Need help removing Creative Audio Control Panel

Question

So I've been trying to get the Creative Consol Launcher to work with my soundcard again and found that in my "Programs and Features" list in windows 7 there is one item of Creative labs software that I can not remove. It is called "Creative Audio Control Panel" and when I attempt to uninstall it it tells me "C:\Program Files (x86)\InstallSheild Installation Information\{7E96A7F-AFE3-47-87B-583E37639E8}\SUPPORT.Cab not found."
Whenever I try to use the Creative Console Launcher it tells me "There are no supported audio device[sic] available. You need to close the application. Click OK to close the application now."? I assume it's trying to launch Creative Audio Control Panel which for some reason or other is no longer present on my system but was never properly uninstalled. Also, great work on that error message - seems like Creative needs more proof readers.
In other words it seems the file I need in order to uninstall this broken program is missing - any idea what I should do? I've tried seeing if I can reinstall the program but I can't find any setup file for it online - all I can find is "Creative Console Launcher" which seems to intigrate a launcher feature into volpannel, but since it doesn't have the Creative Audio Control Panel to actualy launch it just gives me error messages if I want to get into my EAX settings or mixer or anything like that. If anyone knows how I can uninstall/reinstlal this program (in windows 7) I'ld be very greatful.

Answer 1

Well I believe I have found a solution to my problem and it is manyfold so here goes.
First off, Creative Customer Support Americas corresponded with me via e-mail and notified me that there are known issues with all PCI cards and Creative Audio Consol in Windows 7 (which is to say they don't work together at all).
After getting this info I removed my SB 0790 card and plugged in another one I had handy - it's still a SB X-FI Xtreme Audio but this one is has a PCIe interface and a digital audio in/out jack on the back to boot - this card is manufactured not by Creative but by MSI (licenced I assume) and came with my motherboard (good thing I had it laying around).
Initialy I had the same issue - even uninstalling everything related to creative and re-installing the hotest newest drivers from the site simply wouldn't resolve the issue. Finaly I downloaded a 3rd party program called CCleaner - a freeware utility that can clean up registry errors and delete items off the program list by force if need be (and it was in this case). I used that to completely eradicate Creative Audio Console and Creative Console Launcher, re-installed the latest drivers and audio pack for the PCIe card, and then even had windows update the driver again after that (the result of which was not a new driver version but it did seem to download and install something - no clue what). After all of that I once again had a functioning version of Creative Audio Consol back on my computer - and now it recognizes that I have a valid card installed and I've got access to all the features I was missing. The interface for Creative Audio Console looks a bit different than it used to (no longer a fake looking stero but instead a fairly plane interface) but whatever it's working and that's what I care about.
Oddly enough with all those installs it never put Volume Panel or Creative Consol Launcher back on my computer, I wound up having to install those off of the MSI card's driver disk to get easy access to the Creative Audio Panel again (otherwise I'd have to either make a shortcut or go straight into the install directory any time I want to launch it - now though I can launch it right through the Volum Panel).
One persistant issue still remains: In my recording audio device list I am still missing: "What U Hear" but it has been this way since I installed Windows 7 for the first time in October when it releaed, and I have given up hope on ever seeing What U hear again - If I want to record from my soundcard I have a 3rd party freeware utility called "Virtual Audio Cables" that are a bit clunky but get the job done.
Conclusion:
Though it may claim on Creative's support page for the SB0790 (Sound Blaster X-FI Xtreme Audio) soundcard that the latest drivers support Windows 7 it is abundantly clear that this is NOT the case. You will manage to get audio out of it, but almost no other creative aplication is going to work with your card or even detect that a valid working SB card is installed. It seems the only aplication I could get working relyably was the auto updator (which was able to see I had the card installed) and Volume Panel. By the admission of Creative Customer Support America, however Creative Audio Panel will not work, and I have observed that Creative Consol Launcher does not function properly either. Indeed even plowing through the file system you'll find support only for XP and Vista versions of the drivers - there is no Win7 specific driver for either this card or it's PCIe counterpart.
Also don't expect to have access to the "What U Hear" utility - this goes for the PCIe version of the card as well. As ever, it seems the marketing guys are making claims about the card that can't actualy be backed up, sure it's techincaly illegal, but only if your customers are willing to start a class action lawsuit over a 50 dollar soundcard that sort-of works anyway.
Issue resolved for now - and I am no longer pulling my hair out in frustration.
Links to the Utilities I used to make my card functional:
CCleaner
http://www.ccleaner.com/
Virtual Audio Cables
http://software.muzychenko.net/eng/vac.html