Creative Surround Station: Late 90s Quadraphonic PC Gaming!

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When I saw it actually used, I was surprised they'd ever actually produce something that, at least on first inspection, looks so ridiculous. But the more he talked about it, the more I can see that it's one of those "if it's stupid, but it works, it's not stupid" situations. Strange device, interesting results.

👍︎︎ 8 👤︎︎ u/Maklarr4000 📅︎︎ Jan 07 2023 🗫︎ replies
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[smooth jazz surrounds you] [drive buzzes, computer beeps] - Mm, I hope you're ready to be surrounded by LGR Things, 'cause that's what you're mounted to right now. Greetings, and welcome to an LGR Thing about the Creative Surround Station! Which is a set of arms and things that extend outward like this so that they can go behind your head. And you can mount surround sound speakers on a big-- Y'know what? It's just easier for me to show you. Lemme remove this. Yeah, here we go. So, it's this whole armature/mount/stand situation. Released in 1999. And yeah, you get your speakers and you put them on here, and then you take this whole thing and set it underneath your monitor so that it's just ready to go and you don't have to set up a bunch of wires going around your floor or across the ceiling or through... Or whatever, you just sort of go through here, and yeah. It's such a cool idea, and I had never heard of it until fairly recently when an LGR viewer named Kai, who worked at Microsoft for 31 years, offered very kindly to send this over. And it was just so odd and I'd never seen it before that I had to say 'yes' and just check it out. And as I was getting my area set up here and looking for some cool new speakers, or really, old speakers, to set up with some of my old computers for LGR, I'm like, "Aw man, I should get this ridiculous thing out and test it out while I'm at it," so here we is. And yeah, apparently Kai used to have this in his cubicle at Microsoft back in 1999 to 2005 or so to play "Counter-Strike" on the corporate LAN after hours. [chuckles] He did specify "after hours." You know, never any other time, I'm sure. But yeah, dude, just the fact that this was used at Microsoft to fart around, playing some games and stuff, that is just kinda neat. But you know, it's a Creative Labs thing, and while I'm not a huge fan of the company necessarily, I do like a whole lot of their products from back in the day. So let's take a closer look at this one, the Surround Station, which sold for $80 from 1999 to 2002 or so. And it was designed to be compatible with Creative's entire range of Cambridge SoundWorks satellite speakers, namely the Desktop Theater 2500 and 5.1, and the FPS2000 and 1000 bundles, like I have here. And yeah, this is the thing that I was getting out of storage and was about to set up and sort of kicked off this particular video, I don't know. There's gonna be some other videos too, I'm sure. As for why they made this, well, I don't know, I think its pretty obvious. I mean, setting up surround sound speakers, especially in a late '90s desktop office type of situation, you know, wherever, in the home, in the office, doesn't matter, is always kind of awkward. You know, you either mounted them behind you somewhere, on tripods or on a wall, on your chair, whatever. I've tried all kinds of things over the years, and yeah, that's the whole idea here, is that you can have the speakers in the rear behind you when you need them, and then you can fold them out of the way when you don't. And yeah, not only is it gonna be held down by a lot of weight from the CRT itself, but the thing is no slouch in terms of construction quality, for the most part. It's mostly made of iron and steel, weighing 9.4 kilograms, or about 20 and a half pounds, just on its own. Now, this one is a little worse for wear, I guess. I mean, some of the mounts aren't as strong as they used to be, some of the arms are a little bit floppy now and plastics have worn down from years of use, there's a couple of bolts missing, and of course, the sticker there on the top is just coming apart. Overall, it seems to still be holding up, though I haven't tried it yet, but I am really interested to do so. But before we do that, we gotta get this Cambridge SoundWorks FPS1000 kit open. I've always wanted one of these! I mean, I've had a couple over the years, but never in the box. Anyway, let's get this thing open. Get ready for that late '90s surround sound experience! The 4.1... kinda quadraphonic surround experience, actually. Yeah, there's no center channel speaker, just two front, two behind, and the sub. This thing retailed for I wanna say it was $100 back then. Although this one has a sticker for $89 back in 1998 or whenever this was on sale. And yeah, we got a whole buncha wires. Ooh, look at that! That's fresh, man. Those classic cubes. Yeah! Got some mounting bits here. And that delightful sub. It's pretty wild to see one of these this clean. Not yellowed, just lovely, creamy beige, off-white goodness. Oh, look at that. PCWorks FourPointSurround. Yeah, I see these not uncommonly, y'know at thrift stores and whatnot. Bass control, power on and off, power in. And yeah, this is a Cambridge SoundWorks. They were a real company. [laughs] I mean, of course they were, but they were their own independent company, but Creative Labs snapped 'em up in 1997 as they did with so many other audio companies back then. One reason I'm not a really big fan of them as a company, really, in their practices over the decades. On a related note, I just saw that the CEO of Creative Technology actually passed away as I was recording this, who founded the company back in 1981 in Singapore and kicked off the whole Sound Blaster line and everything else. RIP to an OG. Oh hey! So we got some sticks. The tripod setup for the rear speakers, which we won't be using, cuz we got a Surround Station. And our big ol' beefy power supply. 