My Soundblaster is misbehaving on W11

RoadBlaster · Jul 13, 2022

Necrosaro said:
The more I think about it, might be the connections wearing out if they were unplugged and plugged in too often. Could also be cable issues or even not quite seated correctly in its spot.

Blue Tack helps with loose connections.

I use blue tack to hold my optical cable output from the SB Card from falling out because I pushed it in wrong & broke the little door that also locks the optical connector in place.

TairikuOkami · Jul 13, 2022

You can try the latest unofficial 3rd party drivers.

Daniel_K's Official Blog

Modified drivers for Creative soundcards

danielkawakami.blogspot.com

Yerm · Jul 14, 2022

TairikuOkami said:
You can try the latest unofficial 3rd party drivers.

Daniel_K's Official Blog

Modified drivers for Creative soundcards

danielkawakami.blogspot.com

That sounds like something I would try! I'll wait however until my backup disk order comes in.... I want to safeguard all the configuration and bugfixing I did setting this thing up before I start messing with it.

Yerm · Jul 15, 2022

TairikuOkami said:
You can try the latest unofficial 3rd party drivers.

Daniel_K's Official Blog

Modified drivers for Creative soundcards

danielkawakami.blogspot.com

Hm, reading through the blog he seems to have given up. He's not maintaining them anymore and the drivers are 1) not free from bugs and 2) only 'hopefully work' with W11. I won't be trying them for fear of wrecking something.

Yerm · Jul 15, 2022

Well I removed the Audigy in the hope the onboard audio would maybe magically have the surround option HP promised (like those old jack-sensing chips from old) but alas, it really only outputs 2.0 stereo and the mic/line in jacks are just that.

Dru2 · Jul 15, 2022

Yerm said:
Hm, reading through the blog he seems to have given up. He's not maintaining them anymore and the drivers are 1) not free from bugs and 2) only 'hopefully work' with W11. I won't be trying them for fear of wrecking something.

It doesn't matter who produces them, no driver is ever 100 percent perfect on all machines. That's life. Realize you are attempting to use old, discontinued hardware on a new operating system, so yeah, there's risk. If you don't feel comfortable with using hacked drivers, that's fine. Creating assumptions out of fear is not.

Anyway, Daniel K has been doing what he's been doing for a long time, and I've used his drivers myself in the past. If Creative doesn't have a driver for you, and you wish to use whatever card you have, I'd say give Daniel K's a try before declaring them bad.

You can always create a System Restore point before installing the drivers, and if something goes wrong, revert back....

Create System Restore Point in Windows 11

This tutorial will show you how to manually create a restore point in Windows 11. Turning on system protection for a drive allows System Restore to include the drive when restore points are created so you can undo undesired system changes by reverting to a previous point in time. System...

www.elevenforum.com

And as always.... make sure you backup your data in-case something does go wrong.

Good luck.

glasskuter · Jul 15, 2022

This page shows a driver dated 8/12/15. I would try it. If it doesn't work, uninstall it and any software that came with it (be sure and remove driver), restart, then reinstall it in compatibility mode to see if it will work that way. Creative Worldwide Support - Sound Blaster Audigy Fx

Dru2 · Jul 15, 2022

The big problem is the SoundBlaster Audigy FX was released in 2013 and is no longer supported so I'm not sure there's going to be a driver that's 100 percent "bug free" for an OS (Windows 11) that was released in 2021

Dru2 · Jul 15, 2022

For those interested Creative did release a new SoundBlaster Audigy FX V2 in 2021

Creative Announces Sound Blaster Audigy Fx V2 Card

Creative Technology today announced the release of Sound Blaster Audigy Fx V2, the latest addition to its well-established series of Sound Blaster sound cards. A compelling facelift over its predecessor Sound Blaster Audigy Fx, which was already a bestseller in its own right, this sound card...

www.techpowerup.com

Sound Blaster Audigy Fx V2

The Sound Blaster Audigy Fx V2 delivers high-resolution 5.1 audio playback for your movies, music, and games. It also comes with audio enhancements and SmartComms Kit via Creative app.

us.creative.com

Edited for link change to U.S.

