My Computer Specs Are:
Intel Pentium 4 2.26GHz
512MB PC2700 DDR RAM
Abit BD711-RAID
Lite-On16x40x DVD-ROM
Lite-On 48x12x40 CD-RW
Asus GeForce4 Ti4400
Creative SoundBlaster Audigy Player
Creative Inspire 5300 5.1


Yesterday I installed my new Creative Inspire 5300 5.1 Surround Sound speakers which I bought. My friend, who has the same speakers, helped me connect all the wires and position sattelite speakers, etc.

I also bought a Creative SoundBlaster Audigy Player Sound Card OEM to match with the speakers.

First, I installed my sound card into a free PCI slot, and ran the driver and software installation CD for the sound card. The drivers and stuff installed with no errors. I then turned off the computer and connected the speakers to the sound card, and turned my computer back on. I thought that the installation of the speakers was successful because I heard the windows startup music.

My friend just wanted to check if all the speakers were working correctly, so he right-clicked the 'Creative Taskbar' on the taskbar, and clicked on 'Surround Mixer'. The Surround Mixer menu appeared, and he clicked on 'Speakers'. '4 Speakers' was selected at the time, but he changed it to '5.1 Speakers'. Then he clicked on 'Test' to test the speakers, and he said that it should call out the names of the speakers which are working properly.
It said 'Front left', missed out the center speaker, 'Front right', and missed out the rear speakers. This indicates that there is something wrong with the speakers or something. We looked at the sub-woofer connections and the connections to the sound card, and we noticed that everything was connected properly.

He then went to Start > Programs > Creative > Creative Sound Blaster Audigy > Creative Diagnostics 2. this checked if all the programs are working properly. All had a green tick next to them, except for SoundFont Settings and Surround Mixer Check, which had red X's next to them. We clicked on 'Begin Fix' but an error appeared which said 'Some files required by Creative Diagnostics 2 are missing or having problems. Please reinstall the software from your installation media.' We uninstalled all the software and reinstalled them, but it didnt fix the problem.

I went to the Creative SoundBlaster website and downloaded the latest drivers for my soundcard, but when I tried running the driver program, an error message came up saying that it couldn't detect a SoundBlaster Audigy Player sound card, and automatically exited.

My friend, who bought the same sound card and speakers a month or so before me, offered me to use his Installation CD. I tried running it, and then an error said that it could not detect a SoundBlaster Audigy Player sound card.


Oh, and one more thing. I know that all the satellite speakers are connected because when I switch on the power switch for the speakers, I hear a sound from all speakers.... so I don't think this is a hardware-related problem.

I'm very frustrated and want to fix this problem. I'm not much of expert, so all your help would be appreciated.

Thanks in advance,
Technix

For now the first thing to try would be to move the Soundcard to another PCI slot, try moving it up/down one & try reinstalling it then.
If you're wanting to check the speakers are ok just turn the volume up real loud, you should hear a hiss coming from each of them.
It's more than likely a soundcard issue though.

I moved the card to another PCI slot.... but there's no difference. I checked the card for bent pins, etc... but there4s nothing wrong. Do you think it's a faulty sound card? I think it's been used because when i opened it from it's OEM package, the screwhole had all screw marks around it, indicating that someone had used it before. What should i do?

if that is really what happened, and you think its been used, and its not working properly, then likely the shop has given back out a return. you should return it if possible and get your money back and then not shop there again because they are giving out goods that they suspect to be faulty just in case they turn out to work fine in someone else's machine. your card has likely been returned by someone else who failed to get it to work, and the shop is just chancing it with you.

Actually, I had the same speakers connected to a Sound Blaster Live! 5.1 Platinum, and I had the same problem...the center channel wasn't playing anything when I tested them through AudioHQ. I tried all the connections at the back and I found that I had the speakers hooked up wrong. Check the connections on the back again because when I carefully reconnected everything according to the manual and tried it again, everything worked.

Hey!

Today I went back to the store and got a replacement sound card, and it worked! It was a faulty sound card after all. Thanks for all of your help. It was very much appreciated.

Thanks,
Technix

Faulty soundcard? Damn. Least it's fixed though