How I've Eluded Soundblaster Driver incompatibilities for all these years

Question

Hi I just want to share my experience on Soundblaster. It's been several years since the X-Fi's release. I was then using the original SB li've 5. to my original 53 units of computer in my PC internet and Gaming Shop. All these years I had to replace unit after unit as it grows old and manifest system problems but never would have failed to put soundblaster as a soundcard for that particular new or replaced unit. I have jumped from SB li've 5. to audigy series and then as of now X-Fi extreme music.And so far in my entire life I have never encountered a single problem out of soundblaster not even in a single unit of my PCs. And because Iam puzzled with all the complaints when I visit here. I pity all of you guys and I decided to make this post for a reason that it might help some of you as it had helped me through all my Creative experience years.
Ok here are the some simple steps I've been using and have acquired all these years and never did it failed me:
.You must know the inside and out of your PC. Find out all the drivers that has been installed from the past and present in your pc. This is generally important so that if you will have compatibility problem in the future you can start scanning and eliminating some incompatible drivers one at a time. If you don't know you can always go to "Run" and type:"regedit" and press "enter" and you will find all your drivers and activities you've done and currently making there. basically, everything as in everything even the secret of all secret funny things you've done in your pc from the past and present. Yes you can find all the things about you computer there. "If you familiarize yourself with your pc in the registry editor, you become one with your computer."
2. Before installing soundblaster soundcard, Be sure to "UNINSTALL ALL THE EXISTING SOUNDCARD DRIVERS" your closest friend might say it's okay I've tested it myself it doensn't matter if you uninstall the existing soundcard driver it or not. Never believe him/her, remember "The enemy of your enemy isn't always your enemy too." your pc has a different build content depending on your activities from the past and present with your friends have; and this will be a big factor if you are installing sensiti've drivers like creative's. Ignoring this often results to system problems of incompatibilities. Thus, you start to cry and blame creative for all the stupidity you just caused yourself.
3. After installing and you decide to restart now go to you "SYSTEM BIOS" and "turn off" your onboard soundcard there if you currently have one.
4. If you decide to reinstall the driver because you felt you've missed something. It never hurts to "ALWAYS UNINSTALL FIRST" And then install the current driver again.
5. Lastly, guess you've heard this one "Never fix your PC, if it ain't broke." If you try to overclock your PC a dozen or hundred times and you "suddenly forgot" the "last oveclock activity" you've made and then after a week you discovered you suddenly have a sound problem in your Battlefield 2 when the last time you played it the sound were okay. After a couple of hours of trying to reinstall and you've abide to all the right procedures installing above and still finds the sound in bf2 sucks. Don't panic and come blaming creai've again with your stupidity cause you just broke the general law and tried to fix something that ain't broke.
6. One more thing, never use very cheap, never heard motherboard that you personally insist it's too good for you. Some motherboards are genuinely incompatible with soundblaster X-fi as of now because the driver is in early stage. Early adopters usually gets hit with this.
Important: When uninstalling past creative drivers, actually to all the drivers in my case, just to be sure. Go to registry editor and erase all the hidden dll files and clutters. soundblaster drivers are not ordinary driver that once you uninstall this its all gone?.. No, it's not gone at all, In fact, soundblasters drivers are embedded so deep in your system that some people need driver cleanup softwares so that the hidden remaining dll files will be totally wiped out; problem is some bogus driver clean up softwares are in rage for years and there's a big chance that you would catch one, most specially the one that comes in free. But If you familiarize yourself in the registry editor, There's no software that can erase all the hidden files and dlls better than you would do it manually.Done this for years and it never did failed me.
***not so important in the process but better get rid of it st just to be sure anyway it's easy as .2..3... Try to remove all the spywares before installing by using Ad-Aware,Spybot search and destroy and microsoft ad remove software. Don't just try to use one, some spywares are just as stubborn as humans are.Message Edited by spenz on 04-7-2006 04:00 AMMessage Edited by spenz on 04-7-2006 04:00 AMMessage Edited by spenz on 04-7-2006 04:03 AM

Answer 1

spenz wrote:Hi I just want to share my experience on Soundblaster. It's been several years since the X-Fi's release. I was then using the original SB li've 5. to my original 53 units of computer in my PC internet and Gaming Shop. All these years I had to replace unit after unit as it grows old and manifest system problems but never would have failed to put soundblaster as a soundcard for that particular new or replaced unit. I have jumped from SB li've 5. to audigy series and then as of now X-Fi extreme music.And so far in my entire life I have never encountered a single problem out of soundblaster not even in a single unit of my PCs. And because Iam puzzled with all the complaints when I visit here. I pity all of you guys and I decided to make this post for a reason that it might help some of you as it had helped me through all my Creative experience years.
*Edited due to length of post and the normal troubleshooting BS that you hear every time one user has a problem.
Good post for general troubleshooting, but it doesn't sit to well with me when there are literally thousands who have these problems. Don't you think this will rub anyones nose in the dirt who through no fault of they're own has problems?
I for one have a good working x-fi but for someone to say that the multitude of problems are due to bad installations or viruses, i feel is downright insulting for the people who have reformatted, bought new hardware, and come up against a brick wall each and every time.
I know a lot of the time when it comes to pc's and they're faults its due to the person themselves and not the pc, but those people tend to be few in number and don't complain of the same symptoms over and over again.
It exists on very popular motherboards and at a guess i would say the x-fi is asking for to much bandwidth which certain chipsets can not supply.
A pci asking for to much bandwidth is not the fault of the user the pc or some other supernatural event, its the pci card itself, they should conform within the pci specifications and not go over what is set by a standard.