Creative Sound Cards.

stormy13 · 21 Aug 2009

Seen this enough here and elsewhere with people not knowing or understanding the differences between the different cards. For example have seen too many instances of someone recommending regular X-Fi drivers with the Xtreme Audio. With that said here we go,

1. Audigy SE/LS/Value, X-Fi Xtreme Audio and the Sound Blaster 24 bit

All of these cards are virtually identical hardware-wise, and for the most part the drivers are interchangeable. The only thing the Xtreme Audio has over the others is that it gets to use some of the X-Fi software (and supports Entertainment mode only). Drivers for all of these cards can be found on Creatives support pages,

Creative Worldwide Support > Sound Blaster

the Audigy and Live 24 bit can be found by using the "If your product is not listed above, please click here." link at the bottom of the page. Alternatively you can also try/use the Daniel_k package,

SB P17X Series Support Pack 2.7 (04/01/2010) - Aud... - Creative Labs

that has been modified to work with all the above cards (single installer and driver) as well as return the use of some of the applications that used to work in XP (and Vista if the card was bought recently enough and came with Vista drivers on the CD).

2. The Audigy 1, 2 (all, including the 2 Value) and 4 series. These cards again all use the same driver and can be found through the saem link as above. And again there is also the Daniel_K driver set,

SB Audigy Series Support Pack 3.8 (04/19/2010)

Filefront mirror - Download Audigy_SupportPack_3_6.exe

and will not work with any of the cards from #1.

3. Original X-Fi series and the new Titanium series. Again latest drivers as well as some of the applications can be found on Creative's site, as well as the daniel_K set,

SB X-Fi series Support Pack 2.5 (10/25/2011)

Filefront mirror - XFI_SupportPack_2_5.exe | Game Front

Daniel also put out an unofficial Windows 7 install disk for the original X-Fi series,

SB X-Fi PCI Install Disc 1.0 (unofficial) - Creative Labs

Again like the regular Audigy drivers, these will not work with the Xtreme Audio.

4. That leaves the original SB Live series of cards. There is not now and never will be any support for these cards from Creative, and I really wouldn't expect them too considering most of these cards are from the Windows 95/98 era. For anyone with one of these cards the only option you really have (applies to Vista as well) is yet another Daniel_K modified driver set,

SB Live! series Support Pack 2.0 (04/30/2010) - Creative Labs

Filefront mirror - Download SBLive_SupportPack_1_5.rar now superseded

New version - Download SBLive_SupportPack_2_0.exe

See post #10 for how to install these drivers manually.
Updated link for #2.

RustyFalcon · 21 Aug 2009

Nice collection of information! Rep+

stormy13 · 04 Sep 2009

In addition to a couple of updated links in the OP, there is an new Audigy 1/2/4 Vista and 7 beta driver,

Creative Sound Blaster Audigy series beta driver 2... - Creative Labs

Sassa · 04 Sep 2009

Very good info...

+rep from me...

mickey megabyte · 04 Sep 2009

thanks stormy,

i've got an x-fi xtreme gamer - will i get any benefits from using danny_k drivers?

currently i'm using vanilla drivers, only problem i have with them is with fallout 3 and alchemy settings - i've tried lots of buffer/duration combinations but still get so many crashes that i hardly play that great game anymore...

stormy13 · 04 Sep 2009

The one big advantage to the daniel_k driver set is the return of some of the apps in excess of the Console launcher that is available from Creative's download site. If what you have installed now is working for you, then personally I would leave it alone; that is unless you are like me and like to play around with new drivers (I always create a restore point and a full backup, just in case), just to see what if anything is different.

I have used both his and the stock Creative drivers (usually with the Creative driver installed over the top of his), with no problems at all (YMMV on this). I am also at the moment using his modified Auzentech Forte driver,

SB X-Fi Series driver 2.20.0001 - Forte v1.1 (08/0... - Creative Labs

with no issues.

I just wish I had his know how on how to do what he does. Years ago i used to use modded Audigy 2 drivers on an old SB Live Value that I had modded myself, but they were easy to do as there was a tutorial (link since dead) and a couple of small tools that would do it for you; made it easy to keep the drivers up to date.

Mickey you are not the first I have seen that is having problems with that game. Might be worth having a look around here,

http://connect.creativelabs.com/alch.../AllItems.aspx

I just had a quick look and there is one thread there about the game (don't have it) and Alchemy,

http://connect.creativelabs.com/alch...FAllItems.aspx

maybe post in it or start another and see what if anything they have to say (haven't been following there much lately, but the dev's were quite active the first few months that Alchemy was out). If nothing else the more that report the issue there helps in determining if it is an isse with Alchemy or the game.

thefabe · 04 Sep 2009

Maybe a little off topic but I have the audigy 2zs gamer and would like the media software is it available? I have been to the creative site and the card drivers work great just missing the application to select all the eq settings different speaker settings ect. any ideas?

stormy13 · 04 Sep 2009

Try the Audigy support pack linked to in the first post. It has most of the Audigy apps working in Vista and 7, only the EAX Console isn't,

Included in the pack:

- Audigy series driver 2.18.0011.8 (latest beta)
- ALchemy 1.30.00
- Audio Console 1.32.02
- DDL and DTS Connect License Activation 2.00.03 (*)
- Dolby Digital Live Pack 3.00.03 (*)
- DTS Connect Pack 1.03.04 (*)
- EAX Console 3.00.56 (Windows XP only)
- Graphic Equalizer 2.00.65
- MediaSource DVD-Audio Player 2.00.78
- SoundFont Bank Manager 3.21.00
- Speaker Settings 2.00.60

js09 · 11 Sep 2009

option #2 works great for me! fixed the low decibel problem (when compared to XP) i was having. thanks a bunch.

stormy13 · 10 Oct 2009

Just a bit of an addition to this as I have seen a few posts with people with Creative cards (can happen to the others too) where when they try to install the drivers they get the ever popular,

"Setup could not detect any Sound Blaster Audio Card on your system."

In most cases this can be fixed by installing the driver manually. First download the driver appropriate to your card (links to most Creative cards in the first post), then use something like Winrar or 7Zip to extract the downloaded driver file. Next follow the tutorial here (for Vista but the same applies for Windows 7),

Device Manager - Install Driver - Vista Forums

When you get to step #9 the file you want to point it to is,

for the Audigy SE/LS/DE/Value and X-Fi Xtreme Audio is P17.INF

for all X-Fi cards (except the above Xtreme Audio) and the rest of the Audigy series (1, 2 and 4) the file is wdma_emu.inf

In most cases the above files are located in the Drivers\WDM folder in the extracted folder. If the driver installs successfully, you should then be able to install any of the applications that have been updated to work with Vista (and will/should work with Windows 7); best to use one of the modded driver packs for this.

Creative Sound Cards.

Creative Sound Cards and Drivers.