# Creative: ASUS Misleading Customers on EAX Drivers



## malware (Mar 26, 2008)

PC sound card maker Creative Labs said in a e-mail message today that rival hardware manufacturer ASUS is misleading its customers by claiming that new drivers for ASUS sound cards support EAX 3,4 and 5, a set of environmental enhancements for sound in games. Responding to an announcement by ASUS that newly released drivers for its Xonar line of sound cards support EAX, Creative communications VP Phil O'Shaughnessy said that the drivers effectively trick games into outputting EAX-capable sound, but they don't actually fully support it. "There are a small number of PC game titles that specifically query the audio device on the system to see if EAX 5 is available before they will attempt to render more than 64 3D simultaneous audio voices," O'Shaughnessy said. "The new ASUS drivers are falsely reporting EAX 5 capabilities in order to get these games to output 3D audio on ASUS sound cards. ASUS customers are not getting a genuine EAX Advanced HD experience with this driver update. Furthermore, the several hundred games that support EAX 3 or EAX 4 for delivering in-game effects will not provide those effects from ASUS sound cards." he added. ASUS representatives are still awaited to comment on the story.

*View at TechPowerUp Main Site*


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## DanishDevil (Mar 26, 2008)

Ooh, burn!  I wonder how this one's gonna play out...


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## tzitzibp (Mar 26, 2008)

It is very interesting to see how this is going to effect asus soundcard owners... maybe at the end Asus will be forced to provide even more updated drivers. 
It is funny, because only yesterday, I commented on this issue in one of the thread here in TPU. To be more specific, ¨Conflict: Denied opps¨ has the problem described by Creative...


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## BumbRush (Mar 26, 2008)

creatives eax 3-4-5 are not hardware bound anymore with current cards any maker COULD support them, problem is creative dosnt want that because its the ONLY selling point they have anymore.

see creative pretty much shot themselves in the foot when they put out the x-fi pci-e card thats just an hd ac97 codec on a pci-e card(no hardware dac) and renders EVERYTHING in software, what i mean is that the card "supports eax3-4-5" dispite lacking the hardware to truely support it........

so yeah, they may need to update their drivers, but if asus does it, then others are likely to follow, and when u start seeing cmedia based cards that support eax3-4-5 you will also see creatives balls shrink up inside them like a kid who just went swiming in a mountin steam!!!

screw creative.......


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## tkpenalty (Mar 26, 2008)

:shadedshu

lol. At least there is some sign of competition


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## Wile E (Mar 26, 2008)

I just wish somebody else would design cards that offload. So far, Ceative seems to be the only ones that are doing it. All other cards still render via cpu.


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## INSTG8R (Mar 26, 2008)

I mean I dont see why Creative just dont use the opportunity to license out more than just EAX 2.0. If they werent so tight fisted with EAX then other manufacturers wouldnt be trying to end run around them....I mean they arent losing anything by licensing it out. If people like me want a Creative card we will buy one. I didnt buy my X-fi Fatality for the EAX...(tho its a nice feature)


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## btarunr (Mar 26, 2008)

This is rubbish. EAX 4~5 require a hardware processing engine that cannot be software emulated. Afterall, the Xonar doesn't feature a audio processor, just a chipset. The Creative EMU10K series and CA20K1, CA20K-A2 processors can handle EAX HD 4 and 5. You cannot 'trick' an audio application to thinking an audio device supports EAX 3, 4, 5 as they are OpenAL extensions and Creative ships the ICD with its drivers.

All in all, it's just as big a marketing blooper as HIS / Diamond multimedia sporting a "THX" logo on some of their boxes.


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## sinner33 (Mar 26, 2008)

So what's going on here? Can the Xonar output the EAX 3,4,5?


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## 1c3d0g (Mar 26, 2008)

Creative is one of the most arrogant companies I've ever known. Their stupidity is incredible. Yet for all their faults they do produce good hardware, but it's the drivers that let them down. They should do like NVIDIA, sell their chip to whoever is interested and put a lot of focus on the drivers. This way add-in partners can worry about manufacturing/distributing/selling and Creative can do what it does best, make better APU's. At least they appear to slowly test the waters with Auzentech, and I hope this will open the way for other audio manufacturers to implement Creative's chips. Still, wouldn't it be great if NVIDIA offered a standalone, PCI-Express SoundStorm 2?


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## btarunr (Mar 26, 2008)

1c3d0g said:


> Creative is one of the most arrogant companies I've ever known. Their stupidity is incredible. Yet for all their faults they do produce good hardware, but it's the drivers that let them down. They should do like NVIDIA, sell their chip to whoever is interested and put a lot of focus on the drivers. This way add-in partners can worry about manufacturing/distributing/selling and Creative can do what it does best, make better APU's. At least they appear to slowly test the waters with Auzentech, and I hope this will open the way for other audio manufacturers to implement Creative's chips. Still, wouldn't it be great if NVIDIA offered a standalone, PCI-Express SoundStorm 2?



How does this news item even relate to Creative being arrogant? The discussion is about a company falsely advertising Creative's proprietary technologies as marketing features which it can't. Auzentech has a license to those technologies and it can advertise. So the issue of 'arrogance' is out  of the window. 

Yes they sell their technologies to Auzentech and MSI...the way you were pointing out NVidia does. 

Better APU's? The CA20K1 (X-Fi processor) is the best APU there is, name a competitor? (NVidia SoundStorm is out of the race).


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## WarEagleAU (Mar 26, 2008)

Very interesting read indeed. Personally I dont care if the card supports EAX or not, to me I dont notice a difference in games.


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## btarunr (Mar 26, 2008)

WarEagleAU said:


> Very interesting read indeed. Personally I dont care if the card supports EAX or not, to me I dont notice a difference in games.



Doom 3 + EAX4.0 HD...can almost hear imps fart.


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## Mussels (Mar 26, 2008)

what asus did was when the games asks, the drivers say "yes we support EAX 3/4/5"

This lets some games work better (the ones that disable 5.1 sound without EAX for example), but others (as have been mentioned) have problems with this.

Creative are pissy because as has been said they have released cards without the hardware acceleration that still have the full EAX support... so its been proven its not a hardware limit.


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## tzitzibp (Mar 26, 2008)

spot on, Mussels... they are pissed with their mistake....


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## BumbRush (Mar 26, 2008)

btarunr said:


> This is rubbish. EAX 4~5 require a hardware processing engine that cannot be software emulated. Afterall, the Xonar doesn't feature a audio processor, just a chipset. The Creative EMU10K series and CA20K1, CA20K-A2 processors can handle EAX HD 4 and 5. You cannot 'trick' an audio application to thinking an audio device supports EAX 3, 4, 5 as they are OpenAL extensions and Creative ships the ICD with its drivers.
> 
> All in all, it's just as big a marketing blooper as HIS / Diamond multimedia sporting a "THX" logo on some of their boxes.



um then explain this
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16829102017

it dosnt have hardware rendering, yet according to creative supports eax3-4-5 that supposdely requier hardware rendering.........

as i said, creatives just pissed that somebody else is following their example and doing software support for eax above2.

and the cmedia current chips can deal with as many or more voices as the creative cards, they just have nicer, smaller, better working drivers and dont bugger up on common hardware!!!!


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## btarunr (Mar 27, 2008)

BumbRush said:


> um then explain this
> http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16829102017
> 
> it dosnt have hardware rendering, yet according to creative supports eax3-4-5 that supposdely requier hardware rendering.........
> ...



Get your facts straight. The Xtreme Audio does NOT support EAX 4 and 5.


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## BumbRush (Mar 27, 2008)

then this dosnt eather
http://us.creative.com/products/product.asp?category=1&subcategory=208&product=16770

because you insist it requiers hardware support and that card is just an hdaudio codec on a pci-e card.......yet they claim it supports 3-4-5,things that arent sposta be supporable without the proper hardware like an audigy or x-fi DAC on the card.

just accept it btarunr, creative is a shit company that has shit drivers and lies about whats needed to support their bullshit audio extentions, if you look at the cmedia chips and some others they support more or as many voices as the x-fi, and thats what eax really is about, given time to flush out the drivers any card and even most of todays hdaudio codecs can run eax5 and lower no problem.


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## btarunr (Mar 27, 2008)

BumbRush said:


> then this dosnt eather
> http://us.creative.com/products/product.asp?category=1&subcategory=208&product=16770
> 
> because you insist it requiers hardware support and that card is just an hdaudio codec on a pci-e card.......yet they claim it supports 3-4-5,things that arent sposta be supporable without the proper hardware like an audigy or x-fi DAC on the card.
> ...



Excuse me, where does it say EAX 4 and 5 ? That page from Creative doesn't mention EAX 5.0 HD label either. I'm getting you a specs sheet. Accept it BumbRush, you're more of a Creative hating troll than anything useful to prove your contention.


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## driver66 (Mar 27, 2008)

BumbRush said:


> then this dosnt eather
> http://us.creative.com/products/product.asp?category=1&subcategory=208&product=16770
> 
> because you insist it requiers hardware support and that card is just an hdaudio codec on a pci-e card.......yet they claim it supports 3-4-5,things that arent sposta be supporable without the proper hardware like an audigy or x-fi DAC on the card.
> ...



