Vista vs SB Live, Again (CTHelper problems) \ VOGONS

Vista vs SB Live, Again (CTHelper problems)

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First post, by Jorpho

Posted on 2010-12-11, 23:10

Jorpho Offline

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Having neglected the Windows Vista Home Basic (32-bit) installation on my hard drive for a few years, I decided to take another poke at it today. That's when I found out there were no official Creative drivers, period, for my Sound Blaster Live (SB0060).

A great deal of searching around eventually turned up "SB_Live_Naimad_Mod_LB_2_15_0002.zip", apparently based on the X-Fi drivers. Trying to run the Setup program inside the zip eventually brings up a message advising me to please upgrade to Windows Vista. However, using Update Driver from Device Manager and directing it to the folder where the files are unzipped has resulted in a functional sound card.

The only problems are that when I first log in after restarting (and oy, have I had to do a lot of restarting today), I get a window for a "ReadReg MFC Application" accompanied by a "Not Responding" dialog. I have to press Ctrl-Alt-Del to log off even after I force the application to quit. Afterwards, when I log on, I get a similar message stating that CtHelper.exe has stopped responding.

The first thing I did was reach for Autoruns from Sysinternals.com, and I used it to disable CtHelper.exe and CtXfiHlp.exe in Windows Startup. Unfortunately, they keep coming back! Clearly one of the sixteen Creative services is responsible - but which one?

Reply 1 of 7, by Zup

Posted on 2010-12-11, 23:33

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I suffered creative drivers for a long time (Windows XP), and my troubles went away when I started using the kX Project drivers.

I don't know if they work in Vista 32, and they lack some gaming oriented features, but they may work for you.

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Reply 2 of 7, by Jorpho

Posted on 2010-12-11, 23:48

Jorpho Offline

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Gee, I thought they were discontinued. That's one possibility, I suppose - but as there's no convenient "undo" option for this driver installation I attempted, changing the driver probably won't solve this CTHelper problem.

Reply 3 of 7, by Zup

Posted on 2010-12-12, 22:52

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They're discontinued, but they still work. I think Creative drivers are discontinued, too.

The problem with creative drivers is that they throw too much garbage at your system. Why do they need some service to work?

KX drivers install only their sound drivers, without any service. I supose that it may be possible to install the vanilla Creative drivers, without services... but I didn't find the way.

BTW, installing KX drivers means uninstalling any Creative drivers and programs, and installing KX drivers after that.

I have traveled across the universe and through the years to find Her.
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I'm selling some stuff!

Reply 4 of 7, by Tetrium

Posted on 2010-12-12, 22:57

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Yup, SB Live!'s aren't officially supported...so everyone's selling them dirt cheap now, so go get 'em! ;D

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Reply 5 of 7, by Jorpho

Posted on 2010-12-12, 23:44

Jorpho Offline

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Zup wrote:
BTW, installing KX drivers means uninstalling any Creative drivers and programs

Yes, yes, fine. But how do you do that? As I said, I didn't use the Setup program!

Reply 6 of 7, by swaaye

Posted on 2010-12-13, 00:56

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In Vista and 7 can't you just go into device manager, uninstall the driver and check that "delete files" box?

BTW you may have sound quality problems with the kx drivers in Vista/7. I had some audio distortion. I think I actually ended up using the AC3 output even for regular analog output.
http://www.hardwareheaven.com/general-discuss … s-7-64-bit.html

Reply 7 of 7, by Jorpho

Posted on 2010-12-15, 06:13

Jorpho Offline

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All right, that appeared to work. And I got the kX drivers installed and apparently working. (The UI is pretty terrible.)

So far so good. All I've really tested is ZSNES for Windows, which had heavy distortion with the old drivers, but seems to work now.

Now to see if I can run the Just Cause 2 demo...

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