Starter (Ensoniq Mixer)

I have Windows 95. When I boot up the computer, a program called Starter, also identified as Ensoniq Mixer, appears to be starting up twice. If I do a Control Alternate Delete, I see Starter listed twice. I can't seem to find it in any startup list, including Startup Cop. It doesn't seem to affect any performance, but I'm curious as to:

What is Starter (Ensoniq Mixer)?
How can I get rid of one of the startups?

Thanks,
Grandpa

 

It's been a while since I've used windows 95 but I think this applies.

First: Starter.exe brings up the Creative Labs Ensoniq Mixer Tray icon. Double-clicking on the icon brings up a sound mixer control which is very similar to the one you get when you double-click on the System Tray sound control (yellow loudspeaker), except that it has one or two additional controls that are specific to Creative soundcards.
This program was installed as a result of installing a Creative sound card (soundblaster).
If you click start->run->msconfig- see if it is listed twice.
If it is- uncheck one of the entries.
You could also check to see if it is listed twice in control panel
Double click the system icon then click the device manager tab
It would probably be listed under creative miscellaneous devices or something like that
If it is listed twice- you could right click one of the listings then choose properties and then check disable in this hardware profile

Hope this helps!

 

Thanks for the reply, Jazcan. O.K., first of all, msconfig is not available with Win95. But I found them via the control panel, system, device manager, listed under "Sound, Video and Game Controllers ". They're not totally identical. One is called ENSONIQ Audio PCI, the other is ENSONIQ Audio PCI Legacy Device. Both have "disable in this hardware profile" (unchecked) and "exists in all hardware profiles" (checked).

I guess my question now is should I disable one of them, and if so which one, or doesn't it matter? Can I cause a problem by disabling, and if so, will I be able to go back and uncheck the disable box?

Currently, with both enabled, there's no obvious problem, my only concern is that unnecessary resources may be used.

grandpa

 

Sorry for being so long getting back to you. I was actually playing around with an old computer of mine this weekend (repartitioned, reformatted and reinstalled win95) and yes I remembered that msconfig was not available - sorry
Anyway, startup cop is just as good.

I would leave both alone since they're different. They are both related to your soundcard- I think one of them enables Dos based games to have sound.

Anyway, if you're not having any problems and there are no resource conflicts listed in device manager then I wouldn't touch a thing.

If it ain't broke......

 

You know, my reply is even confusing me.

I literally forgot what your original question was about.

The starter.exe places the mixer icon in your systray. If you don't want the icon placed there I think that you can uncheck the line :
"add mixer icon to taskbar " - This line may be found when clicking the properties of the two entries in your device manager that you previously mentioned.
I still don't know why the starter.exe is running twice.

If you ctrl-alt-del and click on one of them and then press end task does the mixer icon in the systray disappear?

 

O.K. I think I've found the answer.

They are in fact two different programs.
One is the Systray icon for the ensoniq mixer and the other is the System Tray icon to configure a Creative Soundblaster PCI soundcard.
You should have both these icons in your systray.

From the several posts I've read in other forums, it's not that easy to stop these processes from starting up without doing some registry edits.

 

The ENSONIQ Audio PCI is your sound. If you disable it you'll have no sound in windows. The other one is for dos support. If you don't have any dos programs that require support for sound you can disable it. If you want to get rid of the Ensoniq mixer icon in the system tray, I seem to rememeber you can get rid of it in device manager. Double click on ENSONIQ Audio PCI in device manager and click on the settings tab. I believe you'll find an entry for it there (if memory serves me correctly).

 

Thanks for the replies, jazcan and Zander. Actually, although two starters show up in CAD, there's only one taskbar icon. It doesn't go away when I delete task on either one of them. Well, I disabled the ENSONIQ Audio PCI Legacy Device (I don't do DOS games), rebooted, but the two starters still appeared in CAD. Anyway, I'm taking jazcan's advice based on "if it ain't broke don't fix it ", and leaving it all as is. Sometime in the near future I'll probably get a new computer and won't have this problem anymore (Of course I'll have different problems!)

grandpa

 

Though MSCONFIG did not come with Win95 you can download a copy and run it with 95 from the following site;

MSCONFIG.EXE

HTH

 

Thanks, Rod, for the info on MSCONFIG. I downloaded it and it works fine!

grandpa

 

You're welcome. Glad to hear it helped you.