Sim Wong Hoo, founder of Sound Blaster maker Creative Labs, has died

Sim founded the company in 1981 and had remained at its head ever since.

[Orchard]

Sad news. I remember the days everyone was out buying SB cards.

RIP sir.

[XxINFERNUSxX]

Me to but I never stopped buying SB cards. Motherboard audio no matter how good it is now still is not equal to a good sound card. I'm using a Sound Blaster AE-7 now.😊

[CantThinkOfAUsername]

You sure seem to spend money on your hardware but not games?

[lonewolf10]

Quite right, while on-board audio has come on leaps and bounds, I cannot use it as I have hearing issues. I have the AE-5, great audio and paired with a decent headset nothing comes close for PC sound.

[Petebloodyonion]

Is there a real alternative to Soundblaster when you want a real audio card that can support things like Dolby Atmos or a 7 speakers configuration?

But I agree with you Orchard, sad news indeed.

[XxINFERNUSxX]

The AE-7 and AE-9 do 7.1 virtual surround on headphones and speakers. The other card is from EVGA called NU Audio it does the same though virtual 7.1

[jonivtec]

creative are not only building sound card...you are misinformed.

[MWH]

A great man. I've always had a SoundBlaster in my pc, then and now.

[Goozex]

May his soul rest with Christ

[Aloymetal]

RIP

[LoveSpuds]

Surely one of the most recognised and respected PC brands in history. A great legacy to leave behind for sure.

I remember buying a SB card alongside my first 3D graphics card, the Voodoo 2.....Happy days!!!

[RonsonPL]

Sad day :(

I don't like the company, but the sound cards in the 90's were something special.

It was the 3dfx of sound cards, I'd say.

I couldn't afford Sound Blaster 2.0 so I got a cheap Sound Galaxy. A SB2.0 clone with 8bit mono capabilities.
I remember reading articles about Sound Blaster 16. By the time the reviews of AWE 32 showed up in PC magazines, I already dreamed about getting a real Sound Blaster one day.
Eventually I bought Sound Blaster AWE64.
It was every bit as good as I dreamed.
It had superb sound quality, I could connect my MIDI enable keyboard, use wave table soundfonts and I could record sound with decent quality.
the audio quality was superb too. And you could tweak the bass and treble separately.

Then I got Sound Blaster Live! and it brought the magic of real time voice processing. REAL TIME, whcih is not what most of the modern mainstream hardware can do even today
You could connect two pair of headphones, a decent microphone and have hours and hours of fun from talking with Helium filters and other.
And it supported 5.1 sound too. And had EAX for games, which was a nextgen feature on its own. And it worked marvellously in games that supported it.

And the recording quality was even better than that on AWE64.
Then Audigy and Audigy 2.

Yeah, "the guy who gave PC the sound" is not that big of exaggeration.

Rest in peace, Sim

Let us SET BLASTER A220 I5 D1 and play the trumpet honoring part through Creative speakers.

[Fonsecap]

Still have my Creative Labs I-Trigue 2.1 Computer Speakers since 2002 and it still sound very good. Rip Sim Hoo your company always made very good products

[jonivtec]

I love ma sound blaster Katana soundbar....everybody are impressed when im showing it.Awesome sound and quality!

[blacktiger]

Sound Blaster simple, affordable and high quality sounds card, not like others over rated price!

[frostypants]

Aw man. Easily amongst the most influential figures of all time in PC hardware. Back in the day you either had a Sound Blaster or a cheap immitation. They were THE standard.

[glennhkboy]

He brought sound to computers, when PC was no more than an expensive type writer. He made interactive entertainment as we know it today.

[Binarycode]

https://toni.org/a3d/

Awesome audio back in the day.

Sound cards are still good to have, but Motherboard audio, and audio in consoles are excellent these days.

But you need good quality headphones or speakers to justify and also a great game or movie that uses those features.

[amiside]

R.I.P Sir 🙏