Sunday, June 8th 2008
Creative Software Modder Daniel_K Gone for Good
Driver modder Daniel Kawakami or better known as Creative's Daniel_K is backing off his deal with providing modded software for all Creative sound cards for free. After receiving second warning mail from Creative threatening him with legal actions, he is finally "gone for good". He has posted a message over at the Creative forums informing everyone for his decission. Leave your thoughts here, and tell us what do you think.
Source:
Creative Forums
Daniel KawakamiI've received another cease and desist e-mail.
I'm done with Creative, enough is enough.
Don't even bother asking me for the files.
126 Comments on Creative Software Modder Daniel_K Gone for Good
I hate to say it. GOOD!. I have always bought Creative top of the line cards. all the way back to the original Soundblaster. I have a X-FI Elite pro in this box and I was happy with it in XP, well I was happy after a year or so when they released a driver that actually worked with multi-core processors. Then Vista came and it made my $400 sound card suck again. Creative had PLENTY of time to write and test drivers LONG before Vista was RTM. The Driver Model was firm nearly a year before RTM.
Creative has always released awesome top of the line hardware, but has NEVER been able to release drivers that didn't suck.
Remember when the Live! came out. All thier PR was about the programmable nature of the EMU10k SPU. Yah right. what new features ever came out for that card or any other card based on the 10k [including the XFI] programmable chip? NONE and worse is that they disabled features to force obsolete the hardware.
I honestly hope they keep losing money until they figure out that it is PEOPLE who buy thier crap and it is these people who they should bend over backwards to support. Or better just go out of business. That way I am forced to buy another companies product.
Good riddance.
kxproject.lugosoft.com/
They say here that this is a "ground up implementation". Like I said before, if Daniel wants to build drivers from scratch, he should. But these are modified drivers.
Secondly, this will never reach the popularity similar to the modified creative drivers mentioned here.
The crucial thing here, is that Daniel blew his chance by unlocking extra features. Creative clearly wanted to end this there and then, and set a precedent. At that point they became "hacks" and creative excercised their right (which always existed) to end this. A promise not to unlock anything after this means nothing. I may be wrong in the last bit, but he seems to have done exactly this with Vista drivers by enabling things which otherwise didnt exist in the Vista drivers.
yeah - cause it's just that funny :toast:I've never been screwed by Creative - I've never had major issues with my hardware, ever, over the years I've been a customer. But, one thing I can say for sure with audio cards is that they don't always work correctly right out of the box. if anyone remembers the ISA days and earlier PCI days, it required a little work to install things. Audio cards are very picky.
That being said, I find their hardware worth it - but again, I find their tech support to be shoddy and worthless. That's the whole reason I started the X-Fi thread here, is to try and offer help for those that can't get it through Creative.
I've taken both sides with Creative recently over the last 6 months. It depends on the issue, and how people are reacting. I felt that Creative charging Audigy users $10 for the ALchemy software was a load of tripe, and I made that statement known, and was willing to point users in the direction of a "free" legit ALchemy download for Audigy users, as I didn't feel they should have to pay. I took both sides when the first dan_k driver issue broke - Creative's side defending their EULA, and the users side cause Creative were idiotic enough to publicly admit to defeating hardware features (bad PR move, no company should be this dumb).
But, I see a lot of people that get into the mob-mentality and don't think why an audio company might react this way, or what the big picture is - there's too many people that join along just cause they don't know any better, or can't think for themselves.
Like I just mentioned, I've never been screwed by Creative, so I have no right to bitch and complain. I've also run across numerous other users runnign both XP and Vista who've never had a problem, either. Why should I have to move on from a company I have no beef with? Sure, I find their customer relations distasteful, but that hasn't changed my opinion about their hardware. Seriously, give me one solid, good reason to move away from a company I personally have no issues with . . .
Considering the bad publicity Creative have come under over the last 6 months or so, there's enough noise out in the general public that potential customers should be aware of the issues as well. But, their hardware is still good and reliable, and in that respect, and considering the vast amounts of users who've never had any issues, I'm still willing to recommend their hardware. If you hear about the bad PR and still decide to purchase their products, that's your deal, but I'll still be more than willing to help out should an issue crop up; and if you're still not happy at that point - return the card. This doesn't mean I only recommend Creative's products, though, as many other users here can point out, anytime a thread crops up with people looking for soundcard purchasing advice, I generally try to figure out what their intended and typical use would be so I can recommend a card that I feel would best suit their needs. i don't recommend with any bias, and I don't change how I interact with others with any bias.
If other users have a problem with how a company handles itself, that's their issue - it's up to them to make the decision to stick with the company or not. I find it absolutely histarical, though, the number of users with Creative hardware that have pitched a fit over things, but the used hardware market isnt' flooded with Creative cards yet - if you have that much of an issue, why hold on to the hardware? Sell it and put the money towards what you consider to be a better product.
Just because you don't like a company doesn't mean that other users would still be able to make use of said company's equipment, and never experience any problems.
As of that, I'm done with this thread - if I was in the mood to debate my views of a questionable audio company, I'd go hand out with the career-trolls lurking the Creative forums . . . I have no use for that here at TPU.
From a legal standpoint, Daniel, is unfortunately CRIMINAL. He has commited a criminal offence by breaching the EULA. A lot of you guys go "oh but the customers"- I mean what sort of logic is that? The law rules above all. You CAN'T bypass laws, the EULA states that any unliscenced modification of intellectual property will result in criminal charges. Daniel is legally not allowed to modify the drivers. Yes it might defy logic, but isnt the law usually logic-defying?
