Price Paid:  $150.00 from CompUSA

Summary:
You can get all the specifics from the other reviews. The card has an impresive list of features, looks good and sounds good. I have owned it for about 2 years now, and still works like a champ. I agree with the other reviewers that the shipped drivers are buggy. I tried to record via optical in with no luck the first time. I updated the drivers and got all the features to work. I have not had a chance to use the hardware mp3 decoder....a feature that seems to be great, but I use Winamp (no support on this?) I love the inputs / outputs and like the way it's layed out more than the Creative Labs Exigy (yet I also own 2 Sounblaster Live(s) in my other machines. My only two gripes are the initial drivers being buggy and the headphone volume jack could use more output

Price Paid:  $80.00 from compUSA

Summary:
CompUSA has this card for $99 (i work there so i get a discount though :))...like most people, i was deciding between spending $180 on the Audigy Platinum which has gotten rave reviews, or pay less than half the price and get most of the same features and one extra channel with the Game Theater XP. I decided to get the Hercules and save my money for some better speakers... I have nothing but good things to say about this card in windows 98 and now windows 2000. Its worked flawlessly in Q3, GTA3, and dozens of benchmark programs. I havn't had a chance to test digital input and output (which is the #1 complaint about this card) but hercules tech support assures me that the newest driver revision (4.18?)has fixed any problems with digital sound input and output....Sound quality is amazingly detailed, and there is significantly less Humm than i experienced with my Maxi Muse soundcard (ughhh!)....

Price Paid:  $94.00 from Newegg.com

Summary:
This card is good for the avarage gamer. Even the Hardcore gamers get a kick out of it. The drivers SUCK MAJORLY. Even on the analog outputs, EAX does not work in ANY OF THE Half-Life SERIES GAMES. (Including counterstrike.) Sometime A3d doesn't work either. I agree the outputs and inputs on a rack is nice. But Creative has been doing sound for much longer than hercules. Hercules actually does videocards, not soundcards. Sometimes on the center/sub, I get absoultly no sound whatsoever. DO NOT TRY TO USE THE DIGITAL OUTPUTS FOR GAMES!!!! It WILL not work, I tried. Otherwise, the digital input works great. Oh, by the way, this peice of hardware is over 2 years old, and they have NEVER tried to make an inprovement on it. Hardware MP3 decoder? First off, it ONLY works with windows media player, and direct show API. Second of all, IT SUCKS!!! If you use Winamp which doesn't use Direct Show API, it sound 1000 times better than with Hardware accelration.

Price Paid:  $120.00 from vitalitycomputer.com

Summary:
This card is hands down the best card I have used. I build my own computers and I just put together a kick ass computer. I used a AMD Athlon XP processor and for the sound card I was deciding between this hercules game theater and the creative audigy platinum. Although they both have a rack I like the hercules one. The thing is just so cool. It turns 1 usb into 4 and has all the things you would want in terms of audio for your computer. Also ports for game controllers. Also this card is much better in terms of compatibility with AMD processors while the creative card is more compatible with pentium. If you want kick ass sound its either this card or the audigy depending on your preference of processors.

Price Paid:  $130.00 from Best Buy

Summary:
"A worthy upgrade from a Sound Blaster Live!"

For the past 1 1/2 years, I have been the happy owner of a original Sound Blaster Live!(with the daughter card too) from Creative Labs. It has undoubtably been the only part of my computer that I haven't had to worry about upgrading, even after what seems so long for a the life span of a simple PC card. Well the day has come to meet the successor to the throne. After reading numerous positive reviews on the internet, I KNEW I had to try out the Hercules Game Theater XP for my own. Fortunatly Best Buy has also dropped the price this week in the Atlanta area to a low $129.99.

On the Box, I quickly notice the points/features Hercules/Guillomont made sure to express to try to sell their card. A believe you me, everyone of them only makes the cake so much better.

Here's a quick list -

Sound API support for EAX 2.0, A3D 1.0, 13DL2, MacroFX, EnviromentFX..to name a few

Digital and Analog Out

Midi-In/Midi Out

Hardware MP3 Decoding (You read that right, hardware)

blah blah blah...the list goes on quite a bit.

The Game Theater XP doesn't stop at just simply onboard features. It also comes with a mandatory external rack that houses many more features. Including are headphone and mic jacks (in the standard stereo plug size), RCA line inputs for right and left channels, Game port, and 2 extra USB connectors. Features that the Live!Drive 2.0
can't even compete with. Definatly worth the price of admission.

Installation wasn't hard at all, I'm constantly upgrading my pc and pulling parts out to put them in proved quite...a holiday. In fact I also bought a burner from Best Buy the same day (8x Sony burners for $99..nice), and was able to get them both in less then 15 minutes.

All this good doesn't come with bad though.

The Rack Unit that comes with the XP is great. My connecters for my Klipsh 4.1 Promedia's were easily put in. The first thing I noticed was the wire that went from the PCI card to the Rack was unusually hard. It was like your old school external scsi wires that were such a pain to move around. That's the only real complaint about that.

Software installation introduced another hurdle also. The drivers went on like a breeze, and I had sound by my 2nd boot up. The only problem was I couldn't set up 4 speaker support without getting a Run32.dll error. That was something that I couldn't let pass. After about 10 minutes of fiddling, I removed my Live! Drivers and was able to change the speaker setup. Simple solution you say, I agree, I just don't see any real reasons why the software drivers would conflict with each other so...cursed Microshaft.

In the aftermath of Several Games of CS, Q3 Rocket Arena, Paul Oakenfold Live Set Fiasco's, and now a turrent of Dido I have to say that I'm impressed by the Game Theater Xp.

Definately something I would suggest to any person interested in getting a card that looks like it's gonna be in the lead for a little.

For the techies here is the test system I have -

Thunderbird 1333/266
Asus A7v133
768m PC133 Micron Ram
15 GB Maxtor 7200RPM
20 GB Maxtor 5400RPM
VisionTek Geforce 2 Ultra
19" KDS .24DP Trinitron
Voodoo 4 4500 PCI
17" Sony MS 200GS
Hercules Game Theater XP
Klipsh 4.1 Promedia
3C0M 3c509B 10/100 NIC
Creative Labs 6x DVD-Encore
Sony Supressa 8/4/32 CDRW
Logitech Optical Mouseman