Cant get sound from working speakers

Hi

I was staying at my mums for a while with my PC hooked up to my sound system. When I left I took the amp etc to use with my laptop. I have some spare desktop speakers which I thought would be OK for her ( Sony Mega Bass ) but I cannot get any sound. The speakers work fine with my laptop. I have checked all the mute boxes and its not that The sound card is apparently generic and according to trouble shooting is working fine. My uncle keeps sending her hurmous videos but she cant her them .

Any ideas ?

Joe

 

How many sound cards does she have? have you tried plugging in some headphones? I take it that your Amp worked fine and all you done is unplug your amp and plug in the new speakers?

Can you download Speccy from hereCreate a log and then post it back in your reply. Make sure you delete your windows serial from the log before you post it.

 

Hi Tueur

As far as I know just the one sound card but what it is I don't know the PC was shop built. The speakers were working fine and then I stored them away and plugged my amp in. and as you correctly assumed, everything was working fine. My mother wanted sound so I plugged in the Sony speakers and nothing, but they work fine in my laptop. Unfortunately no headphones at mothers.
Cant send specs as now back at my place but will be out there in the next few days and will post.

Thanks

Joe

 

I suspect the speakers aren't powerful enough. I've had speakers that work fine on some computers and then become so low in volume, even cranked up all the way, that they are unusable on another computer. A lot depends on the sound card. I simply get another set of speakers to use on the computer that produces almost no sound with the first set of speakers.

 

Hi Plodr,

Im sorry but I have to disagree. An amplifier takes an input signal and simply multiplies it up. Line out on a soundcard should run at -10dBu (from memory I thought it was -28dBu but wiki disagrees) and a line in will expect the same signal level See Wiki. Most poweramplifiers dont actually have a volume control but instead a pre-amp that will reduce or increase the signal going to a power amp. The only explanation for what you have experienced is that the PC is not outputting a true line out signal at -10dBu and thus it has the same effect as only having the amp partially turned up.

It is unlikely to be a driver issue. We have ruled out a hardware issue on the speakers. You really need to try and find some headphones or try plugging back in your amp to if that still works.

What operating system are you using? and just to double check (I know this is obvious) have you got it plugged into the right jack socket? There are two reasons for asking this.

1. when fiddling round at the back of PCs I have often plugged the audio jack into the wrong hole. It should be in a green one.

2. Your mums PC may have an onboard soundcard and a PCI card. You can have multiple soundcards installed and active but Windows will only address one at any time. You may have the jack plugged into the onboard soundcard which is near the VGA, USB and network cards, but windows is routing the audio out through the PCI card output, hence no sound. The speccy log will help identify this.

 

Hi Sorry this is all I could get on Speccy. As I mentioned before the speakers worked fine on the PC before

Operating System
MS Windows XP Home 32-bit SP3
CPU
AMD Athlon XP
Thoroughbred 0.13um Technology
RAM
1.25 GB DDR @ 133MHz (3-3-2-6)
Motherboard
http://www.abit.com.tw/ VA-10 (VIA KM400-VT8235) (Socket A) 50 °C
Graphics
(1024x768@1Hz)
Hard Drives
156GB Hitachi Hitachi HCP725016GLAT80 (PATA) 34 °C
Optical Drives
PIONEER DVD-RW DVR-109
CD-RW CDR-8S52
Audio
USB Audio Device


Audio
Sound Card
USB Audio Device
Playback Device
USB Audio CODEC
Recording Device
USB Audio CODEC


Joe

 

Have you tried plugging the old speakers that work back in?

 

Hi Teuer

I have just tried my Sennheiser ear phones and still no joy. I have tried in the aduio socket on the back of the stack and there is also a headphones input on the front but to no avail. I'm thinking soundcard but all indications are that it is working properly. I think this is one of those kicking yourself later problems

Joe

 

The information that you posted below suggests that you have a usb audio device. I suspect that you have two soundcards.

Go to Control Panel then sound and audio devices and click on the audio tab. The top box that says sound playback has a drop down box. This lists all your audio devices and tells you which one your audio is routed too. See what is listed in there and try the different options. You will need to restart any audio apps when you change the device.

 

Hi Teuer

I'm going to have to get you that new keyboard the amount of time you are spending trying to help

Both drop downs playback and recording have only one option USB Audio Codec.

Joe

 

Could Media Player be corrupted ?

 

Could you disable the drivers listed USB's in the control panel for audio. Re-start with the speakers plugged into the audio green port. See if it then reconizes the green port?

Any ! in the device manager in sound cards installed?

 

You could but I am a little confused why the "Onboard" sound is not listed. Disconnect all USB devices from the PC (Except mouse and keyboard if they are USB) and that will do the same thing as disabling in device manager.

If it still only shows USB audio then I think the driver is screwed and windows has somehow installed an incorrect driver. We can get round this though (hopefully).

PS. dont worry bout keyboard. I use my work one for any long posts!

 

To help. As I'm not an audio expert. I looked @ the M/B specs. I couldn't open the left one, but could on the right one on the manual. Wanted to look @ the board. See on the right for downloads.

-> http://www.abit.com.tw/page/en/motherboard/motherboard_detail.php?pMODEL_NAME=VA-10&fMTYPE=Socket A&pPRODINFO=Manual

The M/B has a 5 channel sound M/B installed. 1st time I've ever seen one like that. If you looked @ the file, it shows 5 ports for speakers. Lower right is the one you put the plug in for a simple speaker connection. It also shows a plug to install a digital output. Like installing a sound bar.

Also in that sight, you'll see drivers for the M/B sound.

Personally, I would. Take out the installed sound card. I would re-install the M/B driver after -> a look see in the device manager if it was ok. Hunt in the bios to see If I could ither disable the usb your seeing. Or see if the M/B sound was disabled when the card was installed. USB your seeing, as I don't know. Would it be the digital connector and called the USB on your Speccy?

I like Speccy, but use Bellarc Advisor along with it. Found here in this sight. Gives me somewhat diffrent info on whats installed where.

I apoigize for my previous post as I didn't do the research 1st on what you have. Shoot from the hip. Tueur, I hope the info here helps you figure out his prob.

 

http://www.abit.com.tw/page/en/motherboard/motherboard_detail.php?pMODEL_NAME=VA-10&fMTYPE=Socket+A

Wrong addy before, this is the one. 10 min allow to edit things and I passed the time allowed.

 

Good shout locodave. Thanks for the help.

The USB audio wount be the digital out as the driver relates to the chipset. I suspect that the usb audio is a webcam or other USB device that uses audio, which is why I say to remove all USB devices.

The Driver for your soundcard can be found here. Click on the link to download the zip file. Unzip it and run the setup utility.

Let us know how you go.