laptop with the Audigy Notebook hooked up to a 5.1 or 7.1 speaker system. If you have such a system set up at home, all you need to do is connect the speaker cables to the Notebook and you have an operational system with minimum fuss and footprint. And the quality, no matter what you use it for (music, DVD or games) is truly excellent. Naturally you do need to calibrate the system carefully with the THX console beforehand. It's a shame, by the way, that the applet doesn't let you memorize several configurations corresponding to where you'll be using your laptop. Not to mention the fact that the one memory it does have has an inexcusable tendency to get lost.

Then there's the question of availability of input connections. Clearly the Notebook is limited in this area, compared to an external card connected via USB or FireWire. That can be a determining factor for some users who make creative use (for music and recording) of their sound card.

Conclusion

The Audigy 2 ZS Notebook is a superb technological achievement and is clearly THE sound card for laptop computers, providing the best combination of performance and practicality. But it remains to be seen whether many users won't prefer an external card with broader possibilities that can also be used with a desktop computer.