Windows 7: Creative SB X-Fi: Speakers refuse to mute upon inserting headphones.

As it stands right now, my Creative Soundblaster X-Fi Xtreme Audio Card will not allow me to plug in my headphones via the front panel of my desktop. (This makes sense, as the onboard audio solution was disabled upon installation of the card.)

Thinking that this would only be a minor setback, I purchased a simple Y audio cable that enabled me to plug in both the speakers and the headphones at the same time.



Unfortunately, this does *not* work as well as I intended. (It merely reduces the output of each, while simultaneous emitting sound. Nothing is muted.) Furthermore, it seems I can not get my card to actually *detect* the headphones. Whenever I insert them, it still tells me I have a 2.1 system installed.

Is there anything I can do about this?

Have you tried changing the front panel headphone/mic jacks from the Integrated audio (connection on the motherboard) to a connection on the SoundBlaster? I know that is not possible on some factory PC's (older Dell's had this problem) but on others they have a standard HD audio connection on the motherboard and in those models you can unplug it from the motherboard and connect it to the sound card (in this case the SoundBlaster).

Check the Lenovo documentation on this model and see if there is a separate cable that you can move to the SoundBlaster.

If this is not possible, and you have an open 3 1/2" bay or a 5 1/4" bay (a CD drive bay) you can buy an I/O panel that will give you the headphone/mic capability from the SoundBlaster.

There should be adapters available at places such as www.newegg.com or www.compusa.com

Here is one that I found doing a google search: FRONTX - FRONT PANEL COMPUTER PORT ( front usb, front ieee 1394 connector, etc )

I would advise connecting your computer case's audio jacks to the header pinouts found on the your Xtreme Audio card, then get rid of the "Y" cable and connect your speakers to the output jacks located on the back of the card. Once that is done use the Creative Console to detect your headphones.
When using the "Y" cable, it is not possible for any sound card to detect your headphones.