Sound for x64 + 4GB or more RAM

[sfxs]

Does anyone know of a card that works properly under x64 with 4GB RAM or more?

The entire creative line disables hardware buffering with 4GB or more (means no eax, etc).

I have heard that the Envy24 based cards also do not work correctly with 4GB or more.

-sfxs

[uOpt]

Well, depend on whether you insist on Windows :)

As long as you don't use their :banana::banana::banana::banana:ty drivers Creative cards are pretty nice.

[screwtech02]

Thats odd, ive got 4 gig, and a X-FI platnimum card, with no issues...:confused:

[sfxs]

That is very strange, as I have an X-Fi Platinum as well. Everything I read seems to indicate it does not work correctly for everyone.

Try this: run dxdiag -> sound tab -> sound test
After it is done with the software samples, it should tell you your card does not have hardware buffering (if you are having the same issues I am).

-sfxs

[Pyr0]

X-Fi XtremeMusic + 4GB working fine here on the BadAxe
just tried the dxdiag test, all sounds including hardware buffered played fine with no error messages

[sfxs]

Is that on 32 bit windows or x64, Pyr0? If it is x64 I am going to have to pick your brain :).

-sfxs

[tomb18]

Does anyone know of a card that works properly under x64 with 4GB RAM or more?

The entire creative line disables hardware buffering with 4GB or more (means no eax, etc).

I have heard that the Envy24 based cards also do not work correctly with 4GB or more.

-sfxs

Yea, I'm in the same boat. If you have 4 g of ram, then the board does not work correctly in XP64. DX Diag works but to really test it it need to use something like the THX console.
If you use this, you find on a 5.1 system that when you select the center channel, the sound actually comes out of the two fron channels and when you select a rear channel, the sound comes out from the fron channel as well.
In addition, any game that uses EAX has the option greyed out, as you can see in dxdiags...ie it says it is not supported.
It does not matter if you have software or hardware memory hole remapping enabled, it still does the same.
The only thing you can do when you are gaming is to put /maxmem=4096 in your boot.ini and then it will work correctly. Only problem then is that you end up with 2.75G ram in xp64:slapass:
I have heard that turning off memory remap works if you have more that 4G but you always lose 1.25G in that case.
The good news is that it works correctly under VistaX64.

[Pyr0]

Is that on 32 bit windows or x64, Pyr0? If it is x64 I am going to have to pick your brain :).

-sfxs
Doh! my bad, i mistakenly booted into xp32 when i tested earlier

i just booted into xp64 and unfortunately confirm dxdiag reports that the card does not support hardware buffering with 4x1GB installed :slapass:
i haven't tried all of the games i have yet, but BF2 and COD2 allowed EAX, but the options in FEAR are greyed out :( (also in vista64 too)

[tomb18]

yea!

Finally two people that confirm the problem I have had for the last 9 months!!
Creative knows about it, but as tech support said, " don't expect it to get fixed any time soon."
At least it's fixed in Vista 64

[screwtech02]

Thats odd, ive got 4 gig, and a X-FI platnimum card, with no issues...:confused:


I stand corrected, i just did the DX-Diag tests, and wow... NO hardware accell, what a big steaming CROC.....

So the os supports more than 4 gig, but Creative fails to impliment a driver for it.....:rolleyes:

Typical.....:mad:

[nn_step]

any Via Envy Card, I have used it in over two dozen operating systems and have absolutely ZERO problems with it.

[Pyr0]

At least it's fixed in Vista 64

in vista, the directsound hardware acceleration has been removed, meaning no EAX support

creativelabs has a project called Alchemy, which enables EAX in vista by using openal (still hardware accelerated)
it's still in beta at the moment, but the webpage is here:
http://preview.creativelabs.com/alchemy/default.aspx

[edit] it also works with 4x1gb installed

[nox_uk]

I'm assuming you are talking about XP here (with the 9 months comment)

I have XP Pro x64, and 4GB RAM, and a creative audigy 2 platinum eX, and a working slider bar in the sound tab thats set to 'full acceleration'

If thats what your problem is, the only thing I *may* of done differently is install the directx redistributable - needed it for vanguard beta.

Nox

[sfxs]

The slider is not the issue - even put all the way up at "Full Acceleration", the hardware buffering does not work. Try running the test (to right of slider).

