Realtek AC'97 Windows Update Problem

[utpian]

So I went to Windows Update, and was updating and noticed that there
was an update for the Realtek Audio. So I installed it.. And my sound
stopped working. I already tried rolling back and uninstalling and
reinstalling the previous drivers.. but it still doesn't seem to be
working whatsoever. I don't have sound in the slightest :/

Does anyone have any suggestions? I don't know what else to do.

Anyway, here are some specs:
Windows XP Media Center Edition with SP2
AMD Athlon 64 3500+
2.21 GHz
896 MB of RAM

And the driver I had that worked previously to now from the Gateway
site:
HDRealTek5136.exe - Realtek High Definition Audio Driver Version:
5.10.0.5136

It was the Windows Update driver that messed it all up :/ You can bet
after this I'm never using them to update my drivers again.

 

[Guest]

The below websites may or may not be of any help, but check them out.
Realtek AC97 audio driver package a3.88 download
http://www.softwarepatch.com/utilities/ac97.html

Resources for Troubleshooting Sound Problems in Windows XP
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;q307918

 

[Chris Laarman]

(e-mail address removed) ([email protected]) in
(e-mail address removed):

So I went to Windows Update, and was updating and noticed that there
was an update for the Realtek Audio. So I installed it.. And my sound
stopped working. I already tried rolling back and uninstalling and
reinstalling the previous drivers.. but it still doesn't seem to be
working whatsoever. I don't have sound in the slightest :/

Does anyone have any suggestions? I don't know what else to do.

It was the Windows Update driver that messed it all up :/ You can bet
after this I'm never using them to update my drivers again.

Does your Hardware Manager (Control Panel, etc.) indicate a problem (yellow
exclamation sign) or disabling (red coss)?
Do you still have a Volume icon on the task bar? If you double-click it, are
any relevant elements muted or set to zero?

Does the problem appear in (plain) audio and in MIDI?

A rude one: do the answers to earlier "no sound" questions inspire you to
try certain actions?
(http://groups.google.com/group/microsoft.public.windowsxp.music)

There are so many factors that could cause "no sound", you see, and it's
hard to tell them from a distance.

 

[utpian]

I tried the links previous to the one I'm replying to.. They didn't
help. Thank you though.

Does your Hardware Manager (Control Panel, etc.) indicate a problem
(yellow exclamation sign) or disabling (red coss)?:
No, it looks absolutely normal and says it's not malfunctioning at
all.. Windows doesn't recognize any problem with the drivers.. Yet
sound still isn't working.

Does the problem appear in (plain) audio and in MIDI?:
Yes.

A rude one: do the answers to earlier "no sound" questions inspire you
to try certain actions?:
No, I exhausted all of the previous ideas after searching the web for a
long period of time. Hence why I said I tried rolling back drivers,
uninstalling and reinstalling, I double-checked everything on the
RealTek audio screen to see whether anything was muted.. I checked the
regular volume of the PC separate from the Realtek. I don't post on
forums or groups unless I have exhausted every option that I could
think of or gather from online.

There are so many factors that could cause "no sound", you see, and
it's hard to tell them from a distance.:
I know that obviously. That's why I'm answering questions and giving
the information I know instead of just saying "plz help sound iz broken
lol".

Thanks.

 

[Sammi]

Nevermind, after nearly a day of trying all kinds of things, I finally
fixed it.

 

[Sammi]

A ton of people keep emailing me asking how I fixed it... I guess that
Windows Update is messing up a lot of people.

The ONLY thing that worked for me (rolling back, uninstalling and
reinstalling, even using programs that removed the drivers from the
system didn't work), was System Restore.

Start Menu > Help > Under Pick A Task, System Restore.
I chose a date that was several days before I had used Windows Update.
And then I restored. The sound worked again.

A recommendation that I got from someone else, NEVER use Windows Update
to update your hardware.

If the restore doesn't work for you, I don't know what to tell you.
It's not like anyone actually got off their ass and helped me fix my
problem either, so maybe it needs to actually be further investigated.