Yerm · Jul 16, 2022

Dru2 said:
For those interested Creative did release a new SoundBlaster Audigy FX V2 in 2021

Creative Announces Sound Blaster Audigy Fx V2 Card

Creative Technology today announced the release of Sound Blaster Audigy Fx V2, the latest addition to its well-established series of Sound Blaster sound cards. A compelling facelift over its predecessor Sound Blaster Audigy Fx, which was already a bestseller in its own right, this sound card...

www.techpowerup.com

Sound Blaster Audigy Fx V2

The Sound Blaster Audigy Fx V2 delivers high-resolution 5.1 audio playback for your movies, music, and games. It also comes with audio enhancements and SmartComms Kit via Creative app.

us.creative.com

Edited for link change to U.S.

Can't find it for sale in my country....

I've been suggested an Asus Strix Soar through another resource.
It's not W11 supported now, but Asus is planning to release W11 drivers in a few months.

erpster4 · Dec 2, 2022

Yerm said:
I've been suggested an Asus Strix Soar through another resource.
It's not W11 supported now, but Asus is planning to release W11 drivers in a few months.

which Asus did NOT do so:

[Sound card] The card cannot output from headphone after the system is upgraded to Windows 11. Switching from Speaker to headphone output will show message and close the application. | Official Support | ASUS Global

At present, the following ASUS sound card models are still available for sale, the problem is already solved in Win11 22H2. Please help let the customer update to Win11 22H2 firstly, then visit the support site of audio card and install the latest audio driver(Win10), and retry.

Xonar SE / Xonar AE / Strix RAID DLX / Strix RAID PRO / Strix SOAR

after updating to win11 22h2, maybe uninstall the asus sound card drivers, reboot and re-install them

edit - although too little too late for this, the latest Sound Blaster Audigy FX (v1) {not V2} driver is 6.0.103.34 (not 6.0.103.30) from MUC.

Scott · Dec 2, 2022

Yerm said:
2) only 'hopefully work' with W11. I won't be trying them for fear of wrecking something.

They absolutely do work, as I use them with my SB X-Fi Titanium.

boombastik · May 11, 2023

I write it here for everyone.
The latest driver for fx and fxv2 is: DriverVer=01/16/2023, 6.0.105.0016 . (it work for both cards)
1)Install the drivers form creative.
2)Unzip the winrar file that i uploaded (i attached them in 4 parts so i can upload it here three parts 1 mb and fourth part 24 kb).
3) Go in device manager and update from the folder that you unzip first the sound blaster audigy fx device and the the sound blaster audio controller.
4) restart.

(the driver found in drvhub.net )
The driver is only x64 bit and work only in windows 10 and 11.

Yerm · Mar 1, 2024

boombastik said:
I write it here for everyone.
The latest driver for fx and fxv2 is: DriverVer=01/16/2023, 6.0.105.0016 . (it work for both cards)
1)Install the drivers form creative.
2)Unzip the winrar file that i uploaded (i attached them in 4 parts so i can upload it here three parts 1 mb and fourth part 24 kb).
3) Go in device manager and update from the folder that you unzip first the sound blaster audigy fx device and the the sound blaster audio controller.
4) restart.

(the driver found in drvhub.net )
The driver is only x64 bit and work only in windows 10 and 11.

Okay I'm a bit slow to respond here I see, but the issue persists until today. I've since disabled sleep mode but even when the screen goes dark (some sort of automatic standby mode in W11 that you cannot disable) it will still (50% of times) wreck my sound output needing either a hard reboot or simply disabling/enabling the soundblaster in the device manager (effectively power cycling it).

These drivers, where did they come from? I've been in contact with Creative Labs support since a month and they did all sorts of log analytics on data I had to provide after running certain procedures, and all they came back with was 'the problem is caused by W11 having APSM and we don't support that'. Bunch of nitwits, I had APSM disabled all the time this went on, they are just looking for an easy way to drop the ticket and stop caring.

The V2 card is now indeed available in my country BUT it's using the same ancient driver as the V1 card so what's the deal here and why should I repurchase a product that was working before but now fails because CL fails to provide new drivers??? Both V1 and V2 are claimed to be W11 compatible, but their driver is still from 2015 so how come you were able to source a 2023 one?

boombastik · Mar 1, 2024

This driver is for the fxv2 originally that it is installed from creative app (the control panel for fxv2) . But i found in the .inf that it support also the old fx card.
This is only the 2023 driver without the creative application, that why i say first install the 2015 driver that include also the creative fx application and then update from the device manager.

Even creative here : -https://support.creative.com/kb/ShowArticle.aspx?sid=200846&c
You can see in last picture they use the same driver for fxv2 and fx.
The only thing that change is the creative control panel. The driver is the same for both.
Here is mine in picture:

So they created the same new driver for fx and fxv2 but they updated only the fxv2. In their site for the fx they left and old driver form 2015. Don't ask me the reason.
You seem to have the 2015 driver installed so you need only the 3 and 4 steps.

