My speculation as to what the second "wow" could be...
I speculated earlier about what the two biggest "wows" possible could be, and opted that that would be something with Intel and something with Microsoft.
The Intel "wow" is easy - something involving putting a Creative design either on a motherboard or on a chip. (Another possibility would be working together on some sort of standard, but this is less "wowing", and could be somewhat along the lines of the Microsoft "wow" I describe below, or perhaps having to do with standards for audio I/O.)
I was at a loss, though, to imagine what they could do with Microsoft. However, in the wake of Creative's recent announcements, I know have a possible "wow" candidate for Creative-Microsoft. I'd guess that they could work together with Microsoft to define a standard and develop drivers for multi-channel environmental audio.
Microsoft's current driver model is implicitly 2-channel. And, while I believe that DirectSound does support multiple channels, I don't think anyone has yet implemented more than 2, nor is DirectSound (at this time) the "mainstream" driver model.
This seems a natural, and it once again puts Creative in the drivers seat defining a standard that also-rans will have to try to copy.
(Caveat - this is only a GUESS and WILD SPECULATION. I have no specific knowledge about what announcements may be coming.) |