Dude if your start on these fine forums are to bash one of our most informative members then GTFO This is not the first thread I've seen you CHASING btarunr around in 

Please take a deep breath and enjoy this forum or you will be "BYE BYE"


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## BumbRush (Mar 27, 2008)

eax is nolonger listed as EAX support its listd as "Advanced HD" http://www.soundblaster.com/technology/welcome.asp?j1=eax

and the card supposedlysupports Advanced HD 4.0(curent version)  so yes they claim full eax support on a card that lacks hardware dac......



> Enjoy Realistic sound effects in games
> Bullets whiz past your head. Explosions shake the room. Take your games to the next level with EAX® ADVANCED HD™ sound effects.



from creative specs on the product page.


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## driver66 (Mar 27, 2008)

THX


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## BumbRush (Mar 27, 2008)

np, see, the thing is creatives EAX is their only selling point for their hardware really, its what sells their cards, so they charge ALOT to allow other makers to use their resorces to support it, on the other hand if a company put the time in to reverce engineer how the creative eax3-4-5 calls work they could support it in software, as creative has with their advanced HD4.0 support in the pci-e cards


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## btarunr (Mar 27, 2008)

The Xtreme Audio PCI-E does not support EAX 4.0 or EAX 5.0. That's a hardware accelerated DSP.

Besides, other selling points include 128 hardware + 65536 software voices, CMSS-3D (which works) and Crystalizer which makes low bit rate audio definitely sound better.


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## BumbRush (Mar 27, 2008)

creative claims it does support advanced hd(new name for all eax tech)

now as to your 128hardware voices.







and about quility cmedia vs x-fi hardware






just examps of the BS creative and their fanboi's hate to see, creative was once the choice for audio cards, now they are just, meh at best, crappy drivers, poor hardware design that dosnt work with all systems properly.


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## imperialreign (Mar 27, 2008)

BumbRush said:


> creative claims it does support advanced hd(new name for all eax tech)
> 
> now as to your 128hardware voices.
> 
> ...





Ummm . . . if you're trying to compare a true X-Fi to an Auzen . . . that's no contest.  Auzen have taken the roost for the absolute best audio quality in the market.  Everyone else is battling it out for a close second.  The X-Fi, though, takes the cake in performance - no other card can really match their proccessing speeds.

So, moot point.  eff-dee-doo, IMO, that Auzen has better rated sound quality, find a better point to argue.


The X-Fi Xtreme Audio PCI and the PCI-E cards do not support EAX 3, 4, or 5 - and no where have I EVER read an advertisement that claimed they do.  You can go and hope that other hardware designers can reverse engineer the EAX drivers, but without the hardware it still won't work.  Usage of any hardware to impliment those features without consent from Creative is a major violation of intellectual rights, and could cost a manufacturer more money than they would actually make.

The Xtreme Audio do support EAX 1 and 2, which give Creative the right to spin their marketing on it and claim the cards support "EAX Advanced HD."  Remember, marketing is all about getting someone to buy your product, as long as your relatively truthful, you can say as you wish - it's up to the customer to be informed and research a potential purchase - not the manufacturer's concern.


I'm sorry, but I don't see EAX being the only selling point to an X-Fi card.  Biggest selling point, IMO, is a dedicated APU instead of a chipset.  Find me a card that can process 128 hardware audio streams faster than an Xtreme Gamer Fatal1ty Pro.  Seriously, go find me a review or something, as I'd like to see it . . .  BTW, audio cards from the EMU line-up don't count, as those are Creative's products too.

ASUS screwed up on this one.  You can trick the game software into thinking your hardware is EAX capable - but without the correct hardware to process the DSP calls, it won't sound right, or it won't function properly at all.


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## department76 (Mar 27, 2008)

imperialreign said:


> ASUS screwed up on this one.  You can trick the game software into thinking your hardware is EAX capable - but without the correct hardware to process the DSP calls, it won't sound right, or it won't function properly at all.




wave the crackling audio across the line!

funny how few people realize what a DSP/APU actually is, what it does, and that the X-Fi is essentially the only one around.  C-Media codecs (or Realtek, VIA, etc for that matter) just aren't the same thing.


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## Mussels (Mar 27, 2008)

people are arguing the wrong points here - the Xfi does have hardware acceleration for EAX, but thats not what MAKES eax.

EAX can easily be done in software, and the guy before did show a quote claiming EAX was meant to be on these cards - EAX 'advanced HD' is thrown around a lot, but its really just creatives way of pushing people around.

Remember the whole uproar about how vista doesnt work in 5.1? Notice how it was ONLY EAX games that screwed up? Thats because creative insisted surround sound be tied in with their audio extensions (EAX)

Creative have good hardware, but horrible marketing and horrible software, and they DO lie about these things. They want audigy users to pay for EAX in vista, when X-fi users get alchemy for free... thats dodgy. no other word for it.


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## btarunr (Mar 27, 2008)

BumbRush said:


> creative claims it does support advanced hd(new name for all eax tech)
> 
> now as to your 128hardware voices.
> 
> ...



You sir are a troll.

Those charts were put up by Auzentech for marketing the X-Meridean on their website, they removed them after the X-Fi Prelude came up, for obvious reasons...so you can pretty much guess their accuracy. The charts were hosted and re-hosted over and over agin until you got them.

The Xtreme Audio does not support EAX 4.0 and 5.0.

"Advanced HD" is *NOT* the new name of EAX, stop making things up. EAX is the effects DSP, when the audio output format happens to be 24-bit with > 44.1 kHz sample rate, it becomes HD audio....by Intel's Azalia specifications. So in a multichannel setup such as 5.1 or 7.1, 96 kHz sample rate is used for the output audio track with 6 (or 8) channels in all. Some games up the resolution to 24-bit and so it becomes "Advanced HD".

So a game utlizing HD format audio with EAX 3.0 and up becomes EAX 24-bit Advanced HD. There's a logo for that as well. 

And just what 'quality' prefix are you giving C-Media? No, C-Media did design the Oxygen HD CMI-8788 chipset for the X-Meridean BUT you cannot give the chipset credit for the card's superior output quality, it was because Auzen used stage II DAC chips made by Asahi Kasei that the output quality was that good. The CMI 8788 basically did the signal processing job there while the CPU processed audio. Get your facts right.


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## candle_86 (Mar 27, 2008)

while with EAX i have no knowlege i do have it alot of experince with sound cards. C-Media uses a codec, all of there cards do, this means the CPU does the work and the card outputs it. I ran a compairson between my Sound Blaster Live and a c-media card last year, and guess what my live did better yet its from 1998. As for Vista support, blame MS for removing hardware APU support via DirectX, the only way around this is to bypass DirectX and that means a new card.

As stop insulting members, your a troll, so go back to your bridge, though from your statements elsewhere i think you belong here

http://www.rage3d.com/board/

go there and annoy them, they are very much like you


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## Mussels (Mar 27, 2008)

BT's comments have a logical backing. while i didnt get his point originally, he has made it clear he is basing it on fact and not assumptions.

why blame MS, when creative were the only people using hardware audio, and it was choking the industry? they STILL dont let anyone use EAX above 2.0, and WONDERFULLY limit most games - ever noticed how say, EAX 5.0 games... ONLY support 5.0. no 4, no 3, no 2 - its Creative or go home. i'm GLAD microsoft killed that.


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## candle_86 (Mar 27, 2008)

creative has a right to hold there license and do what they want with them.

Im sure creative is working on a new APU that can bypass the secruity and allow hardware accelerated audio agian.


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## sman83 (Mar 27, 2008)

*Unoffical Vista Creative Drivers*



candle_86 said:


> while with EAX i have no knowlege i do have it alot of experince with sound cards. C-Media uses a codec, all of there cards do, this means the CPU does the work and the card outputs it. I ran a compairson between my Sound Blaster Live and a c-media card last year, and guess what my live did better yet its from 1998. As for Vista support, blame MS for removing hardware APU support via DirectX, the only way around this is to bypass DirectX and that means a new card.
> 
> As stop insulting members, your a troll, so go back to your bridge, though from your statements elsewhere i think you belong here
> 
> ...



I found this thread most informative and entertaining !! I had to make a comment about the Creative Audigy/Xi-Fi drivers for Vista.

Yea Creatives drivers for Vista suck I think that anyone can recognize that, and they are being lazy and greedy bastards when it comes to there drivers for Vista.  That pissed me off when I bought a Creative Audigy Platinum eX for $30 from there website for a St. Pattys day special.  I didnt need anything special just something to replace the onboard sound.

After much dissappointment with there reference drivers for Vista I found this guy on the Creative forums with FULLY FUNCTIONAL(the spdif for 64bit vista doesnt work, but I use 32-bit) drivers for Vista !!

Been using these and they work perfect onboard DD and DTS encoding work, spdif works, gameport and EAX sounds just like I remember for XP !

Here the links cudos to Daniel K !

Drivers:
http://forums.creative.com/creativelabs/board/message?board.id=Vista&thread.id=29151

Software Pack:
http://forums.creative.com/creativelabs/board/message?board.id=Vista&thread.id=24260

Modified Alchemy to work with new drivers:
http://forums.creative.com/creativelabs/board/message?board.id=Vista&thread.id=18972

This guy will get my money for the drivers not Creative !


