Creative delivers more Vista drivers

[Unknown Soldier]

DELIVERING BEYOND its initial Windows Vista commitment, Creative Labs has dished out news drivers today for the Sound Blaster Audigy and Live family.

Supported are the Audigy LS, Audigy SE, Audigy Value and the Live! 24-bit.

Owners of these cards will now get more than the basic Windows Vista audio functionality - they'll have access to the Vista versions of the Creative Labs Audio console, the various EAX settings and a dedicated speaker setup application.

Gamers will also be pleased to see in-game EAX effects return, whilst hardcore audiophiles will be able to tweak sampling rates and SPDIF configurations, assuming they're not trying to do anything that the Windows Vista DRM Infectionâ„¢ wants to stop them doing.

Creative has come under an awful lot of fire over the last 12 months for its general apparent ambivalence towards driver updates, a big no-no in the world of enthusiasts used to monthly improvements from graphics manufacturers.

Additional support for Creative customers wouldn't go amiss, and this seems to be a step in the right direction, at least.

This suite of driver and application has been updated and combined for your convenience. It installs the following applications to control your audio device's settings. For more details, read the rest of this web release note.

Applications included in this release:

* Creative Audio Console (for Windows Vistaâ„¢ only)
* Creative Device Control
* Creative EAX Console
* Creative Speaker Settings

Added Features or Enhancements:

The above applications provide the following control options for your audio device:

* Output audio quality
* SPDIF Input/Output sampling rate
* Speaker configuration
* Sound effects
* Creative Multi-Speaker Surround

Requirements:

* Microsoft® Windows Vista 64-bit, Windows Vista 32-bit, Windows® XP Professional x64 Edition, Windows XP Service Pack 2, Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005 or Windows XP Media Center Edition 2004
* Sound Blaster® Audigy® Value/SE/LS, or Sound Blaster Live!® 24-bit audio devices

Notes:

* This pack is only for the Creative Sound Blaster audio devices listed above.
DO NOT install this pack for Sound Blaster Live! 24-bit External.
* To install this pack
1. Download the SB24_PCDRV_LB_1_04_0076.exe file onto your local hard disk.
2. Close all other Windows applications.
3. Double-click the downloaded file.
4. Follow the instructions on the screen.

News Source: TheInq
Download: Creative Sound Blaster Audigy Value/SE/LS and Sound Blaster Live! 24-bit XP and Windows Vista Pack 1.04.0076

 

[Davros]

well done creative....

 

[FiggyG]

They enabled EAX HD in Quake 4 for me with Vista 64, SB Audigy SE The Audio Controls are kinda nice, also got a much needed microphone boost.

 

[stevem]

Heh, a cursory glance at the latest Vista X-Fi drivers reveals:

; EMU10K1 chip (SBLive!, APS)
%EMU10K1.DeviceDesc%=EMU10K1_Device,PCI\VEN_1102&DEV_0002&CC_040100

I was almost tempted to try an old Live 5.1. A truly unified architecture...

 

[Unknown Soldier]

Well .. my sister went overseas with her family and I asked her to get me the X-Fi ExtremeGamer. She called yesterday and asked which version, I said the Pro. It'll cost me $150 but it's half the price that I can get it here.

I can't wait for Saturday.

I just checked, hopefully it's the Sound Blaster X-Fi Xtreme Gamer Fatal1ty Pro Series.

US

 

[Rainbow Man]

I bought the Fatality version a while after it came out.

Worked just fine in XP. Never had an issue with it. Getting some pops in audio under Vista tho.
Peace.

 

[Kyyla]

Worked just fine in XP. Never had an issue with it. Getting some pops in audio under Vista tho.

I'm getting pops with Xtrememusic in Vista too. Can't believe I paid for this BS.

 

[Rainbow Man]

I want to blame vista more than creative for this. If MS hadn't screwed with the audio bit of the OS I bet it wouldn't have happened.
Peace.

 

[Unknown Soldier]

Well I just got my X-Fi ExtremeGamer Fatality FPS yesterday

Will be using XP for a while still, but will be going Vista thereafter.

I hear that the Auto-update for the X-Fi(bios?) seems to do weird things to it but as I don't have Internet at home, it's not a big issue.

Will be installing it today.

US

 

[Unknown Soldier]

New OpenAL v2.0.3 071207

Updated Summer 2007 : Version 2.0.3

The OpenAL Installer for Windows will install the OpenAL 1.1 libraries, enabling support for core OpenAL operations as well as extensions such as EAX and EFX. The installer supports both 32-bit and 64-bit versions of Windows.

DLL Version numbers:

* OpenAL32.dll version 6.14.357.22
* wrap_oal.dll version 2.1.8.1

Changes and Bugfixes

* Added new enumeration extension (ALC_ENUMERATE_ALL_EXT) to use AL on any soundcard / audio endpoint
* "Generic Hardware" device only appears in the enumeration string if it can be used
* Fixed alcGetIntegerv's requirement for an active context
* Fixed alcCaptureOpenDevice so that it returns 'NULL' if the capture device fails to open
* Fixed software reverb bugs (Reflection Delay and Air Absorption HF)

News Source: Creative
Download: OpenAL v2.0.3

 

[Rainbow Man]

Auto-update for vista doesn't do weird things. It plain simply doesn't work at all!

Or it didn't a couple days ago anyway when I downloaded and installed the drivers for my XFi Fatality. You have to download and install the driver the old-fashioned way.

Oh and by the way. The driver download package doesn't contain more than a very basic software setup. The THX config thingy isn't included for example. Nor is equalizer or MIDI soundfont loading tool or environment effect editor and a bunch of other stuff.

Most people don't need that stuff but then again some do. Maybe there's a separate package that installs all the rest of the software I dunno. I didn't look around much I just grabbed the driver package and went about my business.



Peace.

 

[Unknown Soldier]

Ah!

And I was just waiting for this card before going Vista... seems I will hold off for a while longer and stay with XP.

US

 

[Unknown Soldier]

Heh, a cursory glance at the latest Vista X-Fi drivers reveals:

; EMU10K1 chip (SBLive!, APS)
%EMU10K1.DeviceDesc%=EMU10K1_Device,PCI\VEN_1102&DEV_0002&CC_040100

I was almost tempted to try an old Live 5.1. A truly unified architecture...

Yep, had a look and found the same thing as well. This means that it should support the Older SB Live! Platinum that I have. Still, SB say no Official support for the card for Vista. Weird hey?

You can find more references at
[Creative.NTIA64]
[EMU10K1.AddReg]
[EMU10k1.CopyList]
[EMU10K1_Device.NTx86.CoInstallers]
[EMU10K1_Device.NTAMD64.CoInstallers]
[EMU10K1_Device.NTIA64.CoInstallers]
[EMU10K1_Device.NTx86]
[EMU10K1_Device.NTAMD64]
[EMU10K1_Device.NTIA64]
[[EMU10K1_Device.NTx86.Interfaces]
[EMU10K1_Device.NTAMD64.Interfaces]
[EMU10K1_Device.NTIA64.Interfaces]
[[EMU10K1_Device.NTx86.Services]
[EMU10K1_Device.NTAMD64.Services]
[EMU10K1_Device.NTIA64.Services]
[Strings]

US

 

[pakotlar]

And I don't even have to pay for them! Wow, so generous creative! Must have been a good month.