12-volt, 28 watts. These are just plastic, by the way. But yeah, I, ah, have all the memories! Seeing these things set up in stores and demo units at Office Depot and Best Buy or wherever. And I was always impressed with how teeny-tiny these little two-inch speaker cubes are. I remember them sounding... pretty good? I don't know, all right? It's been a while since I've heard these. They're fine. I'm sure they're fine. But it was the sub that did a whole lot of the work, of course. But yeah, this was like the low end for Creative Labs surround. And you know, they also had their just regular 2.1s as well with just that sub and just two of these. Which you could set this up that way too. In fact, a lot of times when you see these in thrift stores, you'll see this sub and just a couple of the speakers, and the rear speakers are missing. And what are these? Oh yeah, these just go to the tripods, don't they? So you just like... Well, you know, whatever. You stick 'em in the holes! [immature chuckle] So yeah, we got four of these. I guess they're just gonna be all the same. Little RCA on the end there. It is gold-plated, or appears to be. That's something. As to how these actually mount, [laughs] I don't know. Obviously, if they were just going right there... You know. Eh, that's fine. But actually getting it onto the Surround Station, I don't know. Welp, let's find out. All right, let's get this monitor moved. [smooth jazz tunes play] All right, so far, so good. And this part here, it actually slides more in place. Like that. Now it's not nearly as wobbly, so that's good. And then whenever you need to do that, you can just pull it out and... Yeah! And of course, these are hollow. So the idea is just to, you know, get the cables in there and string 'em through, and just sorta go up and over and then through that. And then it comes out the back over here. And this part is where you can adjust the arms themselves. That just sorta locks into place so you can have it up and above a bit. Sort of pointing down at you. The thing I'm really having trouble with, though, is this right here, where the speakers are supposed to attach. So you have this, just sort of on a ball joint. And that's supposed to point down towards your head, but you can see what we're working with. I don't have any way to attach this, and it did not come with any mounting hardware. Perhaps it originally did. The only thing was this one bolt. I think that's supposed to go around this way, and there was a wing nut that went on the other side or something. Because looking at some pictures... I mean, not that there's many. You cannot find a whole lot about this in terms of images, and I don't have the manual. But yeah, it looks like there were models where you just slide it in place. Obviously that's not gonna work with this. I thought, oh, maybe does it just slide on there? I mean... Doesn't actually go fully all the way in. And you know, with these, that's literally just a stand. So let's see what else I got going on in the workshop back there. All right. Everything's all strung through. That was a little bit tricky, but got it done. And yeah, I just mounted these with good ol' 3M mounting strips. Stuck a little rubber band on there, taking a cue from the '90s pictures. Although I don't think it's doing much of anything, but it makes me almost feel better, not really, whatever. Also taking a cue from the '90s, in all the photos, they're on top of the monitor for some reason. So we'll stick 'em up there and see how that goes. And yeah, this is all shielded, so we'll be fine magnetically. All right, let's just get this mess plugged into our sound card, and we'll turn everything on. All right, while I was getting it set up, I was like, "Where in the heck are the 3.5-mil audio cables?" So I just grabbed a couple of random ones here, plugged it in, and, uh, it sounds bad. Like, just... [white noise hissing] So much noise. No matter I do, no matter what volume it's at. Muting everything, doesn't matter. So, looking in the documentation, and what is that? The volume control. I totally missed that! There's a whole other thing! [laughs absentmindedly] So that makes sense. There's only bass volume control on here, not the actual speakers. So that hopefully will help the noise factor. Also, the subwoofer is not shielded. The little satellites are, but not the sub, so I need to move this. Now, there we go. We got volume! Little knob here, and it actually is going out at the right levels now, so... [alert chimes] No awful hiss or anything like that. Finally! Let's get this changed over into 4.1 mode, quadraphonic. And yeah, I know, recording in stereo here, not gonna really be able to hear quadraphonic. But hey, let's do it anyway. We should have some test programs from Creative. Yeah, let's try this THX deal. - [THX Lady] Front left. Front right. Rear left. Rear right. - [Clint] Oh my! She's right in my rear left and- - [THX Lady] Rear