HT OMEGA eCLARO 7.1 Channel PCI Express Sound Card

I've been a huge HT Omega sound card (Had 5 of them over the years). When I upgraded my system in July of 2019, I bought this eClaro sound card. initially, I was super happy. then after a few windows updates, my system started having a blue screen a few times a month. I loaded the dump file into Window's debugging tool (windbg), it was always pointing to something different. After the last major update from Microsoft, the BOSDs were happening multiple times a day. I used another Microsoft debugging tool called driver verifier (This tool monitors your drivers for bad activity). I set Driver verifier up to watch any driver that was not a Microsoft driver. as soon as I rebooted, driver verifier stopped the system and reported that the eClaro driver was writing outside its memory space. Essentially this means that the eClaro driver is overwriting other drivers and services in my system, which explains why my blue screens were all being reported by different drivers, or services. I disabled the eClaro driver and my blue screens have stopped. I tried to update to the latest driver, but soon found out that the driver for this sound card was last updated in 2016, four years ago! I contacted HT Omega through their tech support, it's been 2 weeks no response.I have moved to a Soundblaster AE-7, which also has Dolby and DST encoding. I'm happily computing and blue screen free!I set this review to 3 stars, as the card is great, and the sound is amazing. HT Omega really needs to update their driver.

I'm completely taken over by eClaro, simply astonishing sound, i been using crappy onboard audio for so long that i didn't remember computer audio could reach this levels. In the past i had such bad experiences with Creative and their drivers that i have been avoiding dedicated sound cards.The high are very detail without being harsh, the mids are very warm and and detail at the same time, and the bass.... the bassss comes with authority, very tight but with a strength that i never heard before using the same sub with previous on-board, i have rediscovered my SVS 25-35PCI, i don't know if its running hot, but man im just astonished by the clarity of bass i get now, the sub was like sleeping with realtek cards even pumping the bass, like if it didn't really bring the punch to the games, music or movies, but now i don't even move to my dedicated home theater.No extra noise, my speakers no longer have a hiss, this is a big plus when you are watching a movie and has quiet scenes, nothing bothers me that hear extra sounds that distracts me, but with the eclaro my speakers don't produce any hiss.The drivers are totally stable under windows 7, their development seems to have stopped from what you download from the website, but customer service representatives can give you access to newer drivers, i have been using those and i havent had a single issue with tons of games.The only con that i can say, is that even though their software is completely functional and i have no issues to report, their UI is very old, seems like it was for windows xp, very basic visuals that don't reflect the quality of sound that this sound card delivers, not a big deal either, just small nit picking on my part, as where it matters, in sound quality its the best that i have heard, and this is all that should matter for someone looking to improve their sound quality.Overall this is the card that has restored my faith on computer audio again, and even though its one of the most expensive cards in the market, well worth the price for the quality of audio that i'm getting.***************************UPDATE 2018***************************Once again im incline to give some feedback on one the best products that i have tested for audio for PCs, with the changes toward Windows 10, i was worried it might lose support or that it might not work great, upgrading toward Coffee Lake i decided to give on board Realtek 1220 a chance, all 4 different mobos, AsRock Z370 Killer / Taichi and MSI Z370 Gaming M5 / Plus all had issues with mouse movement, some more than others but all had it, my setup is very unforgiving with this type of noises, the Emotiva UPA5 can pick up the slightest distortion and amplify it. I was really disappointed into how bad on board still is, even disregarding the mouse/electrical noise, the mids seems recessed the highs were very laid back and the bass was very muddy, no detail at all, like i was hearing another recording all together, even i heard some artifacts that are not in the recording like small pops or glitches, and its present in all 4 mobos, this is probably an issue more with my setup as i said the emotiva amp is very unforgiving with not having a good source, im sure for the vast mayority using Logitech/Creative all in 1 speakers on board might be fine, but for me its simply unacceptable, but luckly i still have my Omega eClaro, and what a difference, im still baffled into how good it is, no electrical noise, no mouse movement noise, nothing bad, but more so the quiality and detail of the audio is simply superb, you might think im exagerating, but get a good setup with a good amp and your choice of quality speakers and you will see what this card is capable, i like it so much i bought a second one.Now this update i also will present you the negative, specially since i have played with it for 5 years now.1) The software is ugly, even the latest drivers have a XP look to it, that said its also simple and effective, and works really well, its just more the aesthetics of it that look very old compared to current modern times. But i prefer this old style than to deal with crappy drivers like creative and asus, its fine, just looks out of place for today.2) Something is not fully correct in the design of the PCI bracket or the card itself, in some motherboards if i attach the screw fully (to the PCI case slot) the card stand correctly and securely it picks up electrical noise, it has happen with multiple motherboards, cases and power supplies, its the cards fault, but removing the screw and jiggling with it some (computer off) and restarting you will find the perfect spot where there is no distortion or electrical noise. I also can add that this happen also with the second Omega eClaro that i just bought, its a flaw in the design, but its very minor.3) The large Capacitors, there are a lot of people, includling my self that have a PCIe x1 behind the GPU and ideal place to install a sound card, but this 3x Capacitors are big, really big that it touches the GPU, and more so this days that most manufacturers have backplates, so becomes a little hard to install the GPU and eClaro, even at the bottom slot it conflicts sometimes with the extra USB connectors, to me if there is a revision of this card, maybe an eClaro 2, i would like to see it full height card with this caps being replaced with more smaller ones that do the same job, simply its to keep the form factor needed today for a more functional design.Now remember the cons are really small, not worth even a star imo, its more sharing with you things that have bother me, but remember we buy this type of hardware for one thing, for its quality on the reproduction and thats something that this card is second to none, to me its the best sound card in the market period.

I did a lot of research before I bought this. I had a long run of bad luck with Creative Labs sound cards (used mainly for 5.1 Digital Dolby signal processing) Sound cutting in and out very consistently after 4-5 hrs run time. When I put this card next to Creative Labs FX it became apparent that this wasn't a different breed altogether, The Capacitors are Huge. The card was easy to install on 64 bit Windows 7 ultimate and I am using the Optical out into a Receiver from a computer built to watch high end movies and shows. There is a sound difference, a clarity and depth that the creative card did not have. The control panel is easy to navigate and efficient.I am so happy with this card it exceeded my expectations.Update: Card has been un-installing and I have to physicaly remove and plug back in to get it to work again, sigh going to return and try another brand. Other reviewers here had this problem also. It's great when it works but this is to much.