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## btarunr (Mar 27, 2008)

I know that guy, Daniel K...very helpful chap.


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## btarunr (Mar 27, 2008)

candle_86 said:


> Im sure creative is working on a new APU that can bypass the secruity and allow hardware accelerated audio agian.








Some comic relief


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## candle_86 (Mar 27, 2008)

btarunr said:


> Some comic relief



lol man you made my day


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## BumbRush (Mar 27, 2008)

candle_86 said:


> Im sure creative is working on a new APU that can bypass the secruity and allow hardware accelerated audio agian.



vista support has nothing to do with the hardware in this case, its all to do with creative needing to rewrite their drivers from scratch and they hate do do that, they just like to mod the ones they already have a little and callit a new version.....


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## imperialreign (Mar 27, 2008)

part of the major problem Creative has had with the Vista drivers is less time to write them compared to other manufacturers.  During the design process for Vista, MS was working with both Creative and nVidia in trying to bring about an API that would replace DirectSound, and allow full hardware acceleration from within Vista.  Problems arose when nVidia pulled out of the collaboration, and MS then decided to quit supporting the project as well - leaving Creative high and dry in the matter; so then they turned all their attention towards the open source OpenAL API.  Big reason why Creative was very late to the field with Vista drivers, and big reason why Vista drivers have been very dodgy and have had numerous beta releases as they try to catch up.

Besides, every audio manufacturer has had their slew of driver issues with Vista - Creative is not alone in this matter, they've just taken the brunt of the flak because their hardware is so more widely used.  Come to think of it - every manufacturer from audio to video has had driver issues with Vista . . . but only a few companies are taking the heat 



			
				Mussels said:
			
		

> people are arguing the wrong points here - the Xfi does have hardware acceleration for EAX, but thats not what MAKES eax.
> 
> EAX can easily be done in software, and the guy before did show a quote claiming EAX was meant to be on these cards - EAX 'advanced HD' is thrown around a lot, but its really just creatives way of pushing people around.
> 
> ...




I can't argue that Creative doesn't lie - TBH, I can't think of a single manufacturer that hasn't lied at some point or another.  I did think it was really effed up that they wanted Audigy users to pay for the ALchemy drivers; it's not just dodgy, it's wrong - a means of trying to force people to upgrade to newer hardware.

The thing I was trying to make clear, though, is that it doesn't matter if an audio card can trick a game or software into running EAX - EAX DSPs are written based around a hardware design and architecture.  While some DSPs might work without the hardware they were written for to be present, most will not function properly, if at all.  I'm not talking about hardware acceleration being related to EAX, I'm talking about the hardware's ability to process the EAX calls.

As to the Vista 5.1 issue - there are a ton of programs that have run into issues with 5.1 audio, not just EAX games (although, they do present the majority).  Creative's form of surround sound, CMSS-3D, runs on it's own DSPs, being only partially tied into the EAX routines at a software level - IIRC.


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## BumbRush (Mar 27, 2008)

EAX can be software emulated, and thats how they added it to the pci-e "x-fi" card, its buggy still because its using creative drivers, and i got a feeling that other companys are using those drivers to model their eax support method on(such as this asus card) hence problems show up.

just like OGL can be emulated using d3d or d3d be emulated via ogl(sitech gldirect for example) you can emulate/convert the API calls for eax 3-4-5 to run in software or use the hardware thats avalable to run them, EAX is not really so much a hardware feture as creatives way of doing enviromental sound, aureal and some others had their own ways, that really where supperior in many ways for thier days, but they are all dead now, mostly due to creatives market power :/

cmedia survived and their xear3d is quite good im my experiance, even with headphones you really get a feeling of 3d possitioning, not as good as true surround sound, but hey, its better then most other options.

creative for years has needed to start from scratch with their drivers, but they dont want to do that, Oh and the audigy thing, utter horseshit,charge people to get support that other companys would give for free!!!!

do you know that the old 8738 got driver updates for both vista and XP just after Vista came out?(and had betas b4 that) the chip is as old as the sblive, a card creative refuses to support anymore, but has GOOD WORKING DRIVERS even under vista!!!!(i tested this and 6ch sound works in vista both in games and in movies)  thats enought proof for me of who the better company is........


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## imperialreign (Mar 27, 2008)

BumbRush said:


> EAX can be software emulated, and thats how they added it to the pci-e "x-fi" card, its buggy still because its using creative drivers, and i got a feeling that other companys are using those drivers to model their eax support method on(such as this asus card) hence problems show up.
> 
> just like OGL can be emulated using d3d or d3d be emulated via ogl(sitech gldirect for example) you can emulate/convert the API calls for eax 3-4-5 to run in software or use the hardware thats avalable to run them, EAX is not really so much a hardware feture as creatives way of doing enviromental sound, aureal and some others had their own ways, that really where supperior in many ways for thier days, but they are all dead now, mostly due to creatives market power :/



<sigh>

the PCI and PCIE Xtreme Audio is capable of EAX 2, because of the chipset that's present on the PCB.  It's not added as a "software emulated" variety, nor by any other means - the card's hardware is capable of EAX 2, nothing further, and that's that.  If it were truly capable of EAX 3,4 or 5, I'm 100% positive that Creative would advertise that fact on their site like they do with ALL THE OTHER X-FI CARDS.  Again, EAX capability is limited by hardware capability.

You seem to forget in the early days, there was a TON of competition in the audio market.  Companines that were acquired by Creative had nothing to do with Creative's market power (which was relatively low during the 90s due to how many other competitors were on the market).  Companies had problems though, as everyone had their own way of doing things, and actual card performance and capabilities varied greatly from one brand to the next.  Aureal was Creative's biggest competitor in the audio market, and was still relatively new when Creative acquired them.  A legal battle started by Aureal over copyright infringement between the two companies left Aureal in bankruptcy, even though they won the lawsuit (although Creative's patent was found to be valid and didn't infringe upon Aureal's technology), and shortly thereafter Creative purchased Aureal and gained the rights to their technology which was vastly incorporated into EAX.  E-Mu, which focused more on music production than audio re-production, was purchased back in 93, and partnership between the two companies lead to EAX 1 and 2.  Ensoniq, which was focused more on synthesizers and music much like E-Mu was, was acquired by Creative sometime in 98, and their technology was incorporated into EAX as well (and their API was the foundation for Creative's virtual audio positioning).

Every competitor that Creative had during the 90s was acquired - their biggest flaw was that the companies were focused more on a very specific target audience . . . not the PC.  E-Mu started as a synthesizer produced, as well as Ensoniq.  Aureal was started as a specialty company as well.  It has only been within the last couple of years that a lot of competition with Creative has again flared up - as ASUS, Razer and HT Omega have entered the ring, and onboard solutions are advancing.  Truthfully, though, Creative's only true competitor right now is C-Media, as they supply all the chipsets found on all competiting products (excluding the Auzen Prelude).


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## BumbRush (Mar 28, 2008)

acctualy i have seen some cards that are good for anything but gaming that use via or crystal chips(the crystal chips cost to much tho, so most companys dont use them)

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16829121006

not the best but damn good for movies and music.

personaly most people i  know who have had newer systems built have ended up sticking with the onboard sound (just tweak the EQ and it sounds quite good on decent boards)  
even had a few ppl who tryed sblive5.1/24bit cards that ended up dumping those cards for onboard because the sound was the same or better and the drivers where more up to date, BTW the sblive24 is an audigy chip.......and dosnt have decent/working vista drivers :/

thats also why u see alot of games that dont use EAX anymore, because alot of gamers have moved away from creative so why spend $ to support something a large part of ur audiance isnt using?


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## Wile E (Mar 28, 2008)

I have to jump in here. Although EAX4-5 are hardware calls, any hardware call can be emulated in software. The hardware isn't 100% necessary. It's the same idea as running game console emulators. Our computers don't have any PS1 related hardware in them, yet we can still play PS1 games with an emulator.

Who's to say somebody won't accomplish this with EAX?


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## imperialreign (Mar 28, 2008)

Wile E said:


> I have to jump in here. Although EAX4-5 are hardware calls, any hardware call can be emulated in software. The hardware isn't 100% necessary. It's the same idea as running game console emulators. Our computers don't have any PS1 related hardware in them, yet we can still play PS1 games with an emulator.
> 
> Who's to say somebody won't accomplish this with EAX?



That's a valid point that _could_ prove possible, but emulators don't always function properly on every system either, and emulation can not always duplicate the original product correctly.

Keep in mind, also, that most console emulators break US laws, and same would hold true for someone to reverse engineer the EAX routines to "emulate" them in some way.  It's Creative's intellectual property, and without their consent . . .


----------



## Mussels (Mar 28, 2008)

dont forget they already have an emulator, they call it Alchemy... which translates EAX into *drumroll* software openAL calls.

It can be opened up, they just dont want to. They should obviously get money, but at least allow other companies to pay for EAX above 2.0 (HOW DAMNED LONG have they been stuck at 2.0! my old athlonXP onboard audio had that!) and definately allow games to roll back to earlier versions (EAX 2.0 card can play 5.0 games, just with less effects)

The best solution would be 100% software, with the cards accelerating it - that way they at least have the marketing of faster FPS/performance compared to other companies.


