Creative screwing it's users long enough... this was the last straw ...

[mikeysg]

I dunno if anyone has heard of this, prolly has I think, but since nobody's mentioned it, I figured it ought to be brought up. There's a furor over the net with regard to this -
http://forums.creative.com/creativel...read.id=116332

Apparently, they've served Daniel_K with a cease and desist order and do not want him to mod their drivers anymore......pretty interesting stuff with >1000 angry replies in that thread.

[wh666-666]

I completely support creative ...

We are aware that you have been assisting owners of our Creative sound cards for some time now, by providing unofficial driver packages for Vista that deliver more of the original functionality that was found in the equivalent XP packages for those sound cards. In principle we don't have a problem with you helping users in this way, so long as they understand that any driver packages you supply are not supported by Creative.

Where we do have a problem is when technology and IP owned by Creative or other companies that Creative has licensed from, are made to run on other products for which they are not intended.

Its good someone is providing driver support. They clearly state they DONT have a problem with this.

Its quite understandable however they want people to be aware these drivers havnt been created or are supported by creative to safeguard themselves from possible lawsuits .....

And its completely acceptable that they dont want them being used on products that arent creative's. That means they dont just get stupid user lawsuits but multi-million company lawsuits ....





Then creative goes bankrupt and those stupid whining b*tches wont have ANY support whatsoever ....




You see, this is what happens when dumbasses are allowed to have opinions, let alone post them ....

[mikeysg]

But what I don't get is this -
With WinXP, I believe X-Fi cards have DDL and DTS decoder functionality, right? Why is it that with Creative very own Vista driver, this does not work. I just tried Daniel_K's driver and I'm surprised that the DD/DTS decoder works......why couldn't Creative have done this themselves?

Edit - IIRC, when I'd gotten my X-Fi's, it was clearly stated on the boxes 'built-in decoding' (or something to this effect), that's one of the features I'd bought the card for. Does Creative have the right to unilaterally NOT enable it for Vista in the first place?

[wh666-666]

No arguements there .....

Alot of companies and microsoft themselves have problems with driver support for vista. Some of it to be expected although the whole process hasnt been eased by microsoft as during development their co-operation with OEM's was less than helpful ....

I dont know why but quite possibly creative didnt want certain decoders to be functional within vista.

If however it states on the box the decoder should work within vista then its lawsuit time

[PriMaTe]

I don't know anything about this guy or the drivers. But if he's good, why wouldn't creative hire him.

[ImaNihilist]

I don't know anything about this guy or the drivers. But if he's good, why wouldn't creative hire him.

Because Creative is a **** company that prides themselves on having the worst driver support in the industry.

I gave up on Creative and their ******** years ago.

[mikeysg]

I don't know anything about this guy or the drivers. But if he's good, why wouldn't creative hire him.

I'd heard of his drivers before, but didn't feel a need to try 'em out coz I was waiting patiently for Creative to release the driver that would enabled DD/DTS decoding........and this was when Vista was just released. Even now, after a year, Creative hasn't delivered on that yet. Daniel_K's driver, aka kX driver, have been circulating for a while......it amazes me that this lone modder has done something that Creative can't, or won't, do.

[Learux]

Still running my old soundcard, never bothered upgrading to xfi.

Worst company ever to have a monopoly.

Learux

[James]

But what I don't get is this -
With WinXP, I believe X-Fi cards have DDL and DTS decoder functionality, right? Why is it that with Creative very own Vista driver, this does not work. I just tried Daniel_K's driver and I'm surprised that the DD/DTS decoder works......why couldn't Creative have done this themselves?

Edit - IIRC, when I'd gotten my X-Fi's, it was clearly stated on the boxes 'built-in decoding' (or something to this effect), that's one of the features I'd bought the card for. Does Creative have the right to unilaterally NOT enable it for Vista in the first place?

If you want the unofficial bs-corporate answer (from what I understand), it's because of copy-protection issues. Because the movie companies are insisting on a "secure channel" from the disc that is inserted, all the way through the output to the monitors and the speakers, Microsoft and hardware manufacturers have been playing it careful with everything.

So the reason they've delayed it is probably because they haven't found a way to secure the decoded output from the soundcard. (I.e. Suddenly, all of those DVD/HD rips would have beautiful surround tracks to go with them.)

I don't know if that's the real reason or not, but considering how much I've been reading on how hardware companies are trying to secure the "playback path", it would make sense.

[rimmerchant]

long story short
Creative is too lazy to write proper drivers for Vista. Some guy decided to take the initiative and help the community out by writing better himself and now Creative is threatening him.

Community outrage.

http://www.theinquirer.net/gb/inquir...driver-debacle

according to a comment/post.
Newegg got 5000+ RMA for creative cards after the news broke out and they pull Creative Cards from their site.