P.S.
Also for the other users the daniel'k driver blog has drivers for x-fi and audigy chip sets from xp era(and audigy rx that in reality is an audigy 4 from 2004) that had hardware acceleration.

He don't provide a driver for the audigy fx that has a realtek chip set.

Yerm · Mar 1, 2024

boombastik said:
This driver is for the fxv2 originally that it is installed from creative app (the control panel for fxv2) . But i found in the .inf that it support also the old fx card.
This is only the 2023 driver without the creative application, that why i say first install the 2015 driver that include also the creative fx application and then update from the device manager.

Even creative here : -https://support.creative.com/kb/ShowArticle.aspx?sid=200846&c
You can see in last picture they use the same driver for fxv2 and fx.
The only thing that change is the creative control panel. The driver is the same for both.
Here is mine in picture:

View attachment 88786

So they created the same new driver for fx and fxv2 but they updated only the fxv2. In their site for the fx they left and old driver form 2015. Don't ask me the reason.
You seem to have the 2015 driver installed so you need only the 3 and 4 steps.

P.S.
Also for the other users the daniel'k driver blog has drivers for x-fi and audigy chip sets from xp era(and audigy rx that in reality is an audigy 4 from 2004) that had hardware acceleration.

He don't provide a driver for the audigy fx that has a realtek chip set.

Okay, I have installed the driver you provided in the manner suggested and for now everything is still working, so that's a good start. I will only be able to confirm that my issue has been eradicated once it stops failing upon standby so I will need a good couple of instances of standby kicking in to test that, but I'm already very grateful for you efforts and comments! Thanks for helping a stranger out :).

sdowney717 · Mar 3, 2024

Yerm said:
How well does it position? I would be kind of an investment to drop, replacing my brand new Z906 set, new cables, receiver... only to find out it doesn't fit my expectations. Surround is nice, but I want to be able to blindly point in a 360 degree direction where everything is coming from, and my current setup has always done that for me.

Also, I'm not yet ready to accept sound cards are a thing of the past. Gaming is bigger than ever.

If the game has 5.1 or 7.1 sound, it will work with a DD audio receiver, even an older receiver. I use an old Sony DD 5.1 receiver with no HDMI input. Cost me $25 used STR-K750P model. That model has COAX DD input and Toslink DD input.

It connects using a Toslink cable from a Smart TV. The Visio Smart TV sends digital audio out of the Toslink port. Visio smart TV also has an eARC port, which could send DD sound thru an HDMI cable to an HDMI input on a modern audio receiver-amplifier.

Although I would try to get your current sound setup working again

Yerm · Mar 13, 2024

Alas, my friends.... the new driver is working just like the old one. It functions great, but it did not solve the root issue and today, after a few calm weeks, it conked out on me again, although I did not consciously see it go into standby or anything this time (but I was working, so, didn't pay close attention).

I've been in contact with creative, and they claim the issue is to do with ASPM or Active State Power Management in W11 not being compatible with the chip on the card (or rather, the other way around) but I have APSM completely disable :-/ since earlier in my searches I already suspected this as a possible cause.

It is my suspicion that CL simply doesn't want to support the card anymore and is forcing older products into obsolescence to force consumers towards a new purchase, but I have little other recourse at this point and no more options to try (let alone prove my theory).

boombastik · Apr 11, 2024

@Yerm right click in device manager and unsistall sound blaster audigy fx first and then sound blaster audio conroller without ticking the remove drivers.
Then restart your machine and will re-detected.

Scott · Apr 12, 2024

Yerm said:
I'm open to any soundcard, price is not that much an issue. I just want a PCI-E based solution that offers 5.1 audio through 3.5mm jack plugs (for my Logitech Z906) and that has proper W11 support. Any advice?

I recently installed a Sound Blaster AE-5 Plus. It has proper Win 11 drivers that work with Memory Integrity turned on.
It has the features you're looking for, plus one optical output and even has What U Hear

I just put my computer to sleep for 5 minutes and when I woke it up all audio functions were still available.

If you do get one make sure you download the Sound Blaster Command software. It's feature rich and leaps and bounds
over older Sound Blaster software. Lots of reviews on the web, check them out.

https://support.creative.com/Products/ProductDetails.aspx

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