Hardware

Ask something
Question Locked

Sound Problems

0 helpful
28 replies

by var1016

Closed to new repliesThis discussion is closed. It stays readable, but it takes no new replies.

Hello all.

As of today, I no longer have sound when playing a Youtube video - and other online things that contain sounds such as music playlists.

The sound is fine for WAV sounds. I have tried system restore with no effect. I also updated the Realtek audio driver again no effect.

System details:

Homebuilt PC
Gigabyte M/Board M55+
AMD 5600+ processor,
4GB ram;
XP Pro SP3

I have had this problem before, on another PC that was running Vista; with that one restarting the computer cured the problem until the next time, but it always came back.

Thanks in advance for any suggestions...

Paul

28 replies

by jck

I would say it might be your sound codecs are corrupt. you might try re-loading/updating them.

by var1016

Thanks for that; I Googled audio codecs, and on a site called "codecs.com" there are four pages of files.

How do I choose?

Paul

by ic-it

That someone (or a rogue program) is messing with you? Verify your Volume Control settings, they may have unchecked all but the Wave.

by var1016

Hello and thanks for your response.

As I wrote above, I found this morning that all was OK; very strange. If it plays up again, I shall certainly try your suggestion.

Best wishes
Paul

by var1016

Thanks for this link - I have bookmarked it should the problem appear again.

Paul

by var1016

Hello.

Thanks for the link, I have installed the codecs - BUT - today, all was fine! I cannot understand why this might be - after all I tried shutting down and restarting yesterday, three times, with no effect.

Very strange.

Best wishes,
Paul

by var1016

As I wrote, the problem seemed to have gone; I have installed the codecs.

However, it returned but restarting would cure it.

This morning however, I had no sounds at all - nothing. Volume controls OK. Restarting had no effect.

System Restore - just back to yesterday - has fixed it. Now all was working last night when I shut down; what could have happened when the computer was off?

NB I have been running Ad-Aware and Spybot; I have Avast anti-virus protection.

Paul

by .martin.

it is most likely the incompatibility between a recent windows update and the sound driver.

this incompatibility does some strange things :)

by var1016

But I suppose one must have these updates!

I have taken up the suggestion in the next post and renewed the Realtek Drivers. As I replied, "so far, so good."

Best wishes

Paul

by var1016

Hello again; I hope you are well.

I have done as you suggested, and so far it works. I was very surprised this morning to have no sounds at all; previously I have just lost music and video.

Thanks very much and best wishes

Paul

by oh smeg

Whenever I power Down or reboot the Realtech Sound Drivers disappear. I have to reinstall them after every restart. This is on my main workstation that I have built in the last few months so I haven't had much time to play with it to work out the issues.

Generally because the Realtech Sound Drivers are not Digitally Signed you can not reinstall or initially install them after you have contacted the M$ Update Server and allow your system to install the Initial Download from M$ that allows either Windows Update or Microsoft Update to be run on your system.

As I;m inherent ally LAZY I don't bother messing around I just make sure that I have an Up To Date Backup and then Blow the Boot Drive away with a Wiping Utility and rebuild from a Image of the HDD that I made after doing a Base install of the Hardware Drivers that I need and the Software that I use. I do have to reapply any updates that are made after that image was but it's just faster for me to do it that way.

Maybe one of the others here has some idea of what is happening here and can suggest a Registry Hack that may save you the need to reload. But once Windows starts to Screw Up like this I never fully trust it again so I find it easier to just start from a Known Good Point and rebuild completely. In the mean time I just have the Latest Realtech Sound Drivers copied to a Temp Folder on a Slave Drive and Update them on every Restart till I get the time to reload the System. I also make a Slipstreamed Install Disc for Windows with all my Hardware Drivers with nLite as this saves a lot of time and messing around when you need to rebuild from Scratch. I also setup nLite for a Unattended Install so it saves even more time and the need to enter a Product Code for Windows. You may like to try this at some time. :)

http://www.nliteos.com/download.html

Just make sure to read the User Guides on the nLite site as the first time you use it it appears different or strange but it's really straight forward.

http://www.nliteos.com/guides.html

OH BTW nLite only works up to XP if you want to do the same thing with Vista you can use vLite available here

http://www.vlite.net/download.html

Col

by var1016

Well Rob,

I am sure that you know I will...

Best,

Paul

by var1016

Yes after a trouble-free day, it just did it again: no sound on playlists and videos; WAV sound still worked.

I restarted and all is working again.

It's interesting that I had the same trouble on another machine with Vista!

Paul

by rob miners

Open Device Manager, double click the Audio Driver and in the Properties menu click the Driver tab then click Uninstall. Tick the Delete the driver software for this device and click OK, click reboot later.

Download and install CCleaner to tidy up your Registry. Backup the Registry as you go along, rescan again and again saving as you go until there are no errors left.

