When I discovered this post, it became fairly apparent that Creative has completely screwed themselves. Not with their market share, as the rumblings on the Internet will not have as much impact as those angry about the driver issue might like. But with the potential of a class action law suit as they have quite frankly not lived up to their advertising claims and have shown no interest in providing a driver for a sound card that provides the level of functionality claimed by them as a company. Not an IP expert or even that well versed in consumer law, but here is how I see the Vista/Creative issue.

Microsoft provides the specs Creative needs to create a competent driver for the Vista OS. To date, based on every bit of review information I have been able to turn up, Creative has yet to live up to their advertised features for their sound card. Now read this closely:

Daniel_K:

We are aware that you have been assisting owners of our Creative sound cards for some time now, by providing unofficial driver packages for Vista that deliver more of the original functionality that was found in the equivalent XP packages for those sound cards. In principle we don’t have a problem with you helping users in this way, so long as they understand that any driver packages you supply are not supported by Creative. Where we do have a problem is when technology and IP owned by Creative or other companies that Creative has licensed from, are made to run on other products for which they are not intended. We took action to remove your thread because, like you, Creative and its technology partners think it is only fair to be compensated for goods and services. The difference in this case is that we own the rights to the materials that you are distributing. By enabling our technology and IP to run on sound cards for which it was not originally offered or intended, you are in effect, stealing our goods. When you solicit donations for providing packages like this, you are profiting from something that you do not own. If we choose to develop and provide host-based processing features with certain sound cards and not others, that is a business decision that only we have the right to make.

Do you see it? I am only speculating here, but it sounds like old Creative driver code was reworked to get things running with the problem card better in Vista. Awesome, right? Not exactly. See, despite this be AMAZINGLY stupid on Creative’s part, they may be well within their rights from the angle of the code used from a driver, which may potentially be of their own creation. Now had this been completely non-IP secured, clean coded driver that was used, I do not believe that this entire mess would have ever started in the first place. Correct me here, as I am left reading between the lines.

So here is where Creative really irked their users - we are not talking about altering a software program per se, potentially putting a trademark or patent at risk - we are talking about a freaking driver copyright. So in the end, Creative is likely (again, speculating here) defending the integrity of a now dated driver, designed to make the card work on XP or an older version of Windows.

On what planet does this possibly make a lick of sense? Ah, this is where the community is not fully understanding how corporations work. The problem is the myth that a corporation is designed to make their customers happy. In reality, this is a targeted byproduct while ensuring that the entity is making a profit. At its core, I have no issue with that. So long as the products sold to me work as advertised for any expressed length of time disclosed to me, I am a happy camper. So suffice it to say that Creative and other hardware vendors cannot rely on your hardware “eventually” wearing out due to age and stress of use. Could you imagine gum that lasts for years or cars that never wore out? Awesome for the consumer, terrible for affected industries that have cemented themselves into a business model that relies on you to buying their products more frequently. But it seems Creative has overstepped this with the “Ready for Vista” claim that has been backed up at a level, that is not living up to the specs of the problem sound card.

I have an old saying I like - the market takes care of its own. Whether Creative has its walking papers handed to them or not will not be up to me, a non-customer. It will be up to you and among others to decide where to stand on the issue I described above. Speaking for myself, I have found that sound cards are hardly a monopoly. From the integrated options to PCI alternatives coming from Turtle Beach, the end user has a choice. And while ethically, Creative would have been much better off finding a less black or while solution to the driver issue, it is not difficult to see why they would be so defensive about a driver, once you understand the profit centers for an ailing hardware company. I fully believe they feel it is just better for their users to either make do, or instead buy whatever newer alternative is just around the bend from this company.