A similar effects DSP was also present on Creative's cards back to the AWE 32. The hardware accelerated effects engine is an E-mu FX8010 DSP integrated into the Creative Technology's audio chip and was historically used to enhance MIDI output by adding effects (such as reverb and chorus) to the sampled instruments on ' wavetable' sample-based synthesis cards (which is often confused with the 'wavetable synthesis' developed by Wolfgang Palm of PPG and Michael Mcnabb in the late-1970s, however not related). Up to EAX 2.0, the technology was based around the effects engine aboard the E-mu 10K1 on Creative Technology's and the Maestro2 on ESS1968 chipset driven sound cards. The aim of EAX was to create more ambiance within video games by more accurately simulating a real-world audio environment.

Rather, EAX can be seen as a library of sound effects written and compiled to be executed on a DSP instead of the CPU, often called 'hardware-accelerated'. Ergo, the aim of EAX has nothing to do with 3D audio positioning, this is usually done by a sound library like DirectSound3D or OpenAL.

EAX is a library of extensions to Microsoft's DirectSound3D, itself an extension to DirectSound introduced with DirectX 3 in 1996 with the intention to standardize 3D audio for Microsoft Windows, adding environmental audio presets to DS3D's audio positioning.

Realtek high definition audio driver