Issues logging in

[Sisca]

I decided to try out the 14 day trial so I just downloaded and installed for the first time. Everything seemed to work fine, switched to IE and copy/pasted the login url and was able to go through the web based character creation stuff and everything patched. It then gets to the splash screen and I get a message on the last line saying Retrieving New Character Essence. That starts out with a series of .'s moving next to it but eventually those stop and the system just sits there. I've let it sit on that screen for a solid 15 minutes with nothing changing before I ended the process.

After reading through these forums I'm beginning to suspect one of two things, either my SoundBlaster Audigy or the fact that I have .Net 2.0. I'm wondering if anyone can confirm this.

Removing the sound card might be an option but I doubt it, if a game that is this far past release can't support the most common audio card on the market I can't see myself paying to play it. Downgrading to .Net 1.1 is definatly not an option as I need 2.0 for work related tasks.

Thanks

[Ophelea]

The problem with the Audigy cards has only recently occurred (with a sound modification) and been verified and is being worked on. If you have on-board sound, please use it for now and we'll announce a fix as soon as it is in.

[Sisca]

Ophelea: Thanks for the update. I'm just curious does it sound like my issue is being caused by the sound card?

Kumu: The BF2 issue you raised doesn't occur on every system, I know I've never once experienced it, whereas from what I'm seeing on these forums anyone using a Creative card is having an issue in Horizons. That would make me think that the issue is on Horizons side moreso than on Creatives.

I will agree that popular does not always equal best, though in this case every review, every head to head test and the leading builders of high end custom systems all seem to agree that the Audigy and XFi cards are the best audio cards on the market. These cards have become the defacto standard for audio on the market today so I would expect any developer that is making use of audio would work towards compatibility with these cards first.

From Ophelea's response and other posts I've seen the dev team is aware of this issue and working on fixing it. Since all I wanted to do was check out the changes in the game since I last played around release I can wait until it's resolved and come back.

[tramsan]

Horizons (or rather its sound library - Miles) was utilizing Creative's drivers perfectly fine. Creative updated their drivers. The exact same library now starts to experience issues. Who is to blame? If anyone, it would be Creative, for updating their drivers so that some libraries no longer function properly. Was the change that created the issue necessary? Maybe. Probably not.

The important thing to note is that old Audigy drivers does not have this issue.

[Sisca]

Tramsan, thanks for the info. That lets me know that the creative card isn't my issue since I'm not using updated drivers. If I had to guess mine are at least 6 months old since I don't tend to update drivers that are working for the majority of what I have to do for this very reason .

So if I had to guess I'd say that my issue is having the latest version, 2.0, of .Net. As I said it's not an option for me to use 1.1 so I guess I'll hold off on trying Horizons until they can update to fix whatever incompatibility was introduced. Yes, I know that this isn't their fault but I also know that it's going to be up to them to fix it.

[Sarus]

I am still having the same issues with my x-fi card after the fix. there are new drivers coming out in a few weeks for the card so maybe that will clear up my problem

[tramsan]

Actually, Sisca, the symptoms you describe are exactly what happens when The Creative Cards Strike Again! (Sorry, couldn't help it.)

Have you tried disabling your creative card, to see if this lets you play? If you haven't, I suggest you do - just to make sure whether it's the sound card or not.

Also, for the record, while we do call these drivers "new" they are in fact from the end of 2005. Creative only actually released them a few months ago, though. If you have the installation CD that came with the card you should be able to use the drivers on it to play - I know that solved it for me.