Daniel_K, Creative's Public Enemy No. 1, Speaks
Rob Beschizza has published a long email from Daniel_K, the Brazilian hacker who got thumped by Creative over the weekend for soliciting donations for the work he'd done to make Creative's sound card drivers actually work in Windows Vista.
Creative purposedly modified the Audigy drivers to disable some features when Vista is detected and also purposedly introduced some bugs to prevent some XP utilities from running.
I did a complete analysis of the driver to determine where all the checks and bugs were introduced and started modding.
Features that I've successfully enabled:
- Dolby/DTS decoding (originally discovered by another Creative forum member, but I've explained how to use it)
- CMSS, CMSS2 and Stereo Surround (originally only "CMSS" was available, this setting also affects ALchemy/OpenAL, so it is really useful)
- Advanced EQ and Special FX presets
- DVD Audio
- Hardware MIDI synthetizer (I wrote a small utility that automatically detects and changes the default Vista MIDI Synth during driver install or can change it later using its GUI. Some media players lets you choose the MIDI synthesizer)
- Equalizer (with preset saving, very hard to accomplish, had to deal with bugs in Creative software and use my creativity to find a workaround).
- WaveRT (a Microsoft replacement for ASIO, however I don't know if it really works or not)...
To date, I've got $146, with amounts ranging from $1 to $50 (this value is still uncleared).
Reversing ALchemy was also wrong, I know. But I reiterate, what is the point of improving ALchemy and changing for it, when it requires an improved driver? It was my protest against Creative.
Daniel_K, Who Fixed Creative's Broken Vista Drivers, Speaks Out [Gadget Lab]
Previously • Creative Stops Hacker from Improving Their Product [BBG]
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Well, he seems like a good guy. I like that he explained himself so well and owned up to his mistakes. I won't hold my breath waiting for Creative to do the same.
Yeah, when a company admits that they have been deliberately crippling functionality on products that people have already purchased?!
Well, Sony issues an apology for the root kit, so maybe Creative will come to their senses. Though I'm not holding my breath either.
Sony only issued an apology for the root kit after a massive libel case.
I imagine that the same is not applicable here.
I've been less than impressed by Creative for years, with crappy drivers and poor hardware quality control being my main gripe - this just completes the circle of "why?!" in my mind. I'm done with them as a vendor, I'll take my cash elsewhere.