Using Creative Sound Blaster Live! with Windows 7

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xcsteve

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Hi everyone,

Just got an old Creative Sound Blaster Live! from a friend, and I'm looking to use it instead of my fuzzy onboard Realtek audio. Does anyone know what I can do to get the computer to recognize the card? I've used this site (http://nerdfortress.com/2009/06/06/no-sound-get-sound-blaster-live-and-windows-7-to-play-nice/) to try to get a better understanding of what's going on, but I've had no revelations yet. Anyone know what I can do? If I have no luck with the Live! card, can someone suggest a $25 or lower price 7.1 capable card that they consider good? New or used is fine.

Thanks!
XCsteve
 
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I did wonder if those drivers would work. Maybe you have a variant of the SB Live that is not supported. I have one myself from years ago and it has been a long time since I could make it work in anything past Win 98.

compulsivebuilder

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Doesn't work for me, just gives a " No compatible hardware found " error.
Can't even find drivers to make the onboard sound work ( P5K_SE )
 

xcsteve

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Thanks for the driver support, I'll definitely use that driver if I get the chance. My bigger problem is that the setup exits with some message that begins with "Setup is unable to find a supported product on your system." I turned off the integrated audio in the BIOS, but the computer still isn't detecting the card...not sure how to make it show up. This may be a dumb question, but did I install it properly? I didn't connect anything to it on the inside; I just attached it to the proper slot. Could it be that it needs more power or something? When I look at my attached devices, the card shows up as an unknown device, but I don't know how to get past that.
 

Wamphryi

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I did wonder if those drivers would work. Maybe you have a variant of the SB Live that is not supported. I have one myself from years ago and it has been a long time since I could make it work in anything past Win 98.
 
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xcsteve

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Thanks for the help everyone, but I think I'll just cut my losses. Perhaps I'll get a budget card from Newegg or something...my integrated is still pretty fuzzy...
 

xcsteve

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Definitely not the speakers; I have a set of Logitech Z-2300s. Best audio purchase I ever made. Also, they sounds great when I have my my Dell Studio 1558 attached to them (I went with the integrated Sound Blaster software on that purchase a while back).

Thanks for the card info, I'll check 'em out!
 

gpavia

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Probably late but hopefully this will help others with SB Live problems. When I made the move to Win7, I discovered I couldn't use the Creative software and the drivers. I did some searches for help with no luck. I did install a program KX Audio driver that was a free generic driver for the SB card. It worked great for about a year then, I started getting muffled sound and lost my rear speaker sound. I messed with it off and loading and reloading with no luck. I was about to give up and shop for a Win7 compatible card. I decided to more searching for a compatible driver for my SB Live! 5.1. I found a guy that said to try some things using the Creative drivers. It didn't work for me, but my own variation worked. I have great sound from my SB Live card and Logitec 5.1 speakers. I can even use my keyboard controls with it. Here's what I did. 1) Went to Creative and downloaded the driver package as I had probably thrown mine away. 2) Before I ran it, I right clicked on it and under the compatibility mode I changed whatever it was to compatibility for Win XP Service Pack3. 3.) Then a little lower on the page I checked Run As Administrator. Closed it. I ran it and when it came up and asked what I wanted to install, I only checked Load Drivers just to see what would happen. Loaded the drivers and had music before I even had to reboot. I tried loading the mixer, but it wouldn't work. Windows & has a mixer that I use, nit the greatest, but i have nice 5.1 sound back!
 
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