Windows 7: Sound Card? Do any Actually Work?

Hi there. I just bought a new pc from Dell. I opted out of buying the SB sound card they had as an option and now I am sorta regretting that. I loaded RC 7100 as soon as I got the machine and after going through this forum I am sorta left with the impression that SB cards don't work with Win 7. Is that really the case?



I was looking at an "Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium Sound Card" but if it will just cause me grief it's not worth it. Does anyone have a suggestion as to what I can get and not pull my hair out trying to get it to work? The main game I play sounds sorta mediocre with the on-board sound.

Thanks

Any Creative SB card from the Audigy 4 line up through the X-Fi models will work on both the 32bit and 64bit 7. The latest Creative audio console launcher as well as drivers are for Windows 7/Vista for Audigy 4 line.

You simply select the version of Windows and the particular update you are after once you have the SB model series chosen from the page seen at Creative Worldwide Support > Sound Blaster

For the XtremeGamer model used here the manual selector is seen at the bottom of the support page at Creative Worldwide Support > X-Fi XtremeGamer

The entire X-Fi series line up sees 7 support.

I totally dislike Creative's abandonment of their 'Legacy' hardware. I tried three different 'legacy' (NON-X-Fi) cards and couldn't get any of them to sound even halfway decent, so I got a $20 Siig Soundwave 5.1 PCI and it works PERFECTLY for me, first time.

I'm so done with Creative.

I have a Creative X-Fi Extreme Gamer card in my current Win 7 7201 64-bit build. I installed two things based on recommendations in another thread on this forum:

Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Series Beta Driver 2.18.0013
Creative Console Launcher 2.61.09

It's working GREAT with ZoomPlayer for movies with the ffdshow audio codec, Foobar for playing audio, and Windows Media Player itself. I typically only install the driver and launcher anyways, since I don't use the Creative file management stuff. The console launcher gives you access to the configuration panel for changing settings in Entertainment, Gaming, and Audio Creation modes of the card.

I suspect the driver and console launcher link will work with any X-Fi series card. Bear in mind I installed these using VISTA compatibility and as Administrator.

I am running the x64 version of Windows 7 and I've had NO issues with my X-Fi Xtreme Gamer card...There are no native drivers, so I do have to download them from Creative...The x64 version for Windows 7 works perfect. Don't even have to reboot.

Only difference I see from my system to some others, is that mine is all custom built.

The Vista 64bit driver update as well as console launcher will go right on the 64bit 7 just as easy as the latest 7 updates. The X-Fi lineup still sees XP support there as well since you arrive right where the XP/Vista updates are shown and scroll down to select the OS option for 7 at the bottom on the same page.