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Actual CPU related performance is not so encouraging. We ran Zdnet’s Audiobench and compared the MUSE to several popular cards, and the MUSE performed so poorly that it shocked us. ZDNet’s Audiobench only test DirectSound and DirectSound3D, but it still gives some indication of how the card does using those MS generic APIs. The SBLive Value and Vortex2 cards literally trounced the MUSE in all tests, as shown in the below graph. We’re talking about a 10% difference in DirectSound3D CPU usage, which is huge! Tests were run on an AMD K7 750Mhz CPU paired with and Asus K7V with the most updated drivers as of Oct. 10th.

As you can see in the DirectSound3D CPU usage graphed below, the MUSE engages an extraordinarily high percentage of the CPU for its tasks. Even at 8 static voices, the MUSE is already using about as much CPU horsepower as the Vortex2 and SBLive cards at the most intense of settings (32 streaming voices). Furthermore, while the Vortex 2 and SBLive increase very gradually when going from 8, to 16, and finally 32 simultaneous voices, the MUSE nearly doubles it’s CPU usage with each doubling of voices, until it is eating up around 14% of the CPU resources.

Now keep in mind that these are synthetic benchmarks, and in the past we’ve found that AudioBench results don’t always translate directly to real life gaming results. There is always a slight correlation though, so we can expect there to be a related drop in gaming framerates when 3D is enabled (whether it is DirectSound 3D or EAX/A3D APIs).