Creative X-fi drivers

[Sinster]

aren't the greatest. I get all types of static, it's not the usually CL Snap, Crackle, and Pop either. A lot of choppiness and looping in ventrilo. Very Poor IMHO.. Just a little warning for those who are thinking about upgrading to Vista and own a X-Fi.

 

[Geffy]

You using 64-bit vista or 32-bit?

 

[Electronic Punk]

Creative are saying March for their first official non-beta release as far as X-Fi goes - may well have ALchemy integrated at that point or even take it to the next level (ie no additional files and no user intervention)

 

[LordOfLA]

march huh... Time to check if my finances will allow an auzentech...

 

[kcnychief]

How can they release drivers almost 2 months after Vista hits the market?

That's horrific!

 

[Electronic Punk]

Due to additional requirements in the Windows Vista driver certification process, the release of the final signed drivers for the Sound Blaster range will move out beyond our initial projected date until early March. The current Beta drivers are still valid for use under Vista and are required to take advantage of the benefits of Creative ALchemy with the Sound Blaster X-Fi range to restore multichannel audio and EAX to your games. We appreciate your understanding for this change to the schedule as we work to bring you the best experience for your Sound Blaster series cards while adhering to the requirements of this new operating system.

 

[kcnychief]

Translation - we are having problems creating final drivers and it's taking longer than expected

 

[madmatt]

Creative isn't the only one dragging their feet, but at least they released beta drivers...

 

[Geffy]

I am definitely not even considering getting Vista til March then

Reminds me I need to find out how stable the Vista 64 nVidia RAID drivers are.

 

[Electronic Punk]

There are beta drivers as matt said and they work fine, for me at least.

 

[kcnychief]

Agreed, beta drivers working fine here too. For that matter, so were NVIDIA drivers cept for the wiggy screen blinking when UAC elevated. I just dealt with it as I didn't want to mess with disabling how it worked as I've been testing a lot of app compatability.

 

[Sinster]

I wish my worked fine.. maybe the problem with Creative Drivers and NF4 are worse in Vista than XP.

 

[madmatt]

Which X-Fi card do you have and which version of the drivers are you using for Vista?

 

[Sinster]

Which X-Fi card do you have and which version of the drivers are you using for Vista?

Fatal1ty and Drivers 2.13.0001

 

[Sinster]

Any 3rd party Drivers? These drivers remind of the days when I had my A2..... all the stuttering and the slow downs in my system. They have to be the worse drivers or beta drivers.. constant crackling and slow downs.

 

[LordOfLA]

you shouldn't use 3rd party drivers.

 

[Sinster]

you shouldn't use 3rd party drivers.

I'm not using 3rd Party Drivers. I was asking if there were any out there.

 

[LordOfLA]

I know. You still shouldn't use any if they exist at all.

 

[Electronic Punk]

Well Dell have released some drivers via Creative:
http://ftp.us.dell.com/audio/R144728.EXE

I will most likely look at installing a little later on.
I have the Fatal1ty and these are for the music but the beta drivers support several cards:

http://uk.europe.creative.com/suppo...&driverlang=1033&OS=26&drivertype=0&x=30&y=18

- Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi XtremeMusic
- Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi XtremeGamer
- Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Platinum
- Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Fatal1ty
- Creative Sound Blaster Elite Pro

I have no idea if it will have all the same features as the retail one but I guess I only have to wait until Friday to find out what the Creative package will offer as extra - guess it won't be as feature complete as the retail CD stuff but what can you do. Maybe they will suprise me, but then alot of that stuff was junk anyway.

 

[sy64004]

I'm using the 2.13.0012 drivers from the link that electronic Punk gave below (uk.creative....). I've got an X-Fi Xtreme Music with some older 4.1 speakers on Home Premium 32bit and the sound is better than I ever had with XP, although I haven't played any games yet but my MP3s are sounding sweet