Vista will support EAX in games after all

[vailr]

http://www.custompc.co.uk/custompc/news...ll-support-eax-in-games-after-all.html

our source at Creative Labs exclusively revealed to Custom PC that the company has developed a driver for its X-Fi range of sound cards that will allow for full hardware sound processing in all games, not only those that use OpenAL. The driver works by intercepting DirectSound 3D calls from the game code and converting them into OpenAL on the fly, before these calls reach the DirectX 10 API. By converting the calls to OpenAL, Creative circumvents the limitations of Windows Vista.

Creative told us that the driver is expected to be completed by December, a month before Windows Vista is due to launch, and will support all Creative X-Fi sound cards. However, older Audigy and Sound Blaster sound cards will not be supported initially, which means that the only way to get high-quality positional audio in Windows Vista is to buy an X-Fi.

 

[43st]

If so then it would also seem like a nice way to get around Vista's DRM restrictions, at least for audio.

 

[Brian48]

Originally posted by: 43st
If so then it would also seem like a nice way to get around Vista's DRM restrictions, at least for audio.

I'm sure MS would love to hear about that

 

[Nocturnal]

I'm sure Creative could care less since they were basically dicked into this by MS lol.

 

[gregor7777]

creative FTW

 

[Ichigo]

Forcing you to buy an X-Fi, didn't see THAT coming.

 

[Smartazz]

What a relief.

 

[MDE]

Why wouldn't this work for an Audigy 1\2\4? Oh well, someone will hack it to run on older Audigy cards sooner or later.

 

[stretchy pants]

this is awesome news. hopefully they do something about that X-Fi requirement.

 

[Brian48]

Originally posted by: MDE
Why wouldn't this work for an Audigy 1\2\4? Oh well, someone will hack it to run on older Audigy cards sooner or later.

From the article:

older Audigy and Sound Blaster sound cards will not be supported initially

It just means Audigy owners will have to wait a little longer, that's all. It only makes sense to allocate most of the development resources to the newer products. The entire industry follows this approach.

In any case, I'm sure the appropriate Vista drivers will be out soon enough. This is no different from when the market moved from Win9x>Win2k>WinXP. And despite what all the anti-Creative zealots will say, driver support from Creative has not been bad in recent years.

 

[WraithETC]

Well you can't knock creative for support for their stuff.

 

[The J]

Throughout the Vista beta stages, it seemed like the X-Fi got new drivers first and then the Audigy series would get drivers a few weeks later. I'd expect the same thing to happen here.

On the plus side, any bugs found in the new X-Fi drivers can be fixed before the new Audigy drivers are released.