left. - [Clint] Right. - [THX Lady] Rear right. - [Clint] All right, well, that is a thing. Oh, hey, we can calibrate stuff. I guess I'll try to calibrate this a little bit, 'cause these, you know, the rear speakers are like 10 inches from my head. It's not letting me input stuff, so I guess I'll just stick it to 11 inches. - [THX Lady] Rear left. - [Clint] Eh, doesn't sound any different to me. [laughs] Ah whatever, it's fine. All right! Welp, I guess it is now time to play some games, and so let me move the cameras and such, and we'll go ahead and do that and enjoy ourselves the surround experience of the late '90s on PC, according to Creative Labs. [jazz music concludes] [chair clinks around, jazz tunes play] [groans somewhat unnecessarily] Yeah it's a bit of a thing getting inside of here. All right, so uh, [laughs] inside of the Creative Surround Station, it feels nice and cozy. Got speakers and speakers. And I kinda like that they're so close, instead of... I don't know, I'm just used to messing around with surround things that are farther away than these. These are like right up near my ears. I don't know if that's a good or a bad thing. Guess we're about to find out. So let's play some "Counter-Strike," because Kai did that back in the day, and that feels like this should be like returning home for these speakers. And, you know, he played it in an office, so let's do cs_office. Ooh! Immediately hearing footsteps and gun things all around me. What are we doing? - [Bot] Lead the way, sir. - Hostages! [shoots hostages] I don't think you're supposed to do that. [guns firing with gunfire] All right, so yeah, this is working well. [gunfire popping] I can hear dudes coming around corners and stuff, extremely accurately, having the speakers like right there. [laughs] It's quite nice. It's almost closer to what I'm used to with VR headsets. But yeah, I don't actually have a surround sound setup for anything in my house, other than just VR, I don't know. I haven't had it set up for such a long time because it's usually an inconvenience, especially at a desktop. So this definitely helps that problem. You know what? Good kill, I was being a doofus. Anyway, this is kinda great. [laughs] I wish this kinda thing were still being sold somewhere. I would have a legit- - [Bot voices interrupt] [gunfire roaring] - ...temptation to get something like this for... I mean, you could use this for modern stuff, but it's a little iffy, worse for wear, after however long it's been. This is good stuff! It's an interesting and effective solution. [guns blasting] Makes me wish I was recording this in real surround audio. I mean, there's the problem of not just recording it in the first place, but... [gunfire blares] [laughs] Also just getting it on YouTube. Like, you can share surround audio/video files on YouTube, but the only way to appreciate it is then if you have a surround setup yourself, whether it be actual surround speakers or headphones or whatever, and then what's the point? Like, if you already know what surround sounds like, then you know what this sounds like. This is just surround, there's nothing crazy going on here. - [Bot] I'm gonna guard the hostages. [gunfire popping] - About the only thing to comment on is the speakers themselves, the quality of them, and, you know, they're fine. They're little two-inch speakers. They're pretty tinny, obviously. The sub sounds great, still. You know, it's probably, what, a four-inch, five-inch woofer in there. But yeah, it's bring back some late '90s memories, man, for sure. [laughs] Oh, I really wish I had a setup like this back then. Really, the only time I ever experienced it- - [Bot] T spawn. [gunfire roaring] - [Clint] Was at demo units, you know, in stores. Game stores, or... They had a setup up like this at, actually, Gateway Country. And they also had one at a Sam's Club, and I want to say Office Depot at one point. I loved messing around with those demo units and such. Never actually had any friends or family that had a setup like this. Always wanted one, though. Thought it was super cool. And it still is! It still is cool. I know you're down there. Tom, or whatever your name is! I'm gonna kill you, Tom. Gotcha! Yes, gotcha. - [Bot] I'm gonna guard the hostages. - It's just so much better, [chuckles] with the surroundness going on. Even just 4.1, it makes a big difference. You can tell the lack of center though, that's for sure. Like, these speakers up on top of the monitor, it's fine, actually. The placement isn't that bad. It kinda gives that effect of being center speakers, just stereo close together. But that's enough of the "Counter-Strike" bots. Let's do some "Unreal Tournament 99" bots, because! Even that's coming out of the rear speakers. Ooh, and so is the menu. [UT menu music plays] [menus chirping] Oh, that's weird. So yeah, the music is all coming from the front speakers on top of the monitor there, but menu sounds are behind me. [laughs] Okay. And I want to say this is one that uses EAX. I know it also supports Aureal and all that, but we have a Creative Audigy 2 ZS something-or-other, I don't know, in there right now in the Windows XP thing. So "Hardware 3D Sound" and "Surround Sound" are both enabled. Let's gooo! [minigun firing] Ha ha ha! This is already sounding awesome. [gunfire roaring] - [Announcer] Double kill! [Clint chuckles] [chaotic cacophony] - Aw. There's like, so much chaos that I'm actually not sure if the surround