I was kinda pissed off at creative a few years back when I was trying to get drivers for one of my Creative card (don't remember which model)

I downloaded the driver and upon installation it asked me for THE DRIVER CD?! WTflock?! who would a driver install need me to have the CD?!

I though it was the wrong driver or something and I redownloaded and reinstall .. same thing.

I looked at the site more closely and they wanted like $16 for a replacement CD. I have to go down to my basement and craw into my the dirty storage hole where I keep my old boxes to get the CD out.. boy was I pissed off. I lost alot of respect for them after that and haven't been keeping up.

but now after reading that article it seems they are more pucked up than I though.

I've been a long time customer of their for a long time. but after this revelation I will not be buying their products again.

[rhettro]

That's pretty typical of Creative. Seems like I abandoned Creative back in 1996, when I discovered after owning two different soundcards, 99% of drive conflicts and resourse management problems I experienced were caused by my Soundblasters. So I've gone with other alternatives since, which is too bad because I've always liked their hardware, but the effort to get it to work was just not worth it.

[rhettro]

Customer support has never been Creative's strong point, or a point at all really.

[Recon]

yep I've always hated creative

[speedyaxon]

Wow, this is the first I've heard of this. I'm using Vista x64 w/4GB of ram with an X-Fi XtremeMusic and have no driver problems at all.

What functionality is missing from Vista drivers that XP had? I just went through the whole upgrade a month ago and don't notice anything major, other than 6.1 support is missing.

One user also stated that the alchemy software isn't free? I d/led it from creative (i think) for free and it works fine.

Maybe I'm just a rare lucky user?

[rimmerchant]

heres some more crap I dug up: (I can't say if it true or not but this scares me on how deceptive their practices are)

The original SoundBlaster was basically a copy of the Adlib (a soundcard by a small American company) with digital output tacked on. Problem was the implementation was so broken it was impossible to play back audio without crackles and pops.

The Soundblaster pro was better, but that's not saying a lot. The fact that the follow up - the Sound Blaster 16 - was NOT Sound Blaster Pro compatible is a clear indication how murky the SB Pro's underpinnings actually were.

Speaking about the SoundBlaster 16. Despite what you may believe the SB16 is NOT a 16-Bit soundcard. It can indeed play back 16-Bit samples, but the drivers simply down converts them to 12-bits.

The AWE was better but it was basically what the SB16 should have been and the competition by this time made the AWE look silly - and that is not mentioning the rather dishonest 64 simultaneous channels claim their marketing department threw about.

Creative's first attempt at a PCI soundcard turned out so murky that 1997 era mobos have something called a "SoundBlaster link" to make them happy. Finally giving up Creative bought another company that had made a PCI soundcard and slapped the SoundBlaster brand on it. (SoundBlaster 16 PCI .. or SoundBlaster 512, they had many names for it).

The SoundBlaster Live! was not PCI 2.1 complainant. If you somehow didn't know that you had to turn off PCI delayed transactions in the BIOS you would get blue screens every now and then. It also caused disk corruption on Via chipsets. Fun fun fun.

Since then the Live has been rebranded several times. They even spewed out a SoundBlaster Live 24-Bit that did the old SoundBlaster 16-Bit down sampling trick. How nice of them.

The SoundBlaster X-Fi is much nicer than the Live and the Soundcard I'm currently listening to. But beware, Creative is up to their old tricks even here. They talk a lot about their 24-Bit Crysalizer - for instance - but it is actually a 24-Bit Compressor similar to the 16-Bit compressors used by CD mastering studios. Like any audiophile can tell you a compressor helps cheepo speakers by making the sound a little more vivid and louder, at the cost of less fidelity on high end equipment.

Also note that the SoundBlaster X-Fi PCIe Xtreme Audio is not an X-Fi but a good 'ol SoundBlaster Live! in new clothes!

one example. when I bought my X-Fi Extreme gamer card. I have to do 2+ HOURS of research before placing my order..

why u ask? I found out that some of their "Xi-Fi" models are actually rebranded Audigy models.. (I think it was someone here at SE that orginally warned me of this) and I have to MAKE SURE that that model card I'm getting is actually a "Xi-Fi" chipset.

Come to think of it. that was the FIRST and ONLY time. I have to do research on something to make sure I get what I'm paying for.. (Imagine placing an order for a C2D and having to makre sure you are not getting a older dual core.. )

What the guy I quoted said about the SB16 and AWE64. I actually bought those card. the AWE64 I paid 232$ for it after tax back around 1998. I guess I fell for their marketing (there were no internet like now to do research on)

What a SHNIT LOAD OF FLUCK!!

I"ve been a Creative customer since like 1988 when I got the SB Pro for my 286 16mhz PC. and I pretty much build system and recommend Creative sound cards exclusively. after reading these stories, I feel like I been molested at night in my sleep by them for years and only found out today.

they can go YANK their PENIS through their RECTUM.

I'm no longer going to buy any of their product ever again and advise my clients/customers to avoid their product...