Cleaner: Windows

When you first open Ccleaner you will have an option to Analyze or Run Cleaner, after checking the left Pane and making your choices. Delete all Temp Files. If you scroll down you will see a greyed out box that has Advanced next to it. Left click on it and keep pressing OK to all of the responses. I normally Untick Windows Log Files and Memory Dumps as they may come in handy.

You don't have to install all of the add ons or shortcuts just the one to the Desktop.

http://www.ccleaner.com/download

Restart the pC after running Ccleaner and reinstall the sound drivers.

Keep us informed as to your progress if you require further assistance. ;) :D

by var1016

Hello and thanks again.

I shall try what you suggest - tomorrow as it's a bit late now, but you know, I regularly run CCleaner, both for the removal of rubbish and also the registry part. I normally run it once every ten days as part of the housekeeping (with ad-aware, Spybot and so on.)

I will let you know what happened. By the way the sound cut out again, but restarting brought it back once more. I just checked: it still works!

Paul

by var1016

Thanks for that long expos?!

It's a wee bit above my ability level I think - e.g. "blow away the boot drive"!

The funny thing about this fault is that it is not consistent. The sound on video and music always works on start-up. Sometimes it will be fine for days and then...

You might have seen that Rob has made a suggestion, which I shall try.

I did use NLite once or twice and managed to slipstream SP3 into XP, but I never had cause to use the files so have no idea if they would work or not.

To repeat myself, I find it very strange that I had the same problem on the HP Pavilion computer when it was running Vista.

Many thanks again, and best wishes

Paul

by oh smeg

Not being Digitally Signed with M$ as Realtech refuse to pay the M$ Tax and have their Drivers Digitally Signed. I know some M'Board Makers have submitted the 64 Bit version of this application to M$ for Digital Signing as they just wouldn't work on that Platform so to get their products Certified for Vista 64 they have paid the M$ Tax.

I personally wouldn't put it past M$ to insert a bit of Code to break the Realtech Drivers but the reality is much more likely that some Programmer at M$ has used a shortcut which breaks these Drivers. While M$ has to be a bit careful here as all new M'Boards now come with Realtech Sound Devices built on they can allow some slip ups to occur under conditions that may not affect every computer with these drivers loaded. Places like HP then have to sort out a Workaround for any issues that M$ introduce with their Updates instead of M$ needing to rewrite their Individual Update that causes the problem.

More like a bit of Power Games being played here between M$ and the Hardware maker in this case Realtech with both blaming the other for problems like this. The up side is if you fit a Creative Sound Blaster Card any type it will work perfectly but you will have to disable the Realtech Sound Device in BIOS.

Col

by var1016

Thanks again, Col.

Sneaky aren't they?!

So far Rob's suggestion seems to be working, but when budget permits in these tricky times, perhaps I'll have a look at Creative Sound Blaster cards - certainly if the problem reappears.

All the best

Paul

by var1016

Hello again Rob.

Well I had never before bothered with the "advanced" section. I followed your directions, and found about 250MB of stuff in there, now gone.

As I wrote before, so far, so good - I'll just check quickly: yes! still OK.

Thanks very much,

Paul

by oh smeg

A old PCI Sound Blaster Live would work a treat and you could pickup one for about $10.00 Second Hand or maybe one of the Old AWE 32's that came out as a PCI Card. They are piratically giving them away as no one wants to buy them.

Apparently because they are not 7.1 Surround Sound they are not as good on the average computer with a set of Stereo Speakers plugged in and the rest of the Sound Reproduction not working. You would only receive any benefit of the new Sound Cards if you are recording from the Line or Mic Inputs as they do have better Sampling Rates. But if all that you are doing is listening to whatever sounds that the computer makes and some Music/Video a simple old Stereo Sound Card is more than adequate. :)

Really you can not blame the programmer's too much at M$ as they have what they consider to be their Standard and because Realtech do not submit their driers for Digital Signing they could very well be using something that wouldn't be acceptable to M$ Ideals.

It would however be easier if M$ didn't charge like a Wounded Bull for the Digital Signing to supposedly make whatever is Certified as correctly written and Implemented. It is however a lot of work to fault find any drivers like this and M$ do not hand out the Complete Source Code to the Makers so that they can develop Drivers that will work without issues.

Another Perfect Example of why Accountants shouldn't be involved any Technical Process as both sides have Developers who are more than capable but they have a Layer of Isolation between them that is put in place by the Legal Eagles to protect M$ Secrets and then the Accountants jump in and want to charge for what any half way decent Developer would willingly hand out to outside Developers so that their products would work with the in this case OS in use. :D

Col

Col

by var1016

Following the clear out I have lost my remote desktop connection. I found the shortcut which still had the URL info in it and which had disappeared from the start menu, but it refuses to work.

Any idea what I have to do to get it back (remember it took about two months to get it to work!)

Paul

by rob miners

can I suggest that you follow the previous instructions that were provided. You have a swag of information there. If you run into any problems start a new thread with the error messages that you get.

Rob

This discussion is closed to new replies.