I installed windows XP pro for the first time yesterday and I'm experiencing problems with my: "Sound Blaster Live! Player 1024" sound card (and my "Desktop Theater 5.1 DTT2500 Digital" Cambridge soundworks" speakers). Either the 2 front speakers work or the 2 speakers in the back work. With the old drivers that were in the XP pro OS the front speakers seem to work. When I tried upgrading with a driver from the creative homepage (SBLiveDrvUni-Pack(ENG)) the speakers in the back were the only ones that worked. I tried deleting the SB Live! from the hardware device list in "control panel/system", and rebooted to get a clean driver installation. When it booted and the "lightning" sound came it started in the front speakers switched over to the back speakers and back again. As if it was some twisted kind of stereo. Afterwards it just continued using the front speakers. Of course I also tried switching the speaker setup in the control panel but none of it worked any of the times (I usually use the Quad setup since it works best with games). It's a pretty boring experience using a computer, especially games, with "stereo" sound when you're used to surround. I hope you can help me! :)

Hmmm... I just tried doing the "DirectSound" thing in WinAmp that somebody said would activate all speakers, and it did! At least for WinAmp. When I checked "allow hardware acceleration" they all played, when it wasn't checked only the front speakers played. It was the same thing when I did a "Dxdiag" (Direct X Diagnostics) when I tested DirectSound it played sounds with the "software buffer" first and only the 2 front speakers worked. When the "hardware buffer" was activated they all played. I don't know how to force "hardware acceleration" as default but it seems to be a step in the right direction :) BTW... after I'd made all 4 (of 5, since I use the quad setup) play with winamp and I rebooted, they all made sounds. I don't know if this has got anything to do with it, since I did this at the same time as the winamp thing, but I used windows update to download a creative driver, from the "drivers" folder on the M$ site. Feel free to give some input if you have some knowledge, even though I got halfway through the problem :)

I found the solution. As it's often the case a part of the error sat 20 inches from the monitor. The sound driver I'd downloaded was really an update - for the sound driver I was supposed to download. It didn't show VERY clearly on the driver download page, but it was there. I was simply blinded by the newer date of the "driver" and I downloaded the wrong one, which caused the problem where only the speakers in the back worked. Windows own sound blaster live! drivers didn't work properly either so only if you by some luck used a game/program (like winAmp) that supported Direct Sound could you use all speakers. But with the new driver everything runs smoothly. WHAT A RELIEF! :)