Greetings all.Recently I made the ill decision to upgrade my sound card to the Audigy 2 ZS series, and I love the performance improvement on my system. My old sound card would constantly crash the entire system in lockups (it was 4 years old - run down no doubt) and thus I upgraded.However I encountered a major issue with this upgrade. And here is how everythign developed in order . . . . . Bought the card -- UNinstalled the other card.Installed the card and tested it with Media Player - LOVED the result. :-)Also installed all applications that came with the card.Started FS2004 . . .splash screen . . . . desktop . . . huh?Tried a few more times. Decided maybe there were multiple drivers or residue from my last install left, so I double checked. Nothing from prior card installed.Finally got frustrated and reinstalled windows. It is on it's own partition, and I reformat every 6 months anyway so I was due -- no loss there.Installed everything, this time NOT installing applications with the drivers -- just drivers only (I absolutely disdain wasting system resources on anything I do not actively use).Checked the internet, installed latest DX, Video and Sound drivers and all available windows updates.Started FS2004 . . . splash screen . . . desktop . . . GRRRR!Uninstalled and reinstalled. . . . same result. . . . . FS2002 and ALL other games work great. Just FS2004 - the ONE program I care about onthis system next to 2002 -- and it doesnt work.Does anyone have any light at all to shed on this subject?oh - - - and once someone told me there miught be a registry conflict between 2004 and 2002. 2002 was not yet reinstalled after the format, thus that issue is eliminated, but I know for a fact they do not conflict anyway because I was ruinning them both before the sound card upgrade.So the question is this -- did I make an ill choice of sound card? Is there a known incompatability or -- even better - a fix?I am hoping someone here will know how to assist me since Microsoft has no tech support that is reliale and only gives cryptic answers meant for computer geeks.I have no idea if this will help, but here are my system specs:Microsoft Windows XP ProfessionalAMD Athlon XP 2200+ 1.7GHz (barton Core)512 MB DDRDirectX 9.0bATI Radeon 9700 Pro 128MBSB Audigy 2 ZSK7N2 Delta MoboFlight Simulator Partition = 80 GBs (so space is no issue)With MANY MANY thanks to anyone who can possibly help . . Christopher N. DittmarStudent Pilot and Avid Simmer

I can't give you a clever answer on your question, since you did reinstall windows, which points out that even on the fresh system, problem exists. Afaik, there is no conflict between 2002 and 2004, especially if you installed windows new, registry settings are deleted and pretty much also not needed.So as a last resort, I'll suggest you just try installing FS2004 into one separate folder, without any additional modules or addons. Start there. But if it closes, again...no idea...My last guess then would be to try either, getting another card with explanation that it's incompatible or maybe before try out couple of drivers which work with the card (if there are more than one).Word Not Allowed

How close to the AGP slot is the sound card - move it as far away as possible and see if this helps. ALso try starting FS2004 in safe mode.HTH--qnh

Sounds like a 'suck it and see' approach is required. ('scuse the double-pun!)You haven't mentioned about sound acceleration. I've noticed in the past when I've had a sound problem with a game that lowering the sound acceleration in 'dxdiag' often solves the problem.Something you can try, anywayAlan

I assume you already did, but did you get the latest drivers from the manufacturer's website? Not the ones off the cd?

One other suggestion if you have not already done it is verify that you have the latest drivers for the mother board and/or any BIOS updates. Sometimes conflicts between a mother board or BIOS and a add on card cause problems but are fixed with updated software. Other than that I would do as suggested above and reduce your sound acceleration as this will usually solve the problem. I also have an Audigy 2 but have had no problems at all so I do not have any ideas outside of these. I hope that you are able to work this one out.Best of luck!Philip

Performed all of the advice from all of you -- still to no avail. Only thing I have not yet done is try a new card. I am going to have to wait until I get a check (doh! need to get a job first) and try getting a new soundcard. I love soundblaster, but if this conflict persists I will be switching to Turtle Beach **shrug**MANY thanks for all your help. At least FS2002 still works great - which is pleasing since I can still use my PSS and other paywar for it.Knik

Go into device manager and see if anything has a red X on it.Just a thought--qnh