Creative offers workaround for Vista gaming sound

[Anusha]

SOUND FIRM Creative said it is offering a software application which will help gamers get round Microsoft's decision to remove the hardware abstraction layer for Vista. The app, called Alchemy, is or will be available on the Creative web site in the next hour or two. The absence of a hardware abstraction level means that Alchemy will detect what Direct Sound games you have, and bypass Vista so you will be able to get the most out of your games. No abstraction layer will also as a by-product affect people relying on Digital Dolby encoding.

Neil McGuinness, product manager at Creative said that his firm had been pushing Open AL and some of the premier titles have adopted it, but that's only a tiny percentage of the available games.

View: The full story (http://www.theinquirer.net/default.aspx?article=37109)

[zerocool]

thanks for the info...

btw there is a project called KX

The kX Project is an independent development project, focused on providing free WDM Audio Drivers for kX-Compatible sound cards.

The kX Audio Driver is an independent WDM (Windows Driver Model) driver for all EMU10K1 and EMU10K2-based soundcards manufactured by Creative Technology Ltd. and/or E-mu Systems Inc., including the SoundBlaster Live! series, the E-mu Audio Production Studio (APS) card, and the Audigy / Audigy2 series of cards. (Full List) (http://kxproject.lugosoft.com/faq.php?language=en#cards).

I'm using this for my SB Live! 5.1 Card with Windows XP for a long time and it is better than the normal SB Live drivers....:yes: :yes: :yes: :yes: :yes:

[Anusha]

But the problem in Vista is that you can't use hardware acceleration (normally)