I'll try a support call to MS, but I doubt that will get me very far.

In fact Outlaw did not design the 990 with that capability, because they say they only support XP. They offer that some customers have figured out how to make it work, but Outlaw doesn't tell you how to do it, presumably because they don't how.

Yes it seems to work on some Vista systems (which tells me I'm not on a wild goose chase), but not all, and not mine.

I would expect Outlaw to figure out how it works and tell me you need driver XXXXX.XXX installed in directory XXXXX for it to work.

What you describe sounds more like an argument against including USB-to-PC audio support at all. They need to know what USB hardware you have (built in to the motherboard or a standalone card? what chipset? what hub or length of cable you have?), what OS version/service pack/patches you have installed, and (particularly for Vista) what solutions might work in your situation. That's a major hassle, especially when the odds are high that there will be at least two larger companies involved (Microsoft and the PC maker) who will contribute support resources that will offer minimal value for the hardware and software that belong to them.

I am not saying that as a way to excuse Outlaw - it would certainly be handy for them to collect a list of the tehniques, drivers, and patches that worked for others - but I wanted to point out that even such an effort as that may not be a guaranteed solution in this case.

This whole issue of USB connectivity really boils down to how well everyone in the chain conforms to the standards or defacto standards for a certain electronic implementation. In the PC world (as compared to the MAC world), the open hardware architecture and multiple brands of components that can work together are both a boon and a thorn. Most compatibility problems are due to the open architecture, and it was worse before almost the whole market got sucked into Microsoft OS. The hardware variety between any number of non-MAC PC's can cause havoc for anyone trying to make another electronic product or software compatible downstream. Some manufacturers will provide technical support to a point, but usually only for mainstream products. With a laptop, the functionality is likely all part of the motherboard, and unless you happen to know what brand motherboard and chipset your integrator used, finding support information is really difficult. I would also not expect HP or Dell to tell me they used a certain model Asus motherboard with a certain chipset, so there's no way to even go to the sub-component manufacturers or user base to see if there's help there. There's also the level of expectation for compatibility. The laptop maker is probably thinking you'll want to use a USB headphone or speaker, a relatively "dumb", passive peripheral, and so makes sure that works. You've already discovered that works. However, with the 990, the USB connection is to another computer (the 990's processor is another computer) with all of the timing and handshaking overhead that goes with it. That makes interconnectivity a lot more difficult, and is usually hardware dependent to some degree on both ends of the connection. To that we add software compatibility. Even assuming that everybody involved built to the standards, and that's a pretty big assumption considering the number of players that can be involved, if the software was never intended to talk between two microprocessor systems it will probably not do a very good job of it. While there is good software developed with little hope of receiving financial gain from it, it's still not practical to expect someone to develop a driver to make small numbers of different pieces of sophisticated electronics communicate with each other. This statement is not meant to slight anyone engaged in this thread, it's simply provided as a fact for serious consideration. I can appreciate the frustration of not being able to get various computers and peripheral electronics to work together. I've been dealing with this problem in one form or another for more than 25 years in my computer hobby, and while some things have gotten way more plug and play over the years, there are still enough issues to cause sleepless nights, hair loss, and turning gray. Thankfully, of those, I've been spared the hair loss.

Bill