----------



## imperialreign (Mar 28, 2008)

Mussels said:


> dont forget they already have an emulator, they call it Alchemy... which translates EAX into *drumroll* software openAL calls.



But, the one difference here is that EAX and ALchemy are Creative's property; OpenAL API is an open source audio protocol that Creative have spent a lot of time and money collaborating with developers on for a couple of years now.  ALchemy drivers only work with X-Fi and Audigy hardware drivers.  I don't see anything wrong with this arrangement.



Mussels said:


> It can be opened up, they just dont want to. They should obviously get money, but at least allow other companies to pay for EAX above 2.0 (HOW DAMNED LONG have they been stuck at 2.0! my old athlonXP onboard audio had that!) and definately allow games to roll back to earlier versions (EAX 2.0 card can play 5.0 games, just with less effects)
> 
> The best solution would be 100% software, with the cards accelerating it - that way they at least have the marketing of faster FPS/performance compared to other companies.




I totally agree on this point that Creative should open EAX up to their competitors.  At the very least, considering their age, release EAX 3.0 (and possibly 4.0) to be used for free.  EAX 5.0 is the newest, and was re-designed to compliment the capabilites of the X-Fi APU, so I think it'd be alright if they kept 5.0 capability for themselves.  EAX 2 has been around since 1998, IIRC (might have been '01 . . .), I know EAX 4 was released with the Audigy 2's back in '02, so . . .


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## btarunr (Mar 28, 2008)

Wile E said:


> I have to jump in here. Although EAX4-5 are hardware calls, any hardware call can be emulated in software. The hardware isn't 100% necessary. It's the same idea as running game console emulators. Our computers don't have any PS1 related hardware in them, yet we can still play PS1 games with an emulator.
> 
> Who's to say somebody won't accomplish this with EAX?



Great! How about emulating Shader Model 4.1 ? If Creative isn't lying, the CA20K1 crunches more instructions / second than the Athlon64 FX 55. Emulate it, and watch your CPU usage shoot up.


----------



## Wile E (Mar 28, 2008)

btarunr said:


> Great! How about emulating Shader Model 4.1 ? If Creative isn't lying, the CA20K1 crunches more instructions / second than the Athlon64 FX 55. Emulate it, and watch your CPU usage shoot up.



I'm gonna have to go out on a limb and say they are lying, or at least greatly exaggerating. I have a great deal of experience dealing with audio in a production environment, and today's modern cpus can easily handle 64 voices and numerous DSP effects. Simulating EAX4/5 would be a cakewalk in comparison to running 103 tracks, all with at least one DSP effect (with an average of 3 DSP effects each, actually).

At any rate, that's not the point I was making. My only point is that it is completely possible, whether or not it increases cpu load, or is practical.

And emulating SM 4.1 is altogether possible as well, that doesn't meant it would prove very useful. lol.


----------



## Mussels (Mar 28, 2008)

btarunr: and if they did that, then people WOULD buy those cards. Creative should open up EAX via openAL to other card manufs, simply because creative (if they arent lying) would have a huge performance lead - hello reason to buy their cards.

As it stands, most people dont care about EAX and so they're happy without it.


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## candle_86 (Mar 28, 2008)

imperialreign said:


> But, the one difference here is that EAX and ALchemy are Creative's property; OpenAL API is an open source audio protocol that Creative have spent a lot of time and money collaborating with developers on for a couple of years now.  ALchemy drivers only work with X-Fi and Audigy hardware drivers.  I don't see anything wrong with this arrangement.
> 
> 
> 
> ...



nah 98, i still have my sound blaster live box, it adverties EAX2.0. EAX2 and EAX1 sound very diffrent


----------



## candle_86 (Mar 28, 2008)

btarunr said:


> Great! How about emulating Shader Model 4.1 ? If Creative isn't lying, the CA20K1 crunches more instructions / second than the Athlon64 FX 55. Emulate it, and watch your CPU usage shoot up.



actully they already do that, thats how most cards are designed, before the core is built they emulate it and the enviroment, but it takes a server farm to pull it off


----------



## Mussels (Mar 28, 2008)

candle_86 said:


> actully they already do that, thats how most cards are designed, before the core is built they emulate it and the enviroment, but it takes a server farm to pull it off



another rare time i agree with candle: this is how they design all versions of directX. they do it in software, make sure its stable and meets their goals (speed, looks, etc) and then ask everyone else to make hardware that fits their standards - thats why its called "hardware accelerated" as the hardware merely does it a gazillion times faster than software would.


----------



## candle_86 (Mar 28, 2008)

hey mussles you know eventually im gonna convert you to the dark side of the computer world


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## Mussels (Mar 28, 2008)

candle_86 said:


> hey mussles you know eventually im gonna convert you to the dark side of the computer world



already there, intel + nvidia.


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## BumbRush (Mar 30, 2008)

found an intresting post on creatives own forums. 



> A short history of Creative Labs (AKA Creative's Unethical Tactics) 		Options
> 
> goodRiddance
> Contributor
> ...



oh and they have demanded that daniel k stop stop producing his drivers.



> Daniel_K:
> 
> We are aware that you have been assisting owners of our Creative sound cards for some time now, by providing unofficial driver packages for Vista that deliver more of the original functionality that was found in the equivalent XP packages for those sound cards.  In principle we don't have a problem with you helping users in this way, so long as they understand that any driver packages you supply are not supported by Creative.  Where we do have a problem is when technology and IP owned by Creative or other companies that Creative has licensed from, are made to run on other products for which they are not intended.  We took action to remove your thread because, like you, Creative and its technology partners think it is only fair to be compensated for goods and services.  The difference in this case is that we own the rights to the materials that you are distributing.  By enabling our technology and IP to run on sound cards for which it was not originally offered or intended, you are in effect, stealing our goods.  When you solicit donations for providing packages like this, you are profiting from something that you do not own.  If we choose to develop and provide host-based processing features with certain sound cards and not others, that is a business decision that only we have the right to make.
> 
> ...



so yeah, anybody defending creative for their acctions/drivers/hardware is just an insain fanboi......


http://forums.creative.com/creativelabs/board/message?board.id=soundblaster&thread.id=116332


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## btarunr (Mar 30, 2008)

BumbRush said:


> found an intresting post on creatives own forums.
> 
> 
> 
> ...



How does that affect me? No ways. I want good sound and I get it. What I also get is that you are a troll. I would go way off topic if I list out similar things pertaining to Intel, Samsung or other major players in the industry of which none concerns us, but I won't. 

Secondly, nothing constructive...leave alone talking on-topic "Creative: ASUS Misleading Customers on EAX Drivers" can be expected from your post(s). So please quit trolling. My buying from a company and being satisfied with what it gives me is nobody's business, certainly not yours. If you call me or another member a 'fanboy'...you will be going against forum guidelines because you are doing nothing constructive here at all.


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## imperialreign (Mar 30, 2008)

For starters, I find a lot of information in that "history" to be incorrect, or manipulated to back up the claim that Creative is evil, devilish, demonic and corrupt.  Although the Soundstorm had good audio quality, nVidia got out of the sound arena because their drivers just sucked and their hardware was dodgy.  Aureal was bought by Creative after the legal onslaught where Aureal won it's claims, but it was ruled that Creative did not infringe upon Aureal's patent technologies.  After the merger, A3D was incororated into EAX 2.0 (different than EAX 2); so the idea that A3D sounds better than EAX 5.0 is a load of bull, IMO.  Asides, EAX 5.0 was designed around the X-Fi hardware architecture, find me a competitng soundcard that can run these EAX calls correctly.

Creative's cards are capable of Dolby encoding, but the reason we haven't seen that capability passed down to the X-Fi drivers is because Auzentech paid quite the sum to Dolby and Creative for those licenses with the Prelude.  It would be an infringement on Creative's part to offer the capability.

And yes, Creative has had a lot of issues with Vista support - they were late to the playing field in terms of writing drivers for Vista. Read my earlier posts to find out why.  Thank MS for that one.  On tope of that, name one audio manufacturer that hasn't had their share of problems with Vista, also.  Hell, name one hardware manufacturer in general that hasn't had issues with Vista drivers.

I'd also like to point out that yes, indeed Creative has crippled drivers for older audio cards - WHAT FRIGGIN HARDWARE MANUFACTURER DOESN'T AT SOME POINT, EITHER BY ACCIDENT OR ON PURPOSE, CRIPPLE THEIR DRIVERS OR DROP SUPPORT FOR LEGACY HARDWARE TO MOVE CUSTOMERS UP TO NEWER HARDWARE?!!!  

*It's not just Creative that follow this practice!!!!*



As to Daniel_K's audio drivers: I commend him on his work, and the help that he provided to others; but to qoute from a post in that thread on Creative's forums:



			
				JohnZS said:
			
		

> Although I agree it is a sad day to see a driver modder get punished for helping people, I think it is unfair to "bash" Creative on this. For a few reasons.
> 
> 
> 
> ...




you will find a similar license agreement with 95% of hardware manufacturer's.  It's up to the manufacturer if they want to undertake enforcing it or not.  Usually, they don't pay much notice, as they don't offer any support for those drivers, and they typically will void warranties as well - if the drivers are the cause of hardware failures.  Once you start accepting payment for modified drivers, though, I guarantee you you'll catch the eye of the manufacturer.


