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Hissing while using headphones.

T

TheNuker

Limp Gawd
Joined
Feb 12, 2001
Messages
398
Hello, I have a problem that I'm unable to solve with my SoundBlaster Live.

It's a Sb-Live X-Gamer (the 4.1 version but with golden connectors). Whenever I use my headphones (Philips SBC HP800) I hear a constant hiss noise even with no audio being played, sort of a electrical static noise. I get no crackling nor popping though, even playing games. If I use my 2.1 speaker setup connected to the line-out of the card, there's still hiss but it's so quiet I can hardly notice it.

Another strange thing is that it only occurs using Creative Drivers. If I use the KxDrivers i get no hissing at all, but since it lacks EAX support some games don't sound very well and Creative drivers are my best choice. Also, if I use my onboard audio codec (the ALC850) there's no hissing on the headphones, but the audio quality just can't match my old SbLive.

Things I have done:
Muted all inputs;
Tried different PCI slot;
Tried on both Win2k and XP with no success;
Tried the official creative driver and the YouP-PaX drivers, but both give me the same problem( but remember, the KxDrivers don't give any hiss);

Also if I turn the Master Volume all the way down, there's still the same hiss as if I turn it all the way up, it doesn't change, but if I hit the mute button on the master volume only!!! it vanishes. And before windows starts up there's also no hissing, so it seens it's tied to the drivers, but I just can't find a solution for it.

Does anyone have a clue on what I could do to solve it? Thanks in advance.
 
Have you tried connecting the headphones to another audio source? It could be a problem with the headphones themselves.
 
Try muting your mic input. Generally that gets rid of 90% of the noise. Other stuff to look into includes muting the analog cd in. If you still can't stand it, there isn't much else you can do except for buying a newer creative sound card. The audigy will have less hissing noise, and the X-fi will have even less.
 
Ok thanks, but I would like you people to read what I said before replying.
 
Use non creative drivers. Honestly, if that's what gets rid of it, then you sorta have no choice. I'd really doubt creative still makes new drivers for the SB Live cards.
 
It is a limitation of the SNR of your SB Live! card. Some drivers mask the problem by turning down the gain levels, or turning the card completely off if the signal levels are below a certain point. You might be able to find some decent drivers that would find you the balance between the hissing sound and the intermittent sounds when at low volume levels. I had this problem with an old SB Live! and an Audigy card. The very original first release drivers had a hissing sound at low levels. Other newer, alternative, and softmod drivers might have eliminated the hissing noise, but I also found that at very low volume levels, the sound was intermittent and the only way to get the sound back was to turn the volume up again. This tells me that the drivers were supposed to be for a better card with a better SNR ratio, but since this card's SNR ratio wasn't quite as high, the software would cut off the sound at audible level.

Personally, I think messing around with so many Creative drivers is a recipe for disaster. Their drivers aren't known for being robust, and many times if I had weird intermittent sounds, the only way to fix that was to seriously format and reinstall to the first issue drivers. While I don't think that buying their new product to fix persistent issues is the correct way to award them, I also see little if any options. If it is of any consolation to you, the newer cards seem to have less problems than the older ones. My current X-fi Xtrememusic has been fine, even with a few driver updates. It's the older Xtrememusic version without the heatsink if that's important for you.
 
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