Hey guys, so I finally got around to installing Windows 8.1 on my main rig and I'm actually enjoying it apart from a few silly issues. I have my sound card hooked up to my surround sound receiver via optical which had no issues in Windows 7, but in Windows 8 I can't click the configure button to set it to 5.1 yet when I go chose the default speakers option I was able to set it to 5.1? I have all the drivers for my Creative Soundblaster X-fi Titanium installed and everything set up the exact way I had done before. Any help at all is greatly appreciated! Thanks, Luke.
Ouch dude, Creative... Creative removes features on new drivers saying it's Windows fault, when nothing was touched by Microsoft, so that you buy their new product. The trick is to force Windows 7 drivers, and not 8. Or try alternative drivers which unlocks these limitations, and Creative tries everything it could to shut them down a few years back. http://www.hardwareheaven.com/community/forums/pax-drivers.174/ That is what I had to do, with my X-Fi that used to have. I got fed up one day, and decided to go with ASUS Xonar series. Never looked back. Even had drivers when Windows 8 was in Beta. I am not going to say that the drivers are perfect, but they are at least solid and does the job, and so far, has decent support.
Thanks for the reply GoodBytes! Its a tricky one as im not to sure if it is actually the creative drivers or Windows 8.1.. ive never had such a silly problem take so long to fix lol. Had a look at the Xonar's would love to get one at a later date, but until I have the funds im going to have to get this working somehow
I wish I could be more helpful to be honest, but I have just an internal sound card, and a pair of headphone and speakers, and not the nice setup you have. So I cant' confirm if it's a Windows 8.1 issue or not. Maybe someone else can help here. Hopefully, you can get a yes or no from someone. Yea.. I was stuck with my X-Fi with serious issues with Windows 7 for over a year, while I collect the funds to get an Xonar. It's hard to justify such an expense, for little in return beside a, hopefully, better support. Again, try the alternate drivers, I had great success on my side when I had my X-Fi.
Just downloaded the latest modified drivers from the site you linked above im going to give them an install now and will report back
TBH i wouldn't use the PAX drivers, most people say they are nothing more than glorified presets with a load of pseudo .ini & registry setting that do nothing. If i was having problems i would try the support pack done by Daniel Kawakami that has just recently been updated to the SB X-Fi Series Support Pack 3.0
Hey man thanks for the comment, i didn't have any luck with the PAX driers either, currently in work but I will have to have a look at the support pack when I get home I just want the grey configure box to be clickable god dammit EDIT: The cards model number is - SB0880 just in case that helps with anything...
Just a thought as i don't use SPDIF myself but is the X-Fi able to output anything other than stereo via SPDIF ? I thought you needed to use (register) the DTS or Dolby Digital encoding to enable 5.1 over optical.
I didn't instal creative drivers for my titanium hd. I just use the generic microsoft high definition audio device driver which works great for me. It doesn't have a bunch of the extra features, but I didn't use any of those anyway so it doesn't matter. What does matter is that it always works correctly and I haven't had any random crashes caused by audio, poor creative drivers.