Just my two cents:
Enough of the Creative bashing here on TPU.  If you want to continue to dig at Creative for any ungodly reason - go carry your ass to Creative's Forums which are breeming with lurkers, trolls, sith and sinners just waiting to have their go with the Nerf baseball bat.  There are more than enough forums on the internet that continue to allow it, and I don't see why TPU needs to be drug into the mix, either.


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## BumbRush (Mar 30, 2008)

no other hardware maker i have ever seen has tryed to charge peopel to enable fetures that where part of the card when sold, 9.99 to get your audigy card working as advertised under vista, thats a crock of shit, creative is just trying to double dip, charge people for the card then make them pay for updated drivers........

and cutting support for a product is FAR diffrent from charging people to have access to FULL support, if you can even call creatives support full with its latist products.


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## Steevo (Mar 30, 2008)

Wile E said:


> I just wish somebody else would design cards that offload. So far, Ceative seems to be the only ones that are doing it. All other cards still render via cpu.



C-media


Creative shut down the guy making their drivers work.

http://forums.creative.com/creative...hread.id=116332&view=by_date_ascending&page=1


That was Creative (same guy) trying to point fingers and make them seem the good guys by dumping on Asus. Good job Creative, fucking over the customer again.


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## btarunr (Mar 30, 2008)

BumbRush said:


> no other hardware maker i have ever seen has tryed to charge peopel to enable fetures that where part of the card when sold, 9.99 to get your audigy card working as advertised under vista, thats a crock of shit, creative is just trying to double dip, charge people for the card then make them pay for updated drivers........
> 
> and cutting support for a product is FAR diffrent from charging people to have access to FULL support, if you can even call creatives support full with its latist products.



A. We don't pay for drivers. 

B. So what if Creative chose to cut manufacturing costs and release the Xtreme Audio as just a rebadged Audigy SE with added features at a premium? Think of them as a 'higher variant' just like you have in cars and pretty much every commercial product. 

C. I have called, I got my support at I wasn't charged. Please stop making things up.


----------



## imperialreign (Mar 30, 2008)

BumbRush said:


> no other hardware maker i have ever seen has tryed to charge peopel to enable fetures that where part of the card when sold, 9.99 to get your audigy card working as advertised under vista, thats a crock of shit, creative is just trying to double dip, charge people for the card then make them pay for updated drivers........
> 
> and cutting support for a product is FAR diffrent from charging people to have access to FULL support, if you can even call creatives support full with its latist products.




The Audigy line is friggin 6 years old!  Audigy 4 dates back to '05!  People still use Live! cards, and those date back to '98!

I'm not saying you have to go out and buy the newest sound card as soon as it hits the shelves - but you wonder why people complain about dodgy sound card issues and audio stability when they're playing the newest games and running the newest OS!  I find it completely dumbfounding.

Creative doesn't charge for full support - only the Vista ALchemy drivers for the Audigy; which I do think is a bit f-ed up - but they're not charging for "as advertised under Vista" - Vista drivers for the Audigy are free . . . but we're coming up on the end of the Audigy's support lifetime.  Creative already revamped the Audigy lineup to close the gap with the X-Fi for it's initial release.  I think they've been more than generous in their support.


<edit>
btarunr beat me to it


----------



## BumbRush (Mar 30, 2008)

btarunr said:


> A. We don't pay for drivers.
> 
> B. So what if Creative chose to cut manufacturing costs and release the Xtreme Audio as just a rebadged Audigy SE with added features at a premium? Think of them as a 'higher variant' just like you have in cars and pretty much every commercial product.
> 
> C. I have called, I got my support at I wasn't charged. Please stop making things up.



buying alchemy=paying for fetures that should be free.

as to your bullshit imperialreign, check out the cmedia 8738 cards and note they have FULL vista support, not just built in drivers but FULL updated drivers for vista, this is a card thats as old as the sb live, so yeah, creative sucks.

also note that creative is STILL SELLING AUDIGY CARDS, if your selling it FUCKING SUPPORT IT dont try and charge people for proper support.........gdm fanboi's......


----------



## btarunr (Mar 30, 2008)

BumbRush said:


> buying alchemy=paying for fetures that should be free.
> 
> as to your bullshit imperialreign, check out the cmedia 8738 cards and note they have FULL vista support, not just built in drivers but FULL updated drivers for vista, this is a card thats as old as the sb live, so yeah, creative sucks.
> 
> also note that creative is STILL SELLING AUDIGY CARDS, if your selling it FUCKING SUPPORT IT dont try and charge people for proper support.........gdm fanboi's......



Alright, you have shown to suffer extremely low IQ, let me spoon-feed:

ALchemy makes multi-channel audio games expolit Creative's propreitary DSP's, it is NOT essential for normal usage of Audigy for Vista. You CAN use an Audigy + Vista output but just not use the EAX and other DSP's. 

Secondly, while they sell it, they don't advertise 100% Vista support anywhere so your argument about "if your selling it ****** SUPPORT IT" is null / void, customers buy them at their discretion...for $20. You get what you pay for. Just because C-Media does it doesn't imply Creative should, there's no hard/fast rule...it's clear that Creative has some surplus Audigy SE stock to sell which is selling because of the current low price and that if they include ALchemy, it would cannibalise the sales of the X-Fi Xtreme Audio PCI so it's a company decision, the Xtreme Audio now sells at the same price at which Audigy SE used to sell when it was out.


----------



## imperialreign (Mar 30, 2008)

BumbRush said:


> buying alchemy=paying for fetures that should be free.
> 
> as to your bullshit imperialreign, check out the cmedia 8738 cards and note they have FULL vista support, not just built in drivers but FULL updated drivers for vista, this is a card thats as old as the sb live, so yeah, creative sucks.
> 
> also note that creative is STILL SELLING AUDIGY CARDS, if your selling it FUCKING SUPPORT IT dont try and charge people for proper support.........gdm fanboi's......



and you call me a fanboi?!     

I have no qualms recommending another audio product if I feel that it would meet someone's needs.  Personally, I find a lot of the attacks on Creative and their products to be truly unjustified and blown out of proportion by people such as yourself.  There are too many people out there that expect instant gratification whith their hardware, and expect it to instantly work beyond their expectations - many times, the issue isn't with the product, but with the owner.

I've grown quite tired of your trollish posts

the Audigy is supported by Creative - they don't use EAX + Vista in their marketing for the cards; I agree it's a little f-ed up to charge people for the ALchemy drivers, but the sound card drivers are FREE.  There's no gimmick there, and no slight of hand - contrary to your belief.

I can gurantee, also, that within the next year or two, we'll see the sales of the Audigy cards come to an end, as more people slowly migrate to Vista.  Creative will continue to offer driver support for the Audigy for a year or two after sales have ceased - as they have with all previous sound card lineups.

If C-Media feels the need to continue support of legacy chipsets, that's their prerogative.  If you also noticed, though, C-Media doesn't list a newer driver for the 8738 chipset with a release date newer than 2002, nor do they offer a driver release for Vista.  So what that they still offer the download?  I don't see ongoing support there.  m00t argument, IMO.


Please, if you want to continue the trolling, do so on Creative's Forums, or find some other board to fill with filth.  I see no need for it here.


----------



## Mussels (Mar 30, 2008)

as to alchemy: its the same as if Nvidia or ATI started charging us to use DX9.0c under vista.

Oh sorry you only get DX8.1, we know your card used to work under XP, but vista changed things so you should either buy a new one or pay us for software to make your card work right.


----------



## BumbRush (Mar 30, 2008)

check the forums, their sites updated by a diffrent part of the company, if a company has forums, CHECK THEM FIRST, since many times the websites are WAY out of date.

http://www.cmedia.com.tw/forums/viewtopic.php?t=863

updated as of july 20 2007, no need for more updates yet as the drivers have worked fine(i have tested them myself, and even 5.1 should works on the 8738 cards and works properly even in games.....something creatives struggled with to say the least, the reasion i said fanboi is that anything bad said about creative you jump in and call peopel liers for having seen or been effected by those propbems, i work in this field, and guess what, i have seen ALOT of these problems, the shop i was working at acctualy started giving creative owners a trade in value of 1/2 the price of a higher end card of their choice(all cmedia based eather auzen or ht omega cards that didnt use the x-fi chip) most took it because the problems they had with vista or even XP with the x-fi where dirrectly related to the drivers from creative.

creative started this downhill quest for ultimage suckage with the sblive cards and their inabliltiy to work properly on 85% of the boads on the market without setting the pci latancy at 96(stock is 16 or 32) the audigy once flushed out was an ok card but had its driver suit related issues, then the x-fi and its underwelming driver support, and creatives lack of xp x64 pro drivers for sblive/live24(same chip as audigy) cards........creative just needs to get a better driver team maby hire some linux programing nerds to start from scratch making drivers that acctualy work without being huge and combersome, hell look at the current drivers, its like watching a giant mountin troll lumber around trying to swat gnomes with a stone hammer.........better make that a drunken mountin troll


----------



## BumbRush (Mar 30, 2008)

Mussels said:


> as to alchemy: its the same as if Nvidia or ATI started charging us to use DX9.0c under vista.
> 
> Oh sorry you only get DX8.1, we know your card used to work under XP, but vista changed things so you should either buy a new one or pay us for software to make your card work right.



exectly, im glad somebody saw my point.......


