windows xp or vista???

[AgentZero]

Well, problems with drivers (sound or otherwise) are the responsibility of whoever made the hardware, yet for some reason people seem to prefer to lay the blame at Microsoft's feet. Comments like, "Vista has lousy support for Hardware X" or "Vista borked my Hardware Y" are a pet peeve of mine since most of the time it's the hardware manufacturer who didn't release the drivers on time, or just did a shoddy job with them.

I was a bit confused as to what you meant by "I've gotten around the way vista hides files by using a flash drive." If it's a matter of not being able to see hidden files this can be fixed by going to Start->Control Panel->Folder Options, then clicking on the View tab and clicking the box for "Show Hidden & System Files". In XP, it was under Tools->Folder options from an Explorer window, which made it a lot easier to find, though part of me thinks that might be the reason they moved it. :P If it's something else, then I'm back to being confused because I can't think of any issues with hidden files that could be solved with a flash drive...