Windows 7 and Sound Blaster Live! cards

Ran into my first problem with Windows 7 right after the initial install. No sound. Nada. Zippo. Silencio.

Turns out that Creative - the company that mfg. the soundcard - doesn't have drivers for the Sound Blaster Live! under Vista or Windows 7. Probably want you to spend money on a new soundcard instead :P

But a bit of Googling revealed the somewhat tedious workaround.

1. Goto Creative's support website and download the WinXP driver for the Sound Blaster Live! The filename is LiveDrvUni-Pack(ENG).exe


2. Before you run the file, right-click on it and choose "Troubleshoot compatibility." Then select "Troubleshoot program."


3. Select "Program worked in earlier versions of Windows..." and click "Next."


4. Select "Windows XP (SP2)" and click "Next."


5. Select "Start the program" and click "Next."


6. Select "Yes to save" and click "close."

Now the driver install program will successfully run, and when you restart - you should have sound. Yes, all that work because Creative got greedy and decided they'd try to force you to buy a new soundcard ;)

Update: There is also an independent project to write a WDM-type driver which supports the Live! and any, other EMU10K1 and EMU10K2-based soundcard - the kX Project. Word has it that this requires some tweaking once installed, but they do list Windows 7 as a supported OS.

QotD for 13 Nov., 2009

The megachurches are mall-like villages or gated communities with Wednesday nite karaoke and movies and Sunday 'prosperity gospel'. Faith is not between you and God, it's 'your team' and flag and get out of jail free card; virtue is a concept, not practice; sacrifice is for chumps and "I'm a special case, with extenuating circumstances, but I'm still a good person cuz I say the right things about God and Country and you don't." ---Mark Brady, in a comment on Bob Carlton's Facebook

Lord 'o mercy, but I do love a good, righteous rant. Amen.

Great Deal on a Macbook

If you know anyone in the market for Apple's least expensive Macbook, Microcenter is running a rebate deal until 11/15/09 that gets you $200 off list price ($799 after rebate - the form is in a link to a PDF file at the bottom of the page)

The rebate is a $200 Visa giftcard - usable anywhere that takes Visa, but can't be converted to cash at an ATM. I've got a slightly older version of this laptop and it's a perfectly pleasant, usable machine.

Pass the word around to anyone you know who might be interested...

QotD for 30 Oct., 2009

“I would love to change the world, but they won’t give me the source code.” ---Jesper Rønn-Jensen

I should know better...

::sigh:: Yes, I should know better, but I got into an argument with an extreme right-winger over in the comment section of someone's Facebook page about the Matthew Shepard Act.

It's just that the disdain positively dripped off of this woman's comments. And every comment of her's was a piece of misinformation lifted straight out of a list of Fox News / Glenn Beck talking points. How Judy Shepard manages to encounter this garbage all the time after losing her son and stay sane & rational is beyond me.

I swear, it's like trying to argue with a Holocaust denier...

QotD for 21 Oct., 2009

Anglicanism: Offering personal ordinariates for disaffected Roman Catholics since 1549. ---the Rev. Jan Nunley

So Tired of This Nonsense...

I can't even begin to describe how sick and tired I am of the personal nastiness being directed at the office of the President of the U.S. Just this morning I was subjected to photos on someone's iPhone of a black, dept. store manikin, dressed up in hospital scrubs, being abused next to a sign about "Obama care." This guy thought it was the most hilarious thing he'd ever seen and couldn't wait to show it around to everyone. Not only completely disrespectful of our President, but absolute racist crap to boot, and nobody around here said a damn thing about it.

Or how about the posts of several "friends of a friend" on Facebook who were going off about how Pres. Obama is trying to DESTROY THE CONSTITUTION (their caps, not mine) because he, wait for it... plans to accept the Nobel Prize.

Welcome to good, old patriotic Texas. We hope you enjoy your stay... :P