X-Fi and Vista - Static/crackling/Bluescreen

[Minmaster]

ok i fired up 2142 on my new vista PC and I am getting very bad crackling near orbital strikes and sometimes it blue screens with the ha20x2k.sys error.

i have x-fi xtreme gamer and 8800 GT. is x-fi not supported in vista? i tried with and without alchemy and same results. hardware and x-fi mode both tried with high and ultra both producing same problems.

anyone have this issue and solve it?

[Kradath]

Re: X-Fi and Vista - Static/crackling/Bluescreen

The Battlefield games don't require alchemy. Have you installed the newest creative driver? It helped many people with their crackling.

Be sure to remove EVERY remains of the old driver first before installing the new one.

[Minmaster]

Re: X-Fi and Vista - Static/crackling/Bluescreen

yea tried the latest creative drivers as well as beta drivers. i have to force it to hardware mode to play w/o the crackling. bf2 works just fine on x-fi mode, its only 2142... damn

[hellR1de]

Re: X-Fi and Vista - Static/crackling/Bluescreen

Min, Are you running Vista 64bit? I'm also running on Vista (64bit) and I've noticed some bad noise during map loads, although it only happens the first time after starting the game. The game also crashes sometimes, because of a looping sound it seems. That may have something to do with my highly overclocked system though, but I'm not sure. :) Because I've only played titan mode since I built my new rig, I don't know about sound problems near orbital strikes, but I'll try that tonight and let you know...

[Minmaster]

Re: X-Fi and Vista - Static/crackling/Bluescreen

no i'm on 32bit vista. no noises during mapload, just during orbital strikes.

[hellR1de]

Re: X-Fi and Vista - Static/crackling/Bluescreen

OK, I've tried it several times (looking silly while running through orbital strikes :)) and I don't have that issue. You said you have the latest driver? That would be the 2.18. I immediately installed that one on my first Vista install and I had problems. I found that the correct sequence for me was to start with the Creative CD, then the 2.15 driver. It's not the latest but 2.18 apparently only fixes a live Dolby Digital issue, so that's no concern to us. You might wanna try that, but you'll need something like Driver Cleaner Pro to correctly remove your current driver.

[Minmaster]

Re: X-Fi and Vista - Static/crackling/Bluescreen

well the only game that has this issue is bf2142 so i'll just keep it hardware setting and leave the drivers alone. plus i doubt that fixes it, if it did, i would've found that answer while i was googling it. i did find a lot of people have this same issue. not sure but i think majority have nvidia too.

btw, i have heard of people installing the ha20ksys file from the CD first then updating. why the CD first?

ok, i tried your method of CD, then 1.5 and stopping there. the sound distortion is still there and it goes even crazier than with 1.8, but amazingly, i don't crash blue screen with ha20x2k.sys error. still i have to use hardware because sound is all fubar'd.

[hellR1de]

Re: X-Fi and Vista - Static/crackling/Bluescreen

btw, i have heard of people installing the ha20ksys file from the CD first then updating. why the CD first?

Well, one reason is because you can install different componentsthat are not available when installing only what you can get from Creative's website. Second, because for me, I wasn't able to get any sound at all by installing 2.18 directly.

Finally, sorry that it didn't fix your problem entirely but at least you don't end up with BSODs... :|:

[Erock2142]

Re: X-Fi and Vista - Static/crackling/Bluescreen

Hi Minmaster....
No need to mess around any longer!
Just turn down the volume! Open the volume control and move the slider to less than half way....
I needed to set mine at about 40%.... If it's higher... the sounds are very distorted...causing crackling etc....

My xFi works super now....