Vista + X-Fi = Sound problems

[Carskick]

Hey,

I just put this on Microsoft's vista forum, but I was wondering if anyone here had any ideas. Here it is:


Hello,

I have had this problem on and off. I had blue screens when I first put
Vista on the machine, then they subsided after all the updates were
installed. That was over 7 months ago. In the past few weeks, I have started
having trouble again, and everything seems to be pointing to an issue between
Vista and my X-Fi Music Sound card.

Basically, the problem is upon returning from sleep after being asleep for
over about an hour, the computer acts very flaky up until it completely locks
up about 30 seconds after resuming. After doing a hard reboot, there is no
sound upon returning to Windows. After a second reboot, sound returns. After
returning from a short sleep, or sometimes just randomly, the sound will
crackle.

I have run driver cleaners and uninstalled all creative drivers, and
reinstalled the latest driver from their website, but the problem remains. I
had one driver blue screen recently, but it was only the second boot after
reinstalling sound drivers, otherwise the problem is still exactly as stated
above.

I have the driver set on Disable all Enhancements as reccomended elsewhere,
still no help, except instances of crackling reduced.

Last night, I switched the computer to hibernate instead of sleep, and have
yet to check it today. But I would prefer to have full use of the sleep
feature.

Computer's specs:
Asus a8n5x motherboard (939)
AMD X2 2.45Ghz
1x4GB DDR400 RAM
2 SATA hard drives
2 IDE optical drives
350 watt antec
8800GT 512MB video card
X-Fi music sound card
Vista Ultimate 64-bit

Before I put Vista on it, the computer was rock stable running XP
Professional, all hardware was the same except 2GB of RAM vs 4, which was
recently added about 4 months ago.

If I use the motherboard's integrated sound, all problems seem to go away,
but the sound quality doesn't even come close, even with it having an
equalizer and the equalizer being disabled on the X-Fi.

If anyone has any ideas, please help! I know I'm not the only one with an
X-Fi with trouble, but after googling time and time again, I have yet to find
something that works.

Thanks.

[Buffalo2102]

Sorry, I don't have any specific advice as this sounds like one of those trial-and-error things - try different drivers, card in a different PCI slot, disable other devices one-by-one, etc.  Unless you can find out specifically what happened on your system at the point where the troubles began.

However, I can say that I have been using Vista x64 with a X-Fi Extreme Gamer for a long time now with absolutely no issues.  I use sleep all the time and it works flawlessly.

Buff; Lucky me.

[Carskick]

The place I posted this offered little help.

Interestingly, I found a forum that claimed that Creative has announced a known issue between the Nforce 4 chipset and X-Fi. Figures for me, huh? However, there are tons of people all over the net with similar issues. There seems to also be a corelation between Nvidia video cards and X-Fi issues as well, though not everyone has them.

I did a complete driver clean, download the latest Nvidia Nforce and Gefore drivers. Installed them, then X-Fi. Works fine until I try to resume from sleep or hibernation. May try different PCI slot next. As far as removing parts, not much I can remove. No integrated video, so unless I try another card, no cigar. But There aren't any other cards in the system, so it's hard to figure such conflicts.

I hate these kind of problems!

One of my customers is having problems with her sleep and hibernation modes, similar, but not identical. She has an ATI chipset, much newer than mine, and an 8600GT, no X-Fi, just onboard sound. Her sleep/hibernation issues are just with the freezing, not no sound or crackling. It seems Vista is STILL having issues with these sleep and hibernation modes. My laptop's bluetooth sometimes stops working after hibernation or sleep as well.

[Buffalo2102]

I seem to recall having some issues when I originally installed my X-Fi and x86 Vista - changing the PCI slot definitely made a stability improvement for me so I would certainly try it if I were you.  Unfortunately (or fortunately), I haven't used an nforce chipset for a long time now so my advice is purely based in the Intel P965 and x38 chipsets.

[Carskick]

Just so everyone knows, it is definitely a creative and Nvidia conflict. Somehow many Nforce 4 boards, once given 4GB of RAM no longer support the X-Fi. After these problems with Vista, I tried again with the card in Windows 7, and it gave IRQ conflicts with my Video Card even though they weren't the same. I gave up and put the card in my Dad's HTPC until I get a new board in the distant future.

[Carskick]

JA,

Well, that kind of worked with Vista, except it would still start crackling randomly even if I hadn't put the computer to sleep or hibernation.

With 7, the card wouldn't work at all, causing a conflict with my video card, causing it's drivers not to work right either. checked IRQs, no conflicts.

I put the card in my Dad's HTPC for now. Gives him better sound where it's really important. In my room, I use my Xbox 360 to play music through my main sound system, so the high end sound card doesn't matter as much any more, though it would still help for gaming.

Once I do a new build with a new board, I will likely take my X-Fi back. This will be quite a ways in the future, since my 2.45Ghz X2 with 8800GT handles everything I need. I even got a new Acer 22" 1680x1050, and everything still works flawlessly at maximum settings, unless I really go crazy with AA on the really tough to handle games. Overall, at this point in time, I don't need more CPU power than the X2 gives me. I actually got a 300 case and 650watt PSU, so with the extra power and better cooling, I probably could overvolt the CPU and get it clocked to 2.9Ghz. Still, don't think it's worth the efforts ATM.