Finaly. How to enable hardware acceleration for X-

Question

After much discussion on this form and with my friends, I've finally cracked hardware acceleration for X-FI on Vista. It works by using Alchemy on a large scale and gives acceleration for everything you listen to. The breakthrough finally came through thanx to help and info I received from alexs3ds on this thread?http://forums.creative.com/creativel...message.id=645?It started as an emulation concept discussion and evolved in to this. It gives all your 3D audio effects and EAX in games without game by game transmutation and I have noticed a large quality and volume enhancement in normal music and film audio because even that is now accelerated. Here's a step by step guide on how to do it.[color="#ff0033">?[color="#3366ff">Download Alchemy and install. Get it here .[color="#3366ff">http://preview.creativelabs.com/alchemy/default.aspx[color="#3366ff">?[color="#3366ff">Open a?window in explorer and go to [color="#3333ff">Windows\System32.[color="#3366ff">?[color="#3366ff">Locate the file dsound.dll and right click on it then select properties.[color="#3366ff">?[color="#3366ff">Click the security tab then click advanced.[color="#3366ff">?[color="#3366ff">In the advanced security panel?that opens up, click the owner tab then edit.[color="#3366ff">?[color="#3366ff">Use this to set your user account name as owner. Use the other users and groups button if you can't see your account name select your user account name using the select users pane and add it. Make sure your user account name is set as owner.[color="#3366ff">?[color="#3366ff">Next you want to change permissions in the advanced security panel so you would click the permissions tab, click edit, on the panel that pops up click add and add your user account name. On permission entry panel, click full control under the allow line. Then ok everything and close every thing down till your back at the explorer.[color="#3366ff">?[color="#3366ff">Now rename dsound.dll to something like dsound.dll.bak. ( changing owner and permissions allows you to do this ).[color="#3366ff">?[color="#3366ff">Open up another explorer window and navigate to the Alchemy directory ie C:\program files\alchemy, highlight the dsound.dll file and the dsound.ini file and copy them.[color="#3366ff">?[color="#3366ff">Paste them into the system32 folder and that's it. Reboot your computer and you are now using hardware accelerated sound. ?[color="#ff0033">IMPORTANT NOTES YOU MUST KNOW[color="#ff0033">?This only supports 6-Bit samples. You can't use 24-Bit audio samples. You can however reverse the process and regain support. The Alchemy drivers can cause a bit of choppy sound now and then if you don't configure them right. See the Alchemy advanced FAQ for info. Plus, remember they are Beta. You can however update your system as and when alchemy updates. It's not known if every game will work with EAX or 3Dsound with this. To my knowledge?all, if not?most do.You can still edit and add game settings to the dsound.ini file. For help and info in getting the best quality out of your X-FI and a list of what XP software you can install off your driver disk that came with your card refer to this thread. http://forums.creative.com/creativel...essage.id=6029?Enjoy. Edit:- IMPORTANT UPDATE?This will only work if your card is set in game mode. It will not work properly in any other mode. See my post further down this thread for more details.Also important is that I have only been able to test this on Vista 32 ultimate. It is untested in any other version of Vista. Perhaps people who have it running on other versions of Vista could post this info and help put together a list. ?
Message Edited by Sensi on 05-09-200705:20 AM
Message Edited by Sensi on 05-09-200705:20 AM

Answer 1

It does work, however I discovered more?important conditions. You MUST have your audio card in game mode BEFORE you do this. The reason is that the alchemy file passes the audio to OpenAL in game mode only. IF YOU TRY TO RUN GAMES IN ANY OTHER MODE YOUR SYSTEM WILL CRASH WITH BSD. IF YOU TRY TO RUN MEDIA PLAYER IT WILL HANG. IF YOU RUN DIRECTX DIAGNOSTIC YOUR SYSTEM WILL CRASH WITH BSD. YOUR?CARD MUST BE IN GAME MODE. IF YOU TRY TO CHANGE TO GAME MODE AFTER THE SWITCH, YOU WILL NOT BE ABLE TO AS THE AUDIO PANEL WON'T LOAD. DO IT BEFORE YOU SWITCH. As for windows replacing files after reboot, that aint happening to me. I've looked everywhere and can't find any sign of?were replacement files would come form either. Not that I'm saying it isn't happening, Vista is supposed to have a security system that stops you from replacing core system files. It just ain't happening in my system. However, I do have various system hacks in place and one of them may be stopping this. Need to look in to this. Fact:- I'm sitting with this in system now ( got no intentions of going back cause the audio's great ). I've tested 0 up-to date games and all give EAX etc. Without transmutation. Audio sounds amazing compared to what it was before and video audio finely plays in sync ( hurray). Maybay I should add a warning to this mod that you must only try it if you know what you are?doing.BTW in case this has anything to do with it, my system is :-
Asus?am2 with nforce 4, amd am2 x2 dual core cpu, 2 gig dual channel ddr2 800, oem?SB X-FI and Vista 32 ultimate.
Message Edited by Sensi on 05-09-200705:04 AM