Sound device problems

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Guest

I have spent about 9 hours fixing one problem on my PC where it lost the IDE
controller. Fixed that but now I have no sound.

No, the sound is not set to mute.

If you click on a wav file for example and Windows media opens to play you
get a message saying there might be a problem with a device.

i have checked device manager there are no exclamation marks in any of the
sound devices.

I tried windows restore, doesn't matter how far I go back, this fails every
time.

I have double clicked sounds in control panel and the dialogue box says no
audio device

I have troubleshooted and have no positive information to act upon.

I paid $ 30 dollars to subscribe to a service which reinstalls drivers
following a scan it performs. no dice on getting my sound back.

I thought I would fool the machine by installing a new sound card. this is
registering as working fine, but guess what NO SOUND

I am not getting sound if I put in a DVD or audio CD.

I have spent 11 hours sitting at the PC, I've tried the manufactuer's site
(no help there)

I am convinced i have lost something in the operating system (Windows XP
home).

I am now just about out of all options to try. I have even tried to recover
the machine ot it's ancient factory settings and the files are no longer on
the machine it appears, so I can't even do that but I was reluctant to do so.

there is a root cause why I have no sound, but I can't work it out.

I am fully up to dat on XP updates (with SP2) At my wits end, so any
suggestions welcome.

Keith
 
relax..... we can help. it's free too.

have you checked to see if you have a sound board? you can check the
backside and see if you have 2 sets of speaker, mic jacks?

have you plugged your speaker into the speaker jac or the mic jac? have you
checked your speakers are powered on with ac adaptor or have batteries or the
on/off switch to on?

next have you checked you cmos/bios settings? some newer motherboards have
sound activation options for on or off.

next have you gone to your motherboards manufacturers website? there you
would have drivers and downloads specific to your motherboard.
 
To answer your questions.

The orgininal soundcard is integral to the motherboard. i can't tell you the
ID of the motherboard, but the PC is a Packard Bell media 5096 (2003 model).

Driver for that is Sigma Tel and was reported by the device manager as OK

Yes I checked that the speakers were plugged in and the speakers mains
powered will crackle if you plug / unplug the jack.

As for CMOS / BIOS settings, I have to confess I do not venture there as it
is territory unknown to me. I know the settings can be accessed by hitting
F2 on boot up.

i would not really know what to look for.

I have been to the Packard Bell website and will have to look again for
motherboar drivers. I am not sure they had such help. there was chipset
stuff, but I would need to look again to list what is available. I did
download the sigma tel driver from there as one of my tries at rectifying the
problem.

Thanks for your help so far. I hope the above helps us on the path to sound.

KP
 
it looks like you have a pentium 4 based motherboard and it is highly likely
that there is a sound option in your cmos settings. but since windows shows
no question marks in the device manager, it appears windows recognizes the
sound hardware. now what you need is the audio/sound device driver...

the site also says that there is a cd installation disk. did you get one
with your acquisition of the pc? the cd would likely contain sound device
drivers that are unique to your pc. the site also allows you to download the
iso to your harddrive and then transfer that iso file to a writable cd with
packard bell image writer..
 
try this step:
startup in safemode by pressing f8 during boot up and selecting safe mode
with cmd prompt.

then in safe mode, delete the sound device driver from hardware manager.
you say it is the sim-tel driver, then delete it. then reboot to normal mode
and ensure your speakers are plugged in. if windows sees your sound hardware
it will begin to add the sound driver or ask you for the driver. select
cancel if you cannot find the driver or don't have it. ... provide a status
here...
 
OK, you've given me some options to investigate. No I don't have a recovery
CD from when I had the machine (a lot of time has passed since then).

I don't know if i have an account at PB troubleshooter, I will log in and
investigate.

As for deleting the audio driver from safe mode start up. This machine
won't respond to the choices options for safe mode when F8 is tapped on boot
up, another quirk.

I have uninstalled the sigma tel driver using device manager.

That Cd you mentioned. I saw a link to create a CD boot disk, is that what
you meant ? It did not help me much earlier.

It will be tomorrow before I do much more as it is getting on here and I
have other stuff to do. Thank you for your effort so far, I will correspond
soon.

KP
 
Here's the progress or lack of at 9pm my time.

I have managed to boot up in safe mode and I think I have managed ot
uninstall all the drivers for all audio devices using add remove prgs. I
have also physically removed the new PCI soundcard.

