[ADD]

I have noticed a very strange thing with Windows Vista. I have noted this phenomenon with two completely different machines (both using pretty up to date hardware), Vista 32 bit and Vista 64 bit, as well as four different soundcards (two Creative based and two ASUS - the latter being the original PCI Xonar and my current card - Essence).

The problem is that at random times, the left and right channels suddenly swap - by that I mean that any balance controls and level controls still change their relevant channels, but that the actual music content itself swaps channels. So if you are listening to a symphony for example, all of a sudden in the middle of a movement the first violins will go into the right channel and the cellos into the left channel. When this happens, there is very brief stutter or "dropout" sort of sound that lasts a few milliseconds immediately preceding the channel swapping.

I have never been able to put a definite finger on what triggers this, but it seems more likely to occur if the computer has not been booted for a while and Windows Media Player in addition to an external source (i.e line input) has been used during that session. That does not guarantee it will happen, but it seems to be characteristic when it does.

As I say, very wierd, and the only common factor is Windows Vista and obviously the way I must be using these soundcards.

 

[obobskivich]

I would be surprised, or inclined to try and troubleshoot or understand this

excepting that we're talking about Windows Vista, where the concepts of "software engineering" and "logical design" aren't really applicable, and magical fairy unicorns tell the gremlins what to do while reason sits on the sidelines and asks "why god why?"

:-/
I would say, time to switch OSes (and notice how I'm not suggesting any OS, yet I will almost certainly be flamed as either "an apple fanboy", "a windowsXP fanboy" or "one of those weird linux types"

)

 

[fjf]

Quote:

Originally Posted by obobskivich /img/forum/go_quote.gif I would be surprised, or inclined to try and troubleshoot or understand this excepting that we're talking about Windows Vista, where the concepts of "software engineering" and "logical design" aren't really applicable, and magical fairy unicorns tell the gremlins what to do while reason sits on the sidelines and asks "why god why?" :-/ I would say, time to switch OSes (and notice how I'm not suggesting any OS, yet I will almost certainly be flamed as either "an apple fanboy", "a windowsXP fanboy" or "one of those weird linux types" )

X2

 

[krosenqu]

Quote:

Originally Posted by obobskivich /img/forum/go_quote.gif I would be surprised, or inclined to try and troubleshoot or understand this excepting that we're talking about Windows Vista, where the concepts of "software engineering" and "logical design" aren't really applicable, and magical fairy unicorns tell the gremlins what to do while reason sits on the sidelines and asks "why god why?" :-/ I would say, time to switch OSes (and notice how I'm not suggesting any OS, yet I will almost certainly be flamed as either "an apple fanboy", "a windowsXP fanboy" or "one of those weird linux types" )

x3

 

[Stoin]

I know that creative did have to do some kind of workaround (Alchemy) for their cards to use EAX under Vista. It could be worth checking out if this is giving you problems. Without knowing a bit more about your systems it's very hard to say - are the systems using both Creative and Asus soundcards, is there any audio manager software installed besides the one that comes with Vista.

As far as Vista goes it is the first MS product since DOS that I've actually enjoyed using. The only time it has crashed on me was when I had a stuck fan on a graphics card which caused the card to overheat and behave strangely. I always build or upgrade a computer specifically for the OS because I think it is such an important part of the system. Not to say that Vista is the best, 'nix is great if you have a specific use, but in my own experience it is the best general purpose OS released so far (a lot of the programs I use don't support Apple so I have limited experience with Apple computers).