----------



## btarunr (Mar 30, 2008)

Mussels said:


> as to alchemy: its the same as if Nvidia or ATI started charging us to use DX9.0c under vista.
> 
> Oh sorry you only get DX8.1, we know your card used to work under XP, but vista changed things so you should either buy a new one or pay us for software to make your card work right.



ALchemy for X-Fi is free. For Audigy it is paid because of the price slash....that people can get an Audigy SE for as low as $20. Secondly, the Audigy SE isn't a current generation product...the way Creative puts it. So I would reverse your logic....take my DirectX 9.0c graphics card to Vista and expect it to run a DX10 -only app such as NVidia Cascades. The reason ALchemy is paid for older cards is they don't want to suffer losses due to people getting away with $20 cards that are 80% the same as current cards, they would want their $45 cards SB X-Fi Xtreme Audio to not be cannibalised  by this...so, though from a consumer's POV it's bad, not so from theirs and it's part of their EULA, and company policies we can't crib about. Microsoft is responsible for this no-DirectSound mess, don't blame Creative for that

And BumbRush, stop this Anti-Creative drama, you're gaining nothing constructive out of it.


----------



## BumbRush (Mar 30, 2008)

btarunr ur wrong, again, its like buying a 9700pro just b4 dx9 came out, then having ati tell you that you gotta pay to get dx9 support, or getting an 8800gts/gtx b4 vista came out, then nvidia saying, "oh wait, you gotta pay to get dx10 support/drivers for that"

creative is still selling the audigy cards, if they didnt want to support them, then they should have stoped making them when the x-fi came out!!!!!

i would bitch about any company that pulls this kinda crap, if you charge to support something that should be supported by default ur disshonist, if you dissable fetures just to force people to buy a new card ur disshonist, just as saying the FX line of nvidia cards where directX9 was disshonest because, dispite them having the hardware to technicly do it, they couldnt do it at a playable framerate, its like selling somebody a yugo and telling them it can tow a 17foot boat, sure maby on a down hill sloap it can tow it


----------



## imperialreign (Mar 30, 2008)

BumbRush said:


> check the forums, their sites updated by a diffrent part of the company, if a company has forums, CHECK THEM FIRST, since many times the websites are WAY out of date.
> 
> http://www.cmedia.com.tw/forums/viewtopic.php?t=863
> 
> ...





Users shouldn't have to check forums for the most current driver release - unless they're looking for beta drivers.  It makes no difference to me, then, if the most current driver is found listed on some BBS.

The most current "official" driver then, is the one listed on their site.  That's how a user is going to look at it.

And, I'm not the only one calling your BS, and that's all it has been IMO is BS.  Your arguments are quite unfounded, and you've been manipulating information to back your BS claims.  That is trollism at it's best right there.  If you actually made solid, legitimate arguments, I wouldn't have to call BS - it would simply be a disagreement.

It matters not to me if you work in this field or not - I've seen lots of issues as well, and not just with Creative's cards.  If the "shop" you worked for had to resort to giving people discounts to convert over to other hardware - that's your issue that you weren't able to get drivers working on people's systems.  To me that says incompetent.  I've never had any major issues with the any of Creative's hardware, and it's never been a big headache to get things working as intended.  Not until the release of Vista have I ever seen so many issues with a soundcard, and it's mostly with the X-Fi lineup, and has more to do with the OS audio kernel than with it being an issue with the audio hardware.

Also, citing that you had to set the PCI latency of the Live! cards to 96 is again a m00t argument.  How many systems back then used a NIX card, a 2D VGA adapter, a 3D accelerator, and other PCI components?  You think the PCI BUS might've been just a little bit saturated with IRQ requests?!!!  C'mon, man, what kind of logical arguement is that you're trying to give me?  BIOS is meant to allow for configuration of a system based upon the components installed upon it.  Name one BIOS from any manufacturer that doesn't need to be 'configured' to some small extent.




> creative is still selling the audigy cards, if they didnt want to support them, then they should have stoped making them when the x-fi came out!!!!!
> 
> i would bitch about any company that pulls this kinda crap, if you charge to support something that should be supported by default ur disshonist, if you dissable fetures just to force people to buy a new card ur disshonist, just as saying the FX line of nvidia cards where directX9 was disshonest because, dispite them having the hardware to technicly do it, they couldnt do it at a playable framerate, its like selling somebody a yugo and telling them it can tow a 17foot boat, sure maby on a down hill sloap it can tow it




THEY DO SUPPORT THE AUDIGY CARDS!!!
AUDIGY EAX SUPPORT IN VISTA IS NOT A MARKETING POINT!!!!

They don't disable features on the Audigy - thank MS for that lack of hardware acceleration, not Creative.

Take your trolling elsewhere.


----------



## BumbRush (Mar 30, 2008)

oh and xp 8738 drivers that where updated as of Jul 31, 2006 no updates have been needed because the drivers JUST WORK!!!!

http://www.cmedia.com.tw/forums/viewtopic.php?t=261

creative fully dumped the sblive not even giving this much support..........so yeah, cmedia the smaller company  totaly pwns creative in the support dept


----------



## Mussels (Mar 30, 2008)

btarunr said:


> ALchemy for X-Fi is free. For Audigy it is paid because of the price slash....that people can get an Audigy SE for as low as $20. Secondly, the Audigy SE isn't a current generation product...the way Creative puts it. So I would reverse your logic....take my DirectX 9.0c graphics card to Vista and expect it to run a DX10 -only app such as NVidia Cascades. The reason ALchemy is paid for older cards is they don't want to suffer losses due to people getting away with $20 cards that are 80% the same as current cards, they would want their $45 cards SB X-Fi Xtreme Audio to not be cannibalised  by this...so, though from a consumer's POV it's bad, not so from theirs and it's part of their EULA, and company policies we can't crib about. Microsoft is responsible for this no-DirectSound mess, don't blame Creative for that
> 
> And BumbRush, stop this Anti-Creative drama, you're gaining nothing constructive out of it.



no one cares about this price slash... we bought the cards BEFORE THAT HAPPENED.

I'd like to see how you'd react if your 6800GT was capped at DX 7.0 in vista unless you paid up because 'its a lot cheaper to buy now'

Yeah you love creative and you have a positive look on everything - some people get the short end of the stick, and DOWNgrading hardwares capabilities and charging to have it re-enabled is just low.

Edit: you're really looking at it the wrong way. with the video card analogy its not buying a DX9 card and expecing DX10 for free, its buying a DX9 card, using it as a DX9 card... and then being told you now have a DX7 card unless you pay up. you can buy a new one real cheap if you want, but its gunna have the same problem.


Edit2: i too had the issues with latency, but then again lots of hardware had issues like that in those days. crackling onboard audio and PCI cards almost went hand in hand.


----------



## btarunr (Mar 30, 2008)

BumbRush said:


> btarunr ur wrong, again, its like buying a 9700pro just b4 dx9 came out, then having ati tell you that you gotta pay to get dx9 support, or getting an 8800gts/gtx b4 vista came out, then nvidia saying, "oh wait, you gotta pay to get dx10 support/drivers for that"
> 
> creative is still selling the audigy cards, if they didnt want to support them, then they should have stoped making them when the x-fi came out!!!!!



The fact that they're selling them now doesn't imply that they should support it to current software. Certain Server/Workstation-class motherboards made by SuperMicro and TYAN, etc do NOT ship with drivers for all devices for Windows Vista. They ship with drivers for XP, Win2003, tons and tons of free Linux/BSD drivers and now, drivers for Server 2008. Beat that!. the logic is that when I make a certain piece of hardware for year 2008, I needn't guarantee software support for 2011. It's not that Creative doesn't offer the support, only that it isn't free _because_ the prices are slashed and that they don't want the surplus stock / current Audigy users to eat into the X-Fi series sales which isn't a big thing to fuss about, really. They have surplus stock of Audigy SE left worldwide, they can't recall all of them and rebadge them to X-Fi which is why they chose to cut their costs and offer ALchemy as a premium feature.


The rest of your post makes no sense.


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## BumbRush (Mar 30, 2008)

imperialreign said:


> Users shouldn't have to check forums for the most current driver release - unless they're looking for beta drivers.  It makes no difference to me, then, if the most current driver is found listed on some BBS.
> 
> The most current "official" driver then, is the one listed on their site.  That's how a user is going to look at it.
> 
> ...



im not gonna spend 4hrs trying diffrent fixes for each system till i find the magic fix for each one to get the creative shitty POS drivers to work, its not cost effective use of the 25/hr i get payed(after taxes).

and if its the pci buss thats the problem answer me this, why would the sblive card STILL POP when it was the ONLY pci device? or why would every other companys card work PERFECTLY and creatives be the ONLY one that had problems?

its called incompatance, the owner finnely instatuted the trade up program for 1 resion he was sick of me having to spend as long as 4hrs fucking with a system to get the damn thing to work correctly, then i had to make a restore point AND reg backup just incase somehow something the client did messed up the drivers magic tweaks and caused it to fuk up again.


