jacksh

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I have bought X-Fi platinum yesterday from futureshop in the boxing day. The problem that the Vista can't recognaize the 7.1 configirations . The sound is superb thou. but not 7.1
I have XP pro 64 and the sound card work perfectly . So, is it the driver issue or the vista's ?

Thanks
 

Weirdo0815

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It's going to be the driver, or atleast I would hope so. Windows Vista is meant to be an upgrade to XP and if XP can handle 7.1, Vista sure as heck better. Chances are that if it is the O/S, Microsoft will release a patch (if it makes it into the retail version of Vista anyway).

At this point, I would say it's the driver if for no other reason then the Vista driver is still in Beta. AND Vista is still not retail, unless you are running the Business version, which why are you running an X-Fi in a business computer then? ;)

I would wait until Vista is released next month and see if the problem persist's. Until then, I wouldnt expect to see a fix for this from either Microsoft or Creative, who ever's fault it really is.

The best way to see if it's the O/S or sound card would be to run your 7.1 Speakers on your on-board (if that's 7.1 anyway), or another 7.1 capable card while running Vista. If it works, its the card, if it doesn't it could be partly Vista.
 

sailer

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This is one of the many things that are plaguing Vista at the moment. There's two possible problems, as I see it. One is drivers that are not working right or haven't been released. Another may be compatibility of the hardware itself. Its the big reason that though I want to build a new machine, I'm waiting until after Vista RTM comes out, and then give allow some time to work the bugs out.

I expect there will be a lot of surprises when Vista finally does appear, and they won't be good ones. I can remember when Win95 first came out. Microsoft said that 99% of the Win 3.1 programs would work with it. Of the programs I had, 99% did not work, not even programs made by Microsoft. Then there were hardware problems. The computer shop that sold it to me couldn't fix it. They sent it back to the company twice and the company people couldn't fix it. Finally they gave me my money back and suggested I buy a new machine after 6 months, when things were stabilized.

Since you sound card works with XP 64 Pro, it shouldn't be a problem with the 64 bit driver, but something in Vista itself. Hopefilly, in a month or two, Microsoft will issue a patch or something to fix the problem. I suspect they will be issuing a lot of patches in the coming months.
 

cdonato

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It is probably the d rivers as Vista is not in official release yet except for corporate & volume licensees so most hardware has no official release driver yet. Another issue has been posted before is that vista is dropping some of the eax surround features & will be moving to a newer format (I can't remember exactly where i read this late last month but I think it was here on toms).
 

jacksh

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yea , actually i have done some digging and found that the driver is not supporing 6.1 and higher speakers . It is the driver(s) .
But iam a little dissappoined with creative that they didn't bother till now to update the drivers . I think there are millions of soundblaster users .
That is really dissappointing .
 

Rhinofart

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I was just thinking that. Is it possible that the 7.1 surround is part of the EAX on the card? If so then 7.1 won't work with VISTA as MS is dropping most if not all of the EAX support in VISTA.
 

Golgo_13

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Creative is making a workaround for it's X-Fi card series in the form of a driver that captures the audio data and sends it to the sound card thereby circumventing Vista's bull$hit.

our source at Creative Labs exclusively revealed to Custom PC that the company has developed a driver for its X-Fi range of sound cards that will allow for full hardware sound processing in all games, not only those that use OpenAL. The driver works by intercepting DirectSound 3D calls from the game code and converting them into OpenAL on the fly, before these calls reach the DirectX 10 API. By converting the calls to OpenAL, Creative circumvents the limitations of Windows Vista.

Creative told us that the driver is expected to be completed by December, a month before Windows Vista is due to launch, and will support all Creative X-Fi sound cards. However, older Audigy and Sound Blaster sound cards will not be supported initially, which means that the only way to get high-quality positional audio in Windows Vista is to buy an X-Fi.
 

jacksh

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so, there is no benefit of having X-Fi after all if MS is not supporting it .That sucks
Maybe it is time to move to other soundcards , what do you think the altrenative will be ?
 

Golgo_13

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so, there is no benefit of having X-Fi after all if MS is not supporting it .That sucks
Maybe it is time to move to other soundcards , what do you think the altrenative will be ?

The benefit of having an X-Fi card is that you'll be able to have EAX with the updated driver since it converts it into the OpenAL format that MS decided to exclusively support.

I'm sure something will come out at a later date, but as it stands right now, it looks like the creative X-Fi series is the best card you could have with Vista.
 

