Drivers on Windows update newer than ones on the site

[Iason]

I newly upgraded to Windows 7 64-bit as of Vista 32-bit and used Windows 7 update to install "Creative - Audio - Sound Blaster X-Fi Xtreme Audio" for my sound card as it was offered as an additional download. I'm not so sure now the driver is the correct one as I have a PCI-Express Sound Blaster X-Fi Xtreme Audio card. I had problems, as with a lot of other users, with the Creative autoupdate software refusing to recognize any Creative products but after having to restore a disk image I was able to get it working. When using the autoupdate it selected the correct drivers for my card listed as Version 1.04.0000 on the Creative site. But on running the installer after download, the drivers refuse to install because it says the drivers on the system are more up to date. Can anyone tell me why Microsoft offered drivers which appear to be the wrong ones from their update site? I am assuming the ones installed are for the non PCI-Express version of the card, although I can't be sure as I can't relate Device Manager version numbers to Creative’s ones.

[DotNetUser]

You be able to force an install in the device manager. Just extract the installer with winrar otherwise 7-zip and then pick the info in the device manager and force the install. Or if you really want the installer to install the driver, download a "driver cleaner" and just clean out all creative drivers from your OS and then try to install it over again. Let me know if that can solve the problem for you.

[$tatic]

You can resolve this problem. Just try thisone to see if this helps you. Right now you are saying that you have the driver from Windows Update installed, is that correct? That is okay. It is a basic driver and has reduced funcionality but your card is labeled as Creative X-FI I am assuming. This is what happened to me when I installed my new Dell OEM X-Treme Music (BEAUTIFUL card by the way). I then downloaded the newest Creative drivers and I ran the installer, it says, "These drivers are older than the ones installed, install anyway?" I said yes. Everything went fine. Now if you are still having problems you can install the Creative driver and afterwards when you go to windows udpate, choose to hide the microsoft/Creative update.

[Iason]

While windows update re-installs driver, it is correctly labeled as Soundblaster X-fi Xtreme. I had been having some strange issues with sound, which is why I wanted to try the Creative driver. When I run the installer, I get "error" these driver are older and I dont think it lets me install them. I saw in my system settings where you were talking about; is there a way I can tell windows not to download drivers for just my sound card, instead of all driver software? It seems like the sound is the only thing being a bit quirky. Every time I think the creative drivers work, when I re-start, Windows re-installs drivers. If I can’t update the sound drivers on my own, would I have the same problem if I attempt to download the latest Nvidia drivers myself for my video card?

[Blazej]

To be truthful Creative looks to have no thought what software otherwise driver to offer Windows 7 owners, I used Creative auto update to recommend which software/drivers to install and got a mishmash of Vista software along with the 1.04.000 driver which is still reported as being older than the one offered on Windows update. I didn't download or install the Creative update stuff, but have found that their auto updater now seems to be broken as it refuses to recognise any Creative product as being installed on my machine, this seems to be something to do with 64-bit as other posters on these forums are having the same problems regarding auto update. Creative really need to get their act together, it's not like they haven't had for warning of Windows 7 being released, and to be honest I can't believe it differing that much from Vista so drivers shouldn't be such a big problem to sort out. It seems to me that most vendors are more concerned about drivers for their new products than their existing ones.

[Zoello]

Auto update does in fact work; I've managed to get it to work after doing a disk image recovery with Acronis True Image to a date before I ran auto update. I'm guessing you reinstalled your OS from your comment "After formatting the other day, I installed the drivers and ran it." and this is why it ran successfully. The problem*for me and others, all apparently using Windows 7 64-bit, is that somewhere along the line it gets broken, perhaps after it's been run the first time. Can you run it repeatedly with success? I've tried the AutoUpdateA.exe "fix" myself with no luck.