Error initializing audio card

nitch blandly · Aug 19, 2004, 07:55 AM

OK, I'm going to have to ask for some help, as I'm totally stuck.

I had the kX drivers (v3534f) working fine on Win98SE. Then, after changing the motherboard and processor there was an error from kX saying I needed to reinstall the drivers. I've uninstalled all the old Creative and kX programs and drivers, rebooted into safe mode, removed all the Creative and kX devices from Device Manager, manually renamed all the relevant .inf files so that Windows can't find them, run Driver Cleaner for both Creative and kX drivers, and restarted into Windows 98.

Now it detects the sound card (a SB Live Platinum), but doesn't know what it is, and I cancel the dialogs. Then I install the kX programs and drivers (3534f). But it doesn't detect the sound card or game port as they haven't showed up in Device Manager. So I run Add New Hardware, tell it to check for new hardware, then cancel after it starts. This detects the sound card again. I press Next and tell it to look for new drivers - obviously it doesn't find them as they weren't installed, but now the devices show up in Device Manager under unknown PCI devices.

Now, installing the kX drivers (3534f) works fine, though says something like 'unable to install drivers, will try later' and has another go, which seems to be successful. So then I restart Windows, and get the familiar old 'Error initializing audio card' error - the card shows up as successfully installed in Device Manager, but there's nothing available for DirectSound to use.

Anyway, that was quite long, but basically I've tried everything and can't get past the 'Error initializing sound card' error. Does anyone have any ideas?

(as an aside, I've tried reinstalling the original Creative drivers, and they work fine, so it's probably not a problem with the card itself)

geraldandreas · Aug 19, 2004, 08:46 AM

i had nearly the same problem with 3538a and after reinstall also with 3537. i made an update to xp and it was never a problem, and the pc is also a bit faster. (with unneeded services switch off).

nitch blandly · Aug 19, 2004, 09:01 AM

XP's not an option here, unfortunately. Everything's too tweaked with Windows 98 to be worth the upgrade. This is just annoying because I know I got it to work after a similar problem before (on the old motherboard), but nothing seems to work this time. It's an Abit NF7-S, with the onboard sound disabled, if that's any help.

anykey · Aug 19, 2004, 03:38 PM

Hello, yes me too!
I am using win98SE. Tried installiing 3534f, then 3537, but both give me the Error initialising error message when I reboot (twice).

Also the Driver says it is enabled but inactive due to an unknown problem.

Before I started, I read all the instructions and removed the creative stuff first. Installed 3534f, and 3537. But still nothing works.

I want to listen to my music. Please tell me where I am going wrong

peate · Aug 19, 2004, 04:10 PM

Have you tried placing the card in a different pci slot? I've got 3538 installed on both Win98se and Win2k on the same PC, different HD's. Maybe I'm just lucky. I use the middle slot out of 5.

Pierre

nitch blandly · Aug 19, 2004, 05:08 PM

I've tried a couple of different PCI slots, but not all of them, and it didn't make any difference. The thing is that the card seems to be working fine, in Device Manager, but the kX at startup says that it can't initialize the card.

peate · Aug 19, 2004, 05:59 PM

What about the quick fix you're supposed to install before? Something about missing or invalid files, i don't know

Doug W · Aug 19, 2004, 09:49 PM

You've already got:

hardware acceleration set to full?
DirectX 8.0 or greater?
Internet Explorer 5.0 or greater?

nitch blandly · Aug 20, 2004, 01:42 AM

The WIn98SE quick fix is part of the full installer, as far as I can tell, so that doesn't seem to help.

I have hardware acceleration set to full, DirectX 9.0c, IE6: everything's up to date.

Doug W · Aug 21, 2004, 04:38 AM

Was this a fresh install of Win 98SE or did you reuse your hard drive with W98SE already installed on it?

nitch blandly · Aug 21, 2004, 04:39 AM

It's the original install of Win98SE.

Doug W · Aug 22, 2004, 09:12 AM

Don't suppose you have an old, spare hard drive laying around to experiment with-as in reformatting and trying a fresh install of 98SE and seeing if the card gets installed correctly that way?

nitch blandly · Aug 22, 2004, 12:02 PM

I might have an old drive around, but it'll be a bit tricky to do that at the moment. Like I said before, though, I had this sound card and hard drive working with the kX drivers before, so I expect a fresh install would work as well. It was after changing the motherboard that something started to conflict, I think, and I can't figure out what it might be to get rid of it, especially as the Creative drivers are working normally now.