"And, I'm not the only one calling your BS," yeah you have btarunr a self admited nvidiot fanboi as your assistant.....thats really crediable........


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## Mussels (Mar 30, 2008)

you cant blame vista for the audio thing, that is just a marketing spin. It works on the X-fi *and* it works on the audigy cards - in fact, i'm sure it'd work on any card that used alchemy.

Heres the thing... why are they charging, why is it a seperate app and not part of the drivers? no one should have to pay more for something they already paid for! screw this 'aaudigy SE for $xx' i paid $150 for the audigy 4, creatives TOP card before the X-fi... and i got shafted. Oops we released a new one, go get screwed. I'll never buy creative again because of crap like this - i dont give a shit what it sounds like or how pretty the box cover art is, if they did this once they'll do it again with the next gen. WIth video cards we upgrade when performance of features convince us, not because features we've used for a long time suddenly stop working.


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## imperialreign (Mar 30, 2008)

BumbRush said:


> im not gonna spend 4hrs trying diffrent fixes for each system till i find the magic fix for each one to get the creative shitty POS drivers to work, its not cost effective use of the 25/hr i get payed(after taxes).
> 
> and if its the pci buss thats the problem answer me this, why would the sblive card STILL POP when it was the ONLY pci device? or why would every other companys card work PERFECTLY and creatives be the ONLY one that had problems?
> 
> ...



If you consider youself an IT tech - or whatever - than it's your job to configure someone's system for them to be happy with it.  Saying that you won't deal with drivers because it would take you 4 hours to get them working means that you have some very shoddy work ethics and practices, IMO.  you'd rather screw your customers by having them buy something else becuase you don't want to actually work?  That's crooked, IMO.

And if it took you 4hrs per system (which is how you make it out to sound), I'd have to say that's incompetent in itself.  Not EVERY system has issues with audio cards, of any sort.

As to your question about when a Live! would still pop being the only device on the BUS - I'd have to know more about what kind of setup it was.  If it's in a more modern setup, it could be a number of things.  On older hardware, it could've been a number of things as well - even down to poor IRQ setup.  Creative's cards have always been a bit BUS hungry, but they've also performed faster than any competing hardware as well.  Whenever they release a new lineup, their cards further push what hardware and software voices are capable of being processed, surpassing that of all competition that is currently out.  But back in the days when the live was released, you couldn't have only one device on a PCI BUS - not if you actually wanted to run a monitor.

bta hasn't been the only other one to call your BS.  I was mentioning that to point out that we find your arguements flawed, and that you continue to provide flawed arguments.  Resorting to insulting other members in such a fashion is quite low as well.


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## Mussels (Mar 30, 2008)

personally i think theres been BS from every side of this argument. Its amount is varying, but jesus people - just because you're pro/anti creative doesnt mean you can agree with SOME of the oppositions comments.

Pro creative people who say their drivers are great, are seriously smoking crack.

Creative DO have great sounding hardware, and in years gone by their performance and quality was quite a cut above the other generic crap at the time - but that time has passed and other alternatives WITHOUT the driver issues are on the market.

I own a creative card, the audigy 4. i am pissed over alchemy, i am pissed over needing to mod x-fi drivers to get updated software, and i really, really hate their tech support. I still use the card however, because it sounds better than my onboard audio when paired with headphones - its somewhat hard to take speakers to a LAN.


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## beyond_amusia (Mar 30, 2008)

Creatives own cards struggle with EAX to say the least... Even when it says EAX on the box.


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## BumbRush (Mar 30, 2008)

imperialreign said:


> If you consider youself an IT tech - or whatever - than it's your job to configure someone's system for them to be happy with it.  Saying that you won't deal with drivers because it would take you 4 hours to get them working means that you have some very shoddy work ethics and practices, IMO.  you'd rather screw your customers by having them buy something else becuase you don't want to actually work?  That's crooked, IMO.
> 
> And if it took you 4hrs per system (which is how you make it out to sound), I'd have to say that's incompetent in itself.  Not EVERY system has issues with audio cards, of any sort.
> 
> ...



the sblive problems are a KNOWN ISSUE even creative has admited to them, tho they blame chipsets and other devices its the same problem the x-fi had on nforce4 chipsets, creative didnt follow proper pci specs, and since they didnt, you endup with a picky card that only works when it likes the system its in.

and i refuse to spend 4hrs of the costmers payed time fixing something that SHOULD JUST WORK, and in 8/10 cases x-fi cards have issues in systems im asked to fix/reinstall, u know how many xtream music card systmes i had brought in because of teh 100% cpu use bugg?  probbly 150-200, all due to the drivers being bugged, sure there4 where hax to get around the problem, but they didnt work the same on every system, and in the end it was cheaper for the costmer to just get a diffrent HIGHER QUILITY card.

see lets add it up, the shop charges the client 45/hour for work, at 4hrs thats 180bucks+tax, then compare that to selling them a 80-120$ card and giving them 1/2 off, thats 40-60bucks out of the costmers pocket, better value and less problems.......so its a win for everybody but creative, then the owner went and put the creative cards on ebay for 20-30bucks each(less then 1/3 their value even used) and made back some of what we lost selling them the card at such a disscount.

also makes fixing the system the next time the user comes in faster since we dont have to worrie that its the creative driver causing their problems.


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## btarunr (Mar 30, 2008)

ALchemy is not a driver. I have so far not met with any issues with the drivers so I'll let it pass though I agree when someone says they have a bad software RnD.


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## imperialreign (Mar 30, 2008)

I've never stated t be Pro-Creative here, I'm just tired of the Creative bashing I see everywhere on the internet.  No other company has taken as much flak as they have, even those palgued with the same amount of issues in Vista.

If you don't like the product, exchange it and be done with it.

For the vast majority of Creative users, though, there hasn't been any issues.


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## Mussels (Mar 30, 2008)

all i want is for the pro creative people, to understand some people ARE having serious issues and creatives excuses dont cut it. The example about the Nforce 4 is perfect, as creative cut corners to make the cards work better and it had severe negative effects on some users - nothing was done, as it worked fine on the majority of systems (intel chipsets for example) so creative blamed Nvidia and said it wasnt their problem to fix.


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## BumbRush (Mar 30, 2008)

oh you could get a partialy fixed version mussels, if you wanted to pay creative to rma your x-fi so they could send you an updated one that would only crackle 10% as much as the older version(firmware update that couldnt be done to older cards because the firmware update requiered creative cliping onto the eeprom chip and doing the update)

eather way, you had to spend EXTRA $ on a 90-150$ card that SHOULD JUST WORK!!!!!


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## imperialreign (Mar 30, 2008)

Mussels said:


> all i want is for the pro creative people, to understand some people ARE having serious issues and creatives excuses dont cut it. The example about the Nforce 4 is perfect, as creative cut corners to make the cards work better and it had severe negative effects on some users - nothing was done, as it worked fine on the majority of systems (intel chipsets for example) so creative blamed Nvidia and said it wasnt their problem to fix.



I completely do understand that some people do have issues with the cards - hence my friggin XSS thread!!! 

But I'm tired of hearing this crap that EVERYONE that buys a Creative product will have issues.  And then the following Creative bashing.  

The issue with the X-Fi and the nForce4 is a bit different, though, as it only happend with nVidia cards.  The X-Fi's are massive BUS hogs . . . but then again, what dedicated processing unit isn't?  nVidia with those boards, had setup the BUS to allow for great bandwidth with their GPUs - and that's where it all started.  It wasn't just Creative's design flaw, but also nVidia's design flaw.

Further from that, those early X-Fi cards didn't have a heatsink on the APU, either, and that lead to a lot of problems as the processor and capacitors would start overheating.

Newer revisions don't really have those issues.


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## BumbRush (Mar 31, 2008)

imperialreign said:


> I completely do understand that some people do have issues with the cards - hence my friggin XSS thread!!!
> 
> But I'm tired of hearing this crap that EVERYONE that buys a Creative product will have issues.  And then the following Creative bashing.
> 
> ...



ur partialy correct BUT not fully, i have ran into the same problem with ati and even via(s3) videocards where the x-fi crackled baddly, remind you of an OLD skool tube radio, really horrible, had creative tested properly they could have avoided the probem, had they followed pci2.1 specs they wouldnt have had the problem, but they didnt, just as they did the same kinda crap with the sblive, it couldnt share irq's with ANYTHING and even then u had to fck with the pci latancys to fix it, i have one, and i loved my sblive, but i also knew how to fix it, even tho that fix cost me perf in games and apps that uses hardware on the pci buss, really erks me that creative cant put out a bood hardware/software combo..........

i would happly talk nice about creative if they stoped sucking on such large numbers of computers.

nvidias onboard soundstorm rocked, i never had problems getting it working, to bad they didnt move to offer it as a standalone APU that would have been nice.

creative just needs to eather get their act togather or move away from making their own cards and just licence the right to make cards/drivers to other companys, if they did that i would bet companys like auzen would get out decent drivers given enought time.


