Question about compatibility of the SB0710 or SB0950 with the HP Elitebook 8770W (and other models)

So, I'd like to give my 8770W a upgrade in audio, and instead of going for a cheap USB DAC, I'd like to go with a soundcard. I found the SB0710 and the SB0950, and think those look pretty good. I'd like to go with the SB0710 because it's shorter and has that box that I can connect to it for more outputs. However, I'm worried that because the design of the 8560W/8570W/8760W/8770W has the ExpressCard on a slope below the USB ports, that it might not fully slot in or it might block those ports. Is there a way to determine if it will fit without blocking anything?

 

I dug out my old SB0710 to check the fit. No problem whatsoever. Slides in easily, 2-3mm clearance to the case.
USB ports stay accessible, standard USB cable plugs no probs, though thick USB dongles might not fit anymore.

 

Thanks for trying it out for me. Also, I wonder if you're able to tell any difference between the laptop's IDT audio and the SB0710.

 

I am not much of an audiophile tbh. I got this card used along with a laptop I bought on ebay. It is quite an old piece of hardware
of what I can tell, think XP/Vista times. Driver is very old 27.08.2009, and I don't know whether there is any complementary software these days for it where you can tinker around any settings.
Used it two or three times when DJ-ing casually and tested it again now on some mediocre headphones.
You can definitely tell a difference. Sound is crisper, richer, better separation. Or in other words, replay via IDT sounds a little more swampy/muddled. But how much of a difference which is worth any money, I can't tell.
I personally wouldn't spend too much on such old hardware, or audio stuff anyway, but then again, I don't know much when it comes to audio, and I suspect on high-end gear, it could probably shine even more.
Edit: tested a little more wit a lossless FLAC demo file on an external portable stereo Bluetooth speaker with audio jack. You can tell a difference, that's for sure.

 

Ok, that's great. I thought the IDT audio sounded lackluster on even my non-audiophile headphones, and I've had some driver audio pitch related issues with the on board audio, so I was looking at external sound cards to use instead. I wonder why HP went with such a terrible audio chipset on such a high end and expensive laptop.

Edit: I wish HP just went with the ALC898 used in higher end boards around the same time. It just worked when my main system was Z77.

 

There actually is an unofficial software suite for this card which lets you adjust all the gimmicks, and it works just fine on Windows 10:
http://danielkawakami.blogspot.com/2015/08/sb-x-fi-xtreme-audio-pcie-notebook.html