Rhinofart

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I don't know about that. My Azuntech HDA X-Plosion works perfectly under VISTA Ultimate. All the features work. DTS Connect, DDL, all the surround sound. Everything. And yes it is the full retail version of VISTA as it was made available to MSDN subscribers already. I don't really see how people could say that Creative cards are the absolute best on the market anymore. Sure they have EAX > 2 but whoop ti doo!! Put your soundcard in to DTS or Dolby Digital mode and you have the same surround sound experience. They may gain you a couple of FPS in games, but with the power of VCs and CPUs these days you won't even notice it unless you are a pure benchmarking freak. My last sound card was an Audigy 2 and I won't ever go back to Creative. Lack of updated features, propriatery EAX, headaches headaches headaches. :evil:

But that's just my personal rant.
 

jacksh

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So , we have more than 1 opinion here . I have been with creative for the last 10 years . but that doen't mean that i will not choose another brand if i have too .
The other 2 choices we have here are Auzentech X-meridan and HDA digital X-Plosion , what is suitable for gamer guys and for music ?

Iam really thinking of replacing my X-fi for one of the above
 

Golgo_13

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Take my opinion with a grain of salt because I'm going based on reports/data gathering and not actual experience with the hardware. I'm by no means an audiophile.
 

Rhinofart

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The only difference between the Meridian and the X-Plosion is the outputs. The Meridian has a higher S/N Ratio meaning it does sound better. I do beleive they have higher power analog outputs as well. But both cards have the ability for you to change the outputs CMOS chips to a higher performance chip. The Meridian is being touted as their "Auidiophille Quality Card" As noted before, I have the X-Plosion and I absolutely love it!

Edit 1: And I do beleive a higher Bitrate on the TOSLINK and SPDIF Input/Outputs which it has 2 optical on the card and 2 SPDIF where the X-Plosion has one of each which also act as an input/output.
 

Golgo_13

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The only reason I'm interested in Vista is because of DirectX 10. If Microsoft chose to support it in Windows XP instead of trying to force the upgrade out of gamers then I'd be sticking with XP as long as possible.
 

human_error

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If you used the Vista beta drivers on your X-Fi uninstall them and use the windows XP 64 edition drivers (if you have vista 64), should fix your problem, though the proper vista drivers should be available soon after vista is released, if not before.

I just hope they fix the damn X-Fi drivers for all platforms, still got issues with my XP machine and an X-Fi, let alone my Vista machine which shouldn't have full support until vista is released.
 

sviola

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So , we have more than 1 opinion here . I have been with creative for the last 10 years . but that doen't mean that i will not choose another brand if i have too .
The other 2 choices we have here are Auzentech X-meridan and HDA digital X-Plosion , what is suitable for gamer guys and for music ?

Iam really thinking of replacing my X-fi for one of the above

You should look into Razer's Barracuda as well.

But all the soundcards mentioned, besides X-Fi, do not use a dsp, so your audio processing will be done in the cpu.
 

Rhinofart

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They all use the DSP that's on the card. The only difference is the Creative cards have EAX which is a different type of DSP/hardware decoding which is actually quicker then the others. That is why a creative card has less of an impact on the main system. It can process it's sound work quicker then the others.
 

sviola

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They all use the DSP that's on the card. The only difference is the Creative cards have EAX which is a different type of DSP/hardware decoding which is actually quicker then the others. That is why a creative card has less of an impact on the main system. It can process it's sound work quicker then the others.

No they don't. They use C-media based chipsets, which are not DSPs. Only the X-Fi uses a DSP.
 

bydesign

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Where are all the Vista isn't out yet folks that jump all over 8800 GTX owners?

Your card works and is recognized by Vista, just not supporting 7.1 right?

Whats the big deal you have reduced functionality on the Business Edition of the OS which wont even be ready for prime time on 1/30/2007. You should feel lucky. I assume you can dual boot into XP as no one in their right mind should use Vista as there primary OS at this time.
 

Rhinofart

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How the heck do you think it does EAX 1 & 2 along with the other sound feild modes that the card supports? DTS NEO7, DTS connect, DDL encoding, and all the "Sound Feilds"? You need a Digital Signal Processor to do that work. It has a DSP. Creative isn't the only company that uses DSP's. They do have the fastest one, but not the only one.

http://www.guru3d.com/article/sound/399/3/
 

Rhinofart

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Heck no. Tripple boot baby!! XP Pro 32Bit, XP Pro 64, and Vista Ultimate 64.

VISTA won't be ready for the real Prime Time till SP1 atleast. I have SA on all my workstations, but I won't upgrade to Vista untill I'm happy with the level of Bug Fixes and Security patches.