X-Fi - how can they get away with this ?

MoodyB · 27 Apr 2007 at 23:56

Hey all,

Bought an OEM XtremeMusic about 2 months ago. Had a hassle getting it working, but finally did. Then it starts to play up a few days ago - BSOD on 1st startup, reset pc and it's fine. Other times the pc starts fine from cold boot, no sound from X-Fi, restart BSOD, restart and it works but only in Entertainment mode, restart - don't get a BSOD but the pc hangs while loading XP.....the list is endless. Even tried a fresh Xp install with only the X-Fi and my gfx card plugged in. BSOD when installing the X-Fi drivers :mad:

Probably doesn't help that I'm using a Asus NF4 motherboard ( last bios update was in March last year ), but afaik the XtremeMusic's with the heatsink on the chip have had the required epprom update to fix the NF4 issues ( according to posts on Creative's forums anyway )

Are we all mugs for buying Creative products when their drivers & lack of proper support appears to be utterly shocking ?

As I used to own a Terratec Dmx6Fire before this, would it even be worth considering an Audigy 2 or Audigy 4 as a replacement for the X-FI ? Are their drivers just as bad :confused:

MoodyB · 28 Apr 2007 at 10:43

Tried all 3 pci slots with a full uninstall / reinstall / DriverCleaner before changing the slots, fiddled with the pci latency...

MoodyB · 29 Apr 2007 at 12:59

Psypher5 said:
complain and make them accept its faulty, then send it back...

they'll send you one that works then

I might just do this to see where I get. I'm wondering if heat has anything to do with my problems, as if you leave your fingers on the X-Fi's heatsink for longer than 5-10 secs you'll burn them

Decided to install an old Pure Digital / Terratec card I had lying around, complete with 5 year old drivers. Doesn't sound as good as the X-Fi, but at least it works flawlessly with no crackles / pops / random reboots.

Edit : I bought the OEM card off eBay. I guess Creative won't cover that as their warranty states thay only repair / replace cards bought from a authorised Creative reseller :confused:

MoodyB · 29 Apr 2007 at 13:02

Fireskull said:
Worries me as ive just ordered one to go in my Asus A8N32-SLI D

You can only try it. After reading the Creative forum, you can have 2 people with the same motherboard & bios revision where the card will work on one, but not the other.

MoodyB · 30 Apr 2007 at 11:23

It does have a heatsink, although you'd still burn your fingers on it after 5-10secs as it gets extremely hot.