And anyway, if Daniel was allowed to continue with modifications (and if he was liscenced to do it), you do realise that it won't actually harm the profits of creative. Hes unlocking features; more bang for buck per-product-Something that consumers desire. They legally can't allow daniel to make drivers. You cannot compare this to ATI/Nvidia, as they do not have a EULA binded to them.
On the flipside... daniel has overreacted to that email. Everything about it screams fake-looks like a prank.
Greed is suffering. Most of you should learn that. My EMUK10 Live Value still has drivers for it, I was pleasantly surprised how well featured they were. I'm still going to purchase an XFI if i decide to upgrade, probably an Auzentech, just note that Creative makes the chip.
I'd rather have direct hardware access in XP, than a workaround which introduces latency in Vista.
As I've mentioned before, the issues with Vista - Creative and MS are both equally to blame for the numerous audio issues that every audio card has been running into again and again.\
During development of the OS, MS was working with nVidia and Creative on the audio architecture, to change it to be more stable, but still allow DirectSound access like we have with XP. For no reason, nVidia dropped from the project, and not long after MS gave up on it - which left Creative high and dry. They already had functioning drivers for this, but now that the audio architecture was different than they initially expected, they had to go back to the drawing board - and they also spent a lot of time with the OpenAL API to ready a new API release . . . this is the biggest reason Creative were almost 6 months behind the Vista release date with alpha drivers. This is also why we've seen so many Vista beta drivers be released, as they're still working on correct functionality. It's still hit or miss.
I have another rig here tha I maintain frequently running Vista home, and has an Elite Pro installed - and not a single issue with that, either. But I won't install Vista on my rig yet, as I don't see a need for it. Once someone releases a full DX10 game that I feel is worth the effort, I will (STALKER: Clear Sky should do the trick).I can see where people are unhappy with it, and I see where Creative have goofed as well - but how many people are looking at it from the manufacturer's stand point as well? Considering the numbers of users out there with Live! series cards that pitched a fit when Creative finally declared them EOSL.
Besides, the drivers don't always suck - many of the times it's hardware or software incompatibilities. This is a big issue everyone has gotten invloved with as more and more commoners who aren't tech aware like we are go out and buy an Xtreme Gamer or Xtreme Audio from Best Buy or Circuit City to install in their Dell or HP system. Factor in the number of people that can't even turn off their onboard audio, and go crying to Creative when their new hardware doesn't work right . . .
sure, I realize that on certain systems there are issues with the drivers, but there are also many "user errors" as wellwhere have I come across as acting as Creative has "done no wrong?" I flat out stated in a few posts already what I've felt was crossing the line in-so-far as how they've treated some customers . . . I've mentioned numerous times in my X-Fi thread where I feel that Creative has screwed up. But, I also recognize the fact that there are numerous other users out ther who've never had a problem as well - why should I allow a few PR mistakes, and the whinning of commoners to influence my recommendations to another user that could potentially benefit from one of their cards? I'm also more than willing to inform new users to this site of the issues Creative have been facing, and at that point, it's up to them what they decide to install.
As to the EULA - so you're claiming that Creative disabaling features for Vista drivers for the Audigy series is wrong - even though the Audigy series were never advertised as Vista ready? The X-Fi cards, although, were advertised as such, but how do we know that disabled features on these drivers were not just a temporary headache that would be re-instated once things were ironed out (like removal of DX10.1 support in Assassin's Creed with the first patch, and then re-instated with the second)?
People were pissed off that their 6-8 year old hardware no longer functioned correctly. IMO, I say be glad they continued support for so long. Like I said before, find me a piece of hardware that old that can handle current OSes, software and games.
I'm not saying Creative have been a handful of angels here, but I'm not going to go around the web spreading tripe to all the uninformed users out there as well. There are three sides to each story, and everyone has only been interested in one side of their situation.DMCA rulings have been having a hard time standing up since that act was passed - it's unfair, and doesn't allow the end user enough rights. Personally, I still hold to the Copyright Act of 1986, which allows for users to make one back-up copy of any digital media for their own use.
Anyhow, d_k didn't exactly charge for the drivers, but he was enabling features that Creative didn't support (like Dolby encoding with the X-Fis) . . . why they didn't support these features is their knowledge, as they haven't said. There could be some kind of contractual agreement between Creative and Dolby and/or Auzentech. If Creative acted like d_k's driver's didn't exist, they could've been held accountable for those drivers breaching a contract. It's all theory, we don't know, as Creative hasn't said.
and as of that - I'm fully done with this. Time to head out for the night, instead of dealing with users calling me blind as much as they are.
I guess I saw it coming, stacking up sorta. First was when I was trying to fix a crash issue (BSOD) and their phone support literally yelled at me when I said I had gone through the standard routines as they listed. Also how much of a hassle it was to get some games to stop auto shutting off the sound or how it would pop and crackle alot.
Tkpenalty: I understand what your saying and technically you are correct, but see it this way; The features Creative was mad at Daniel_K for was the ones we had already had for Windows XP. When people asked why they were removed and not put back for Vista, they said it was in the same group as where DirectSound3D went (which was true, but..). Daniel_K plopped it in at full force and proved to the community that Creative was directly lying to them. We arnt very happy about that.
but then I would have crappy onboard and no speakers...
[sarcasm]SIGH you people make the smartest descisions i've ever seen (:[/sarcasm]
Economics is based on products and services, this is dependent on the services they want you to have, not what the product is fully capable of.
I side with Creative if he was unlocking features they didn't want you to have. I side with the modder if Creative was failing to offer functionality up to what the XP drivers offered.