Creative Labs Sound Blaster Play! 3 External USB Sound Adapter for Windows and Mac. Plug and Play (No Drivers Required). Upgrade to 24-Bit 96Khz Playback

I got this to facilitate using my Sony XM5 headphones on PC/WIN through 3.5mm cable. It worked immedately after plugging it in, and the available software on their website allowed me to tweak the equalizer and other options. Im extremely pleased to use my favorite headphones on PC without the headaches of bluetooth on Windows. Listening to my music library (FLAC) and game sound is great. Excellent value.

Not my fist S,B. and not my last. For short money you get a decent sound. Audiophile sound, a, maybe not. but decent. I use it on my desk-top when listening to my music files, easy plugplay Much better sound than the board in the computer gives you. One drawback is however, this IS NOT an Amp. It has no volume control of its own. You can control your volume on your computer control panel or on the video screen itself during play. But GEE folks ! for under twenty dollars, how can you go wrong? Give it a go.

I have several sets of headsets for gaming, and a problem I had with all of them was that I could never get the microphones set at a good level. All of them had to be turned up to 100% in control panel with mic boost on just so you could hear your voice, and they tended to sound horrible with tons of background noise. After my 3rd set of headphones, I started thinking, maybe its not the headphones at all, but the built in sound card in my computer. I went searching for external sound cards, and came across the Sound Blaster Play 3. For 16 bucks, you cant go wrong, so I figured I would give it a shot. Im now hitting myself for waiting so long! First, it makes your microphone work so much better with no background noise. I have the mic level set to 75%, and it is so much louder and clearer! 2nd, the driver lets you use sidetone with your headphones. This was a feature that was not built into several of my headsets, but you can turn it on with the software. 3rd, the sound is night and day better with this Sound Blaster than my built in sound card. Really impressed with this product, and I recommend it highly! Worth every penny.

I purchased this because the native sound output on my Raspberry Pi was mediocre at best. I needed a better quality sound output to send to my FM transmitter and was recommended to try this and wow what a difference.

I bought a new gaming PC ( prebuilt ) but had many problems with sound . The volume was at 100% with all settings maxed out and they couldn’t hear me and, In many of my games I couldn’t hear behind me , like call of duty, apex , and minecraft. Bullets flurring by me , grenades landing behind me but no audio. I put this bad boy in, and from 100% to 48 % volume , meaning this boosted my sound level ! And I have the extra 52% I can add for max volume . Also turned on sonic for headphones and it just made it better. On my old PC I used the creative labs sound blaster Z . But now this proves to me I want a sound card in every PC . Internal or external . Planning to upgrade to a bigger external sound card that they sell. THABK YOU CREATIVE ! <3

And the sound quality is, uh, really surprisingly good considering the price! I use a buffered preamp rig with my guitar so its easy to get the levels within a range that the device loves, and within that range as long as I set up to avoid clipping (an important part of using any sound card, not just one youve MacGuyvered into some weird stuff) it delivers ASIO-low latency and allows me to record my guitar simultaneously with other audio sources as configured in my DAWs per track input settings. I honestly didnt expect this to work and Im delighted. OH! Also! It has great sound quality with high impedance headphones. I love this about it. No hiss, no issues at all, and more volume than youd expect too. For a bit over $20 Im blown away, its awesome. Dont be afraid to treat it weird.

The sound is great if your audio and mic are separate. However, if you use the TRRS (audio+mic) jack, there is a constant static noise. I verified this with 3 pairs of headphones. So you need to use an audio splitter to split TRRS into TRS (audio) and TS (mic) to avoid the static.

Like other reviewers, this is an excellent choice when picking a USB audio adapter after failure of on-motherboard audio on a Windows desktop PC. This Creative SB adapter delivers great sound at a nice price. Unlike cheaper USB audio units, this SB adapter is quiet during PC bootup and shutdown -- other inexpensive units can produce loud popping noises as the USB gets power, loads driver, etc. Recommended.

This added extra volume and base to my system as compared to the stock unit in my laptop. I do get some occasional analog static, but have been able to make adjustments in the provided software to make some of that go away. You’ll have to tweak it to your liking, but otherwise, it’s a decent product for the money, and will add volume to your laptop speakers.

Solid all around and produces great sound as soon as you plug it into anything, Im very happy with this. Its a cheap fix (and upgrade!) for my mostly broken built-in headphone jack and I would buy it again in an instant. Unfortunately it comes with a few enhancements enabled by default, all of which sound terrible if you are picky about audio at all, and you of course have to install the custom drivers to change this. The drivers/UI are fine (heavily custom UI of course (why???), but its easily enough understood), but it is a bit of an annoyance. It seems like this setting might stick once changed, from other reviews, but I havent yet tested that.