-sfxs

[wanky]

damn this i just upgraded to 4g ram in xp x64 and noticed my rear speakers in games werent working. spent hours trying to get the friggin working then looked at everest and EAX and directsound3d were shown as unsupported! found this thread and went into bios and disabled memeory remap and now its all back. geez wouldnt think amount of ram could effect a sound card geez creative suck ass :mad: :mad: is there some solution since this last post?

[tiro_uspsss]

Yea, I'm in the same boat. If you have 4 g of ram, then the board does not work correctly in XP64. DX Diag works but to really test it it need to use something like the THX console.
If you use this, you find on a 5.1 system that when you select the center channel, the sound actually comes out of the two fron channels and when you select a rear channel, the sound comes out from the fron channel as well.
In addition, any game that uses EAX has the option greyed out, as you can see in dxdiags...ie it says it is not supported.
It does not matter if you have software or hardware memory hole remapping enabled, it still does the same.
The only thing you can do when you are gaming is to put /maxmem=4096 in your boot.ini and then it will work correctly. Only problem then is that you end up with 2.75G ram in xp64:slapass:
I have heard that turning off memory remap works if you have more that 4G but you always lose 1.25G in that case.
The good news is that it works correctly under VistaX64.

so if u do that it works?
my mobo *&* XP64 dont show me my full 4GB anyway... @ boot in does mem check thingy & shows ~ 3.4GB
& under R-click My Computer>Properties it says 3.25GB..
what does it do regarding overall performance, RAM usage etc etc?

[Donnie27]

Picks self up from the floor from laughing so hard.

any Via Envy Card, I have used it in over two dozen operating systems and have absolutely ZERO problems with it.

Any VIA Envy card he's used doesn't support ANY hardware Acceleration LOL!

4GBs of RAM with all four slots filled have always had problems since Day one with many Chipsets. That's why nVidia's boards would slow the RAM down from 3200 to 2700 and were still buggy. If features are shut down, the computer could be running in some type of "Compatibility Mode".

[Donnie27]

so if u do that it works?
my mobo *&* XP64 dont show me my full 4GB anyway... @ boot in does mem check thingy & shows ~ 3.4GB
& under R-click My Computer>Properties it says 3.25GB..
what does it do regarding overall performance, RAM usage etc etc?

If you installed total 4GB memory, the system will detect less than 4GB of total memory because of address space allocation for other critical functions, such as:

- System BIOS (including motherboard, add-on cards, etc..)
- Motherboards resources
- Memory mapped I/O
- configuration for AGP/PCI-Ex/PCI
- Other memory allocations for PCI devices

Different onboard devices and different add-on cards (devices) will result of different total memory size.
e.g. more PCI cards installed will require more memory resources, resulting of less memory free for other uses.

http://support.asus.com/faq/faq.aspx?SLanguage=en-us&model=P5P800

X-fi's without X-RAM will use 64MB of System RAM instead. SLI is the biggest Hog of all.

[swaaye]

Hey guys, I'm in the same boat here with 4 gigs of RAM and an Audigy 2. It's a real bummer because I really do prefer XP over Vista but miss 512 MB RAM in XP 32-bit.

I made a thread on their official forum, but they are just ignoring me. I keep pestering and bumping the thread though. :)
http://forums.creative.com/creativelabs/board/message?board.id=soundblaster&message.id=106432

[Donnie27]

Hey guys, I'm in the same boat here with 4 gigs of RAM and an Audigy 2. It's a real bummer because I really do prefer XP over Vista but miss 512 MB RAM in XP 32-bit.

I made a thread on their official forum, but they are just ignoring me. I keep pestering and bumping the thread though. :)
http://forums.creative.com/creativelabs/board/message?board.id=soundblaster&message.id=106432

That means your system has allocated Memory for Sound, Video, System I/O like Page File and etc.... Did you check out the link I posted?

[tiro_uspsss]

It does not matter if you have software or hardware memory hole remapping enabled, it still does the same.
The only thing you can do when you are gaming is to put /maxmem=4096 in your boot.ini and then it will work correctly. Only problem then is that you end up with 2.75G ram in xp64:slapass:

under R-click My Computer>Properties it says 3.25GB..

so i decided to do the maxmem thingy - seeing as my PC said it had 3.25GB RAM, i effectively lost 500MB - oh dam :p: I will 'test' & keep an eye on stability etc, but so far I dare say I dont mind losing 500MB RAM & gaining EAX etc :up: