You won’t be seeing that little blue square with the white arrow very often anymore, SoundMax is being discontinued by Analog Devices, leaving Realtek as the only major dedicated onboard audio chip provider.  Intel and AMD have the ability to create serious onboard audio solutions, but have preferred to use third party chips and codecs in the past, but now they have only one to choose from.  The Tech Report can tell you more about this move.

“Analog Devices’ SoundMAX line of audio codecs has been one of the more notable integrated audio options in PC motherboards for some time now. SoundMAX solutions have found their way into motherboards from Intel and Asus, among others, and have fared reasonably well in our testing. However, ADI hasn’t quite managed to steal enough market share away from suppliers like Realtek to make a go of it, and now, the firm has decided to cease development of new PC audio codecs in order to focus on other markets.”

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