Before I reboot, device manager is now reading that there is no Sigma or PCI
sound

I opened an account for troubleshooting at PB. As much use as a chocolate
fireguard.

The only thing i have not gone messing with is the BIOS settings.

KP
 
9:30 pm my time

I rebooted and it began to look promising. Firstly Windows said it was
looking for a multimedia audio controller, then the Sigma tel C major audio.
It then failed to find a file which I located using search.

Bottom line NO SOUND and I still get an error if I try to play one through
Windows Media Player

KP
 
ok, so as of now you are in windows normal mode and there is no sound device
loaded and there is no audio drivers loaded as well. Now with the cd for
your pc, locaate and find the audio setup program. The setup will not only
install the sound device but will install the audio driver as well.
 
you said you removed the pci sound card? i thought you said in a prior msg
that you did not have a sound card because i asked if you had 2 sets of
jacks....

if you have a sound card, then you need to install it and use its setup cd...

look at the sound card and see if there are any scribings on it that
refers/reads if there are irq settings....
 
No i don't have my original CD I wish I had...

databaseben said:
ok, so as of now you are in windows normal mode and there is no sound device
loaded and there is no audio drivers loaded as well. Now with the cd for
your pc, locaate and find the audio setup program. The setup will not only
install the sound device but will install the audio driver as well.
Click to expand...
 
according to the website, you can create the cd by downloading it to the hard
drive and then transferring it to a cd r or cd rw.... however, you may not
need the cd.


i would attempt to install that pci card you removed.

It was a good move that you took it out when you rebooted. Windows was
looking for it and since it could not find the multimedia device, windows may
have removed the driver or disabled it.

Install the pci card and make sure it is screwed down tight. did you get a
cd setup for that card? it would have the drivers you need.

however, sometimes pc makers use a variety of sound card manufacturers.
what you can do is to read somewhere on the card for the manufacturer or the
brand. then visit that website and download the drivers from there too.

It may be possible to consider that if you had to reinstall your windows
because you were having problems, then the culprit could have been a bad or
unstable sound card...
 
Tomorrow I shall reinstall the PCI card. It was brand new this morning and
so yes, I do have the manufacturers disc.

The downloadable Cd from PB was just a boot disk. When i used it, the PC
then asked for the master CD 1 which I never had.

I once had to reinstall windows and I used a Flopy (now lost) to boot then
the files were on a hidden partition. I have no idea how to get to them. I
followed loads of options at PB and all failed.

Nuff for one day, i have now put in about 18 hours on this computer.

Thanks for the help so far.

KP
 
sometimes alt+f10 after the pc powers on will engage a boot from the hidden
partition, if there is one. in there you could have the original
configuration that can restore your hd. but usually this is for laptops and
not for desktops. however, it will delete everything that is not original.

there are some motherboards that do not have an on board sound system and
instead will include a sound board.
 
8am Sunday.

Alt F10 didn't work I am afraid.

I uninstalled the Sigma Tel audio driver and then refittred the new PCI
sound card.

On boot up Windows picked up and found multimedia controlelr but also
installed sigma tel driver as well as PCI driver. Still no sound.

despite device manger reporting these items are working OK, I am puzzled
that if you go into control panel and sounds, this reports there is no audio
device shown and the options are greyed out, so you can't choose one.

whilst i am not up on this sort of thing, i am convinced something before
the drivers is missing in the initialisation ???

I feel all we are doing is going round in circles.

As PB don't work weekends, i will try to get hold of them and see if I can
get a recovery disc or ascertain if the recovery files are still on the PC.
I am loathe to wind the PC back to 2003 and lose a majority of programs, but
it seems it is all we have open to us don't you think ?

KP
 
Noon.

I have asked a friend witha similar machine to make a recovery floppy, but I
don't think he did the job right as it doesnt boot and has some tools but
not what appears to be right.

I have spent 10 minutes on the phone to PC world support st the = of $ 3
minute only to be told information I either already know or which is not
pertinent to this machine.

I have another pal who is going to post me his red recovery floppy in the
hopes this will work, but I am sceptical.

As you can probably tell, i am at my wits end with this now. I have no more
options open (at least that I can think of).

KP
 
By the way I learned from the web site that Packard Bell want 45 pounds ($ 90
) for a set of recovery disks.

KP
 
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