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## Mussels (Mar 31, 2008)

Imperial: yeah, your XSS thread is a win.
This is becoming a flame war because people are strangely addicted to taking sides. If they like one side, they argue everything the other side says. its a stupid habit that annoys the hell out of me (dont take this as aimed at you, btw)

For every person that is sick of creative getting bashed, is someone sick of being told to stop bashing creative when they have a serious problem. thus the flames begin.


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## imperialreign (Mar 31, 2008)

BumbRush said:


> ur partialy correct BUT not fully, i have ran into the same problem with ati and even via(s3) videocards where the x-fi crackled baddly, remind you of an OLD skool tube radio, really horrible, had creative tested properly they could have avoided the probem, had they followed pci2.1 specs they wouldnt have had the problem, but they didnt, just as they did the same kinda crap with the sblive, it couldnt share irq's with ANYTHING and even then u had to fck with the pci latancys to fix it, i have one, and i loved my sblive, but i also knew how to fix it, even tho that fix cost me perf in games and apps that uses hardware on the pci buss, really erks me that creative cant put out a bood hardware/software combo..........
> 
> i would happly talk nice about creative if they stoped sucking on such large numbers of computers.
> 
> ...




Issue being with WIN detecting IRQs - typically you never have to set the PCI latency of Creative's cards, not unless you're running an ass-load of devices.  WIN doesn't play fairly when setting IRQs, as it assumes audio devices can share with other components - which just doesn't work, no matter what kind of audio card you have installed.  If WIN treated an audio device like it does other BUS hungry devices, there wouldn't be a problem.  Big reason why I recommend to people when doing a clean install of WIN, that you should install your audio device drivers before any other devices.  If WIN tries to buddy up the audio device with another piece of hardware and have them share the IRQ, you start running into issues that require you to adjust the PCI latency.

Soundstorm was probably one of the best early onboard soultions, but I still found the chipsets of terrible audio quality when compared to expansion cards.  Even current on-board solutions fail in those respects.


Again, I remind everyone that it's not just Creative who've had a lot of issues with audio components over the years, or issues with Vista - I still don't understand why they're the only ones targeted . . . oh, because they have the majority of the market!  Just like why everyone complains that WIN isn't as safe as Mac's OS . . . lol, silly me!

:shadedshu




			
				Mussels said:
			
		

> This is becoming a flame war because people are strangely addicted to taking sides. If they like one side, they argue everything the other side says. its a stupid habit that annoys the hell out of me (dont take this as aimed at you, btw)



no, s'all good - I ain't ever had a problem with ya yet, why start now, eh?!  I agree this thread has gone down the toilet as well, though.


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## BumbRush (Mar 31, 2008)

imperialreign said:


> Issue being with WIN detecting IRQs - typically you never have to set the PCI latency of Creative's cards, not unless you're running an ass-load of devices.  WIN doesn't play fairly when setting IRQs, as it assumes audio devices can share with other components - which just doesn't work, no matter what kind of audio card you have installed.  If WIN treated an audio device like it does other BUS hungry devices, there wouldn't be a problem.  Big reason why I recommend to people when doing a clean install of WIN, that you should install your audio device drivers before any other devices.  If WIN tries to buddy up the audio device with another piece of hardware and have them share the IRQ, you start running into issues that require you to adjust the PCI latency.
> 
> Soundstorm was probably one of the best early onboard soultions, but I still found the chipsets of terrible audio quality when compared to expansion cards.  Even current on-board solutions fail in those respects.
> 
> ...



wrong, had creative followed PCI SPECS their cards would beable to irq share(its requiered in the specs PERIOD, to not support it=non-pci complyant hardware) and turtle beach and other audio card makers cards would work fine in the same possition as the creative cards sharing the exect same irq's, why is that i wonder....... oh yeah, because THEY FOLLOWED the ISO SPECS!!!!!

and creative gets this much flack because they do NOTHING ABOUT THEIR DRIVERS SUCKING ASSS, then they tell the one person trying to fix them to SHOVER OFF and STOP because they want to sell more shitty x-fi cards that still dont work in vista over a year after its initial relece........

if creative wanted to fix it they could, they could have started from scratch and build new drivers from the ground up by now 5x over if not more, and had it FULLY fixed, but they dont want to they just want to keep selling the same SHIT drivers to everybody, hence people bitch about them the most.

if i spent 150+ on a sound card i would expect proper driver support for many years to come.....and from any body but creative i would get driver updates that acctualy work/fix stuff.........even via......VIA one of the worst names in the industry for driver updates has managed to get their audio chips working on vista!!!!!!

im not trying to flaim creative or anybody else, its just that this situation acctualy effects me, and has driven me mad!!!!! 

for the love of god, creative please just hire some compotent driver programers to build your cards some decent drivers!!!!


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## imperialreign (Mar 31, 2008)

BumbRush said:


> wrong, had creative followed PCI SPECS their cards would beable to irq share(its requiered in the specs PERIOD, to not support it=non-pci complyant hardware) and turtle beach and other audio card makers cards would work fine in the same possition as the creative cards sharing the exect same irq's, why is that i wonder....... oh yeah, because THEY FOLLOWED the ISO SPECS!!!!!
> 
> and creative gets this much flack because they do NOTHING ABOUT THEIR DRIVERS SUCKING ASSS, then they tell the one person trying to fix them to SHOVER OFF and STOP because they want to sell more shitty x-fi cards that still dont work in vista over a year after its initial relece........
> 
> ...





So, you're saying that because Creative followed ISO specs is what led to so many issues with their mid-age cards?    I've never heard of ISO setting a standard of specs for *INTEL's *PCI design.
I never said, either, that Creative's cards can't share an IRQ - just that they don't like to.  Just like many VGA adapters don't like to share an IRQ, either - even operating on PCI-E.
There's other things at work with IRQ settings related to Creative's, as well as other manufacturers hardware as well - and has a lot to do with how WIN handles hardware resources, regardless of what settings are dictated in BIOS: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/314068  <-again, why I recommend installing audio hardware drivers before other components.

Part of the problem being, is that WIN does not view an audio device as being resource heavy like it does other components, and therefore usually gets slapped with another device on that IRQ channel.


again, the X-Fi cards DO work in Vista, but some features don't work correctly - and it revolves around the WASAPI and not Creative's drivers.  On top of that, other audio card manufacturers are having similar issues as Creative in the Vista arena.  Get your facts straight.


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## 3991vhtes (Mar 31, 2008)

Asus > Creative

Although I'm using a creative product


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## imperialreign (Mar 31, 2008)

3991vhtes said:


> Asus > Creative
> 
> Although I'm using a creative product



ASUS makes some damn fine hardware - I really like some of the features of the Xonar cards.  ASUS just screwed up with their EAX claims is all.

Damn, 3991!  Didn't even notice you were back!


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## btarunr (Mar 31, 2008)

3991vhtes said:


> Asus > Creative
> 
> Although I'm using a creative product



ASUS is a much larger company, I've always bought their stuff. However if you're talking sound-cards, 

Auzentech > ASUS

^Though I use both Creative and Auzen....and ASUS products.

A lot of bad blood is spilt in this thread thanks to irrational arguments by a hate-kate who beleives in flame-baiting without valid arguments/logic and then waits for someone's support and throws a thanksgiving dinner though I admit I was drawn into it. Creative so far hasn't given me any reason to complain though I'm ready to join Muzz when Creative rolls out a successor to the X-Fi series and decides to play foul with X-Fi and its support in future platforms. Yes ALchemy being non-free for Audigy users is a scam but Creative (and not me) has an explaination for it. All of this wouln't have happened if Microsoft didn't decide to scrap DirectSound from the DirectX 10 specs thereby affecting a system component that Creative's products explicitly depend on, because they are hardware accelerated audio and DirectSound is supposed to make an audio application talk directly to audio hardware. ALchemy emulates DirectSound for Vista, makes an app to beleiving it could communicate with the hardware directly, while in reality it merely carries the audio stack through WASAPI and steps up latency...which is why benches proved Game + Vista + ALchemy + Creative hardware to perform worse than Game + XP + Creative hardware.


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## BumbRush (Mar 31, 2008)

ht omega  also makes kickass cards now that auzen is sucking creative cock to get/keep getting the x-fi chips they are using.


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## btarunr (Mar 31, 2008)

Claro Plus is a total rip-off for just the sake of an added DAC/OPAMP made by Analog Devices. The vanilla Claro is really nice. My cousin owns it, I liked it.


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## BumbRush (Mar 31, 2008)

i have setup 8 of them for people so far, mix of all their cards, all have been EASY to get working and "just work" no driver tweaking or anything, oh and the sounds steller specly in 8ch mode


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## Wile E (Mar 31, 2008)

Steevo said:


> C-media
> 
> 
> Creative shut down the guy making their drivers work.
> ...



C-Media doesn't offload. All work is still handled by the cpu. C-Media chips are just an I/O switch (aka: a codec), not a full fledged DSP.

But I agree with the sentiments about Alchemy for Audigy. Making people pay for it is total BS.


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