is even beneficial here. [laughs] Cuz it's just crap flying everywhere, all around me all the time. Sure does sound damn cool, though. [tinny gunfire pops] That's weird. Yeah, some of the spots in the map are just oddly going back and forth between being able to hear punchy sound up here on these monitor front speakers, but the ones behind me sound kinda like crap no matter what. But then it's sometimes just that and there's no sub. I don't know if that's an EAX quirk or what. That's being kinda weird. I don't know, I'm gonna say that's more of a software issue. - [Announcer] Headshot! - [Clint] Ha ha! And obviously, these little speakers aren't great to begin with, the little two-inch things. But they definitely sound worse here and there. Eh. So I'll try it here without the 3D-accelerated sound, which I think is EAX in this case, and then just the surround mode turned on. [tinny gunfire popping] Nah, it's still weird. [gunshots booming] [bass cuts out] [player groans] Yeah, you hear that? It's like the bass is just cutting in and out. [gunshots booming] [bass cuts out] [bot screams] Ah, yeah, kind of an odd quirk. Don't know what's causing that, but whatever, man. "Unreal Tournament" is awesome, and even more awesome in surround. All right, I want a racing game for the last one here. Ah, what do we want to pick? Something late '90s. Go with "Need for Speed: High Stakes." I don't think I've actually played that one in surround before. Or quadraphonic, whatever. 'Cause yeah, when I had the last surround setup on a PC, it was like 2008, '09, when I had a Logitech 5.1 thing, and by then, it was like Windows Vista, right? Ugh. So "High Stakes" wasn't exactly on my agenda. See what kinda sound mode we have. Ah, D3D/EAX mode. All right. [engine revs] I'm excited. Love this game. [engine revving] [energetic electronic music] Oh, yeah. - [Announcer] Three, two, one! Go! [engine roaring] - [Clint] Aw, that's super cool! I can hear the guy right to my right. [laughs] [engines roaring] [tires squealing] Get outta my way! [metal crunching] [laughs] Oh, the carnage behind me. So... All right, it's kinda doing that thing again where it's like things in front of me don't quite have as much punch as they should, and things behind me sound kind of odd, or oddly balanced. Sometimes it's louder or quieter than I think. In both front and back. I don't know, it's just... It's inconsistent. Either way, this is awesome. [laughs] This is really cool! Just being able to hear like- - [Cop] In pursuit of a white Corvette. - Yeah, like [imitates car zooming], there goes the cops, or the opponent beside me, or whatever. And the damage happening, like crashing behind me or crashing to the left. Yeah, I've just never really made the time to go back and try some of this surround type of stuff on a selection of late '90s games and hardware. Man, combine this with 3D on a CRT, the nVidia Vision, or like the Elsa Revelator, some kind of cool 3D glasses that you could use on a CRT. With this? Dude, that'd be like peak late '90s gaming, early 2000s gaming experience. I've got a number of those headsets back there I've been meaning to cover, and glasses and stuff, for a long time. So tricky to be able to show that kind of stuff in a video effectively, so... [laughs] Ah, I don't know, maybe someday. I don't know. Just gotta do it for fun, like I'm doing here. Been putting this off for similar reasons. Anyway. Well, I suppose that's about it for the Creative Surround Station. Man, this is really darned effective and simple. And just, yeah, for 80 bucks, plus the cost of some speakers, so more like $180 there, plus the cost of a 3D sound card, and you know, computer, nyah-neh-neh, a few hundred bucks, right? Added on to whatever computer you had, back in the late '90s, early 2000s. This would've been fantastic, and I am sad that I haven't really experienced anything quite like this until now. Again, experienced surround sound plenty of times, plenty of ways, but this, this is pretty cool. [laughs] And now that I'm done, you know, I can just... [grunts] Get this crap and put it out of the way like that, you know, and then it's not so much in the way anymore. [laughs] It just works, and it's neat, and I'm glad I got to experience it. And I hope you enjoyed seeing, hearing, sort of, the experience as well. Even though it's way better in person. [smooth jazz music] And if you did enjoy this episode of LGR, then stick around for others. They're always in the works. And let me know if you had this particular Sound Station, or what solution you used for your desktop computer gaming surround things back in the day. And as always, thanks for watching!
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Channel: LGR
Views: 291,426
Rating: undefined out of 5
Keywords: creative labs, sound blaster, surround sound, review, LGR, lazy game reviews, vintage, retro, classic, 90s, 1999, 1998, 1990s, creative technology, sound card, audigy, EAX, Live!, sound effects, audio, music, quadraphonic, positional, 3D sound, hardware, software, THX, setup, test, demonstration, overview, Windows XP, Microsoft, games, gaming, computer, counterstrike, unreal tournament, need for speed, gameplay, cambridge soundworks, speakers, subwoofer, mounting, 4.1, 5.1, system, hi-fi, surround system, mount, stand
Id: bRWWEuNNq14
Channel Id: undefined
Length: 23min 16sec (1396 seconds)
Published: Fri Jan 06 2023
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