Xitel was formed over 23 years ago to provide contact design services for microprocessors. The audio division was formed around three years ago to develop leading class technology with the view to putting it directly into the market and promoting Xitel as a brand name. The audio division remains Xitel’s most public arm and they intend to grow it with many innovative products beyond the Storm Platinum.

We are all well aware that the MX300 was first to the retail market and first to take advantage of the hype surrounding Aureal’s then new Vortex 2 chip and board. Voyetra Turtle Beach, with their strong OEM relationship with Dell had an early foot in the door, despite their late entry into the 4 speaker retail market with the Quadzilla. In Europe, Videologic brings a strong music bundle into the mix and Terratec, at least in Germany, has strong presence and brand recognition to bring to the table.

All of this meant that Xitel really had to distinguish themselves from the start and that’s just what they have set out to do with their low price on the basic 4 speaker board and cool gamer’s pack which includes force feedback headphones for the same price as the MX300 with a built in TOS link optical output to boot.

So where does the combination of low price and an optional gamers pack put Xitel in the Vortex 2 pack? Let’s have a look.

Technical Overview:

Vortex 2 Features

As I noted above, the Xitel Storm Platinum uses Aureal’s Vortex 2 SuperQuad reference board (literally) just like Terratec, Videologic and of course Aureal with their own System Integrator board. Diamond and Turtle Beach are the only two to Vortex 2 partners to alter the reference design (Diamond being the other).

As such, the Xitel Storm Platinum offers the following features:

• 96 DirectSound (i.e., they can all be DirectSound if necessary) streams;
• 76 3D streams* (they can be A3D, DS3D, or A3D 2.0, in the case of A3D 2.0, they are currently split between direct path and reflective sounds (16+60);
• 64 Wavetable voices

The different types of streams can be mixed and matched in various ways, but they always have to add up to a maximum of 96. Note that there are other types of streams (e.g. wavOut) but these are the common ones.

*76 3D streams for DS3D and A3D 1.x are accessible using Aureal’s 2035 reference drivers which have enabled 76 3D steams for 2 speaker and headphone modes but not four speaker modes. The actual shipping Xitel Storm Platinum drivers are based on the 2016 drivers. Xitel’s use of the reference design is perfect for all those power gamers who just can’t wait for custom drivers and all you "lose" in the transition are some minor cosmetic changes from the Xitel drivers. I.e they don’t say Xitel at the top!

• 96dB signal-to-noise ratio over a 20Hz~22kHz range;
• custom crosstalk cancellation circuitry using a biquad crossover filter to optimize left and right sound channels for more effective A3D playback in stereo speakers;
• Sound Blaster Pro DOS support;
• hardware and 256 software wavetable voices using advanced techniques, such as fourth-order interpolation and sweepable filters with resonance;
• effects for delay, room, chamber, hall, cabinet, flange, distortion, and wah-wah on the wavetable;
• support for DLS 1.0;
• a hardware wavetable header;
• a gameport which as well as supporting standard analog/digital joysticks and MPU-401 MIDI I/O, also incorporates DirectX acceleration circuitry that accelerates DirectX gameplay and improves system speed by 10% or more
• four speaker support out of the box;
• hardware support for DS, DS3D, A3D 1.x, A3D 2.0 and planned support for EAX through a future driver upgrade.
• 18 bit DAC
• TOSLINK optical S/PDIF out
• Digital expansion header

If you are looking for digital connectivity and can use a TOS Link (optical) connector then the Storm Platinum has one built in. Most MiniDisc players and some AC3 amps use the TOS Link input, some use the COAX input and others actually have both. Its the same for home theater speakers as some use optical, some use COAX and some use both. For example, Cambridge Soundworks uses a coax connector and Videologic uses both so if digital connectivity is important to you be sure and keep this in mind as the best Vortex 2 choice if you need a COAX connector is currently Voyetra Turtle Beach’s Quadzilla and if you need both, Voyetra Turtle Beach also makes a bracket board with coax and optical I/Os plus the option of the full Home Studio Edition. For the Storm Platinum you also have the option of using one of the optical to coax converters on the market but they are pretty expensive (around the same price as a Vortex 2 board) so not really worth it for this purpose in our opinion.

An example of a converter can be found at Midiman and comes with an $80 price tag.

All things being equal, if you need the digital output and can use the TOS Link connector instead of a COAX you are two step ahead of Diamond which offers the MX25 for $40 and one step ahead of Turtle Beach which goes the bracket board route at no extra cost but takes up more space.

My big issue with the bracket board approach is space. As I noted in the Quadzilla review, slots are at a premium in my machine and I hate to give up a slot for the sake of external outputs when all I want to do is play games. However, Turtle Beach had several other reasons for going this route, including upgradability for their Dell buyers and you can read about them in our Quadzilla review. Voyetra Turtle Beach, despite being late to the market has also delivered what they promised.