Audigy cards "won't work" for surround sound gaming in Vista

Creative has confirmed that its new Alchemy application, which enables surround sound in Vista, won't work with its popular Audigy line of sound cards, following complaints from unhappy customers.

Disgruntled users have complained in Creative's forums that the company is only supporting its high end X-Fi cards and not its Audigy cards, which are still being manufactured and sold.

Creative released Alchemy after Microsoft removed the hardware abstraction layer (HAL) from Windows Vista. It means popular games such as World of Warcraft and F.E.A.R., which use DirectSound3D, will no longer support surround sound or use environmental effects, dubbed EAX.

While many users are unhappy that Microsoft has removed the hardware abstraction layer - which is rumoured to be down to stability problems - others feel Creative should ensure surround support for its Audigy cards through the Alchemy project.

Neil Mcguinness, IT product manager from Creative, confirmed that Audigy sound cards "currently won't work" in surround sound when playing games, but denied the company is only supporting X-Fi kit to force Audigy card owners to upgrade.

"It's about resources; as soon as we found out about this issue we started to work on it. We're not big enough to have a big software development team to work on all of our products," said Mcguiness.

Asked if Creative would make the product open source, Mcguinness offered some hope: "It is closed at the moment. It's a very good point – will it be open? On e way or another this code will be open quite soon – whether we release it or someone cracks it."

Creative says it does not know why Microsoft's axed the hardware abstraction layer, although in the forum community it is generally believed to be down to lack of stability. Mcguinness couldn't clarify Microsoft's reasoning, commenting: "We're in the dark as much as any one else."

As previously reported, Alchemy converts DirectSound3D into OpenAL, which is present on X-Fi and Audigy cards. OpenAL is a major standard replacing DirectSound3D and recent games, such as Battlefield 2042, only use OpenAL for surround sound and environmental effects in games.

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