I'd get me the LiveWare! drivers off Creative's site ASAP.

Tried that, same issue.

which sblive is it?
-neural

It sounds like me and dolemite are having the exact same problem. I've had the card for years and it works perfectly on win98 and winME but has this problem on win2k and winXP. My card is a soundblaster live! (not 5.1) mp3+ (CT4760). I just (as of an hour ago) installed WinXP again to try to get the card to work. It still has the same problem that dolemite described above.
 
In the past I've emailed creative about the problem and have yet to recieve a single responce.

I have the same card SB Live! Mp3+

Hello
Windows 2000 doesn't automatically detect a SBLive card on a clean install. Best recommendation is to install the drivers located on this page:
http://shs-sound.paraknowya.com/
 
Read through this page before downloading and installing any of the drivers. They actually recommend that you only use the WDM drivers if you have not installed any SBLive drivers yet. If you have existing drivers, I did the following which works:
For WinME/9x:
Don't reboot when promtped, only when completely done with these steps. Uninstall the existing drivers through the Control Panel, and/or boot into Safe Mode, open up Device Manager, and remove the SB Live device. You also need to check your \windows\inf\other directory and delete any creative sblive INF files. Make sure you have the new driver file extracted to a directory on your hard drive. Now reboot and when the "Audio Device" or whatever is detected, point the wizard to the directory containing the new driver files.
 
For Win2K:
Don't reboot when promtped, only when completely done with these steps. Uninstall the existing drivers through the Control Panel, open up Device Manager, and remove the SB Live device. You also need to check your \winnt\inf\other directory and delete any creative sblive INF files. Make sure you have the new driver file extracted to a directory on your hard drive. Now reboot and when the "Audio Device" or whatever is detected, point the wizard to the directory containing the new driver files.
 
You can also find some more info here:
http://alive.singnet.com.sg/
 
Good Luck!

I fixed it by going to system properties, going to hardware wizard, going to uninstall device, checking show hidden devices and removing any device that has anything to do with sound ( I had to Creative SB live! and one PCI 512 Snd card under hidden devices). Rebooted, and it all worked fine.
Thanks for all your suggestions and input.

Ahh, great. People with Windows 9x/ME can boot into Safe Mode, and open up Device manager. In Safe Mode, it shows all devices that have been installed on your system at some point in time. Remove the old ones and reboot. Some devices have two listings, and its a crap shoot to find out which one to remove. I say, remove both and when you reboot it will detect the new device, although you may have to point the setup wizard to \windows or \windows\system for the driver files.
 
--I haven't tried it in a while, but at some point I lost the ability to play DVDs in true "Digital" sound. I have the Creative SB Live 5.1 Platinum with the Creative DTT-3500 speakers. The speaker console has a light that turns on when playing Digital audio. I know this used to work at some point, but no longer does. There are too many things that the problem could point to...drivers...DVD software (I've tried both PowerDVD 3 + 4 and WinDVD)...cables...
 
anyone who knows they have Digital working, let me know what drivers you use, DVD software and any settings you have for audio in Win2K or WinME, and audio settings for the DVD software.
 
Thanks