Lost Audio

Ok, here's the facts. Did some routine cleaning (a weekly chore) which included running CCleaner and the normal Glary applications. Afterward, I noted a lack of audio. Couldn't find anything wrong with my outboard equipment (I feed the audio into an external amplifier and thence to the speakers). Tried switching the input of the amp from the sound card to the motherboard's line out jack and still no audio. At that point, did a system restore to a time before the "housecleaning". Still no audio. At this point I'm at a loss and hope someone among this loyal gathering can be of help.

The machine's an 8-year-old homebuilt (I know; it's ancient) using an Asus K8V motherboard running Windows XP-3. 1.5G memory and Athlon 64 Processor. Audio card is a Creative Sound Blaster Live! series.

Can anyone tell me where to look for the problem?
Thanks for any suggestions.

SgtRon
the Old Curmudgeon

 

Have you tried going to Asus' web site to download and reinstall the audio driver?

 

Tried to download from the Asus website...they don't have K8VB boards listed. Tried to download driver to similar board and got error message. Did a search for driver for the Creative SB Live! sound card but when I installed it, got the
message indicating there was no such card in my machine. Strange...Belarc
Advisor can recognize it, though.
At this point, I'm scratching my head in bewilderment. Anyone have any other ideas?

SgtRon
the Old Curmudgeon

 

Unless you did something crazy like list *.dll or *.sys in the list of "junk" files to delete, it's extremely unlikely that CCleaner deleted your audio drivers. However, if CCleaner did not "see" your sound card the way your installer didn't "see" them, then it very likely that the program did delete the registry entries for the card/drivers. CCleaner makes backups of all the registry keys it deletes so you can restore the changes in the event of a bad outcome. The backups are kept in the \CCleaner\Reg Backups subdir. Browse to that directory, choose the file that corresponds to the date and time of the cleaning session, and double click it. This will merge all of the delete entries back into the registry. You'll probably have to reboot to see if it worked.

Good luck, bro

 

SgtRon, please disregard my last post. I somehow missed the part of your post where you did a system restore. Strangely enough, I've now lost audio as well :confused Sooooo frustrating. Any luck restoring your audio?

 

Rusty,
Now that's weird! Maybe there's an audio goblin running around loose. To answer your query; no, I haven't made any progress, yet. I suppose, given
the age of the machine, that it's possible something on the motherboard may have given up the ghost. :confused

SgtRon

 

Greetings, SgtRon.

Looks as if you (and rustysavage) have performed the steps I would have. My next would be to:

1. Boot into Safe Mode - any change in symptoms?

2. Boot to a Linux distro to try to verify if this is a Windows problem or if there's a hardware issue.

3. Does the K8V have onboard audio? If so, you might try uninstalling the Creative card and seeing if the onboard is working or not.

Also, have you tried the generic Microsoft audio Fix-its, and even trying a chipset driver reinstallation?

 

Also, open services.msc - is the Windows Audio Service running?

 

Caliban,

Yes, the Audio Service is running. Your previous post, however, has given
me a couple ideas which I'll try. Will keep you posted. (BTW, I didn't think
Occam's Razor needed sharpening) :-D

SgtRon
the Old Curmudgeon

 

try a usb to audio thingie.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Nw-Blue-Ext...pt=US_Sound_Card_External&hash=item46040ddba3

 

I've used these USB ones - the downside is they often have marginal sound quality and you usually have to adjust the volume using the controls on the USB stick.

Since you have a homebuilt tower, I would look for a PCI internal sound card. I've used this one a few times for replacement installs.

http://www.frys.com/product/6557563?site=sr:SEARCH:MAIN_RSLT_PG

 

Eureka! :hyper :clap Problem solved. I want to thank all you guys for your input during these vexing days. Apparently, I need a new sound card. Pulled the original and connected to the onboard audio out....still no audio. Tried to reinstall the
driver from the CD that came with the mobo, but it kept giving me error messages saying it couldn't find the driver. (??) So I went online and found the beta version of Soundmax's audio driver. Installed with no problems and, after a reboot, my audio is back. Just to make sure, I then reinstalled the sound card and heard nothing. So, once again, thanks to you all for your suggestions and help. May you all have a Very Merry Christmas and a most
prosperous New Year! :major

SgtRon
the Old Curmudgeon

 

Good to hear! Glad you're getting things sorted, SgtRon - thanks for the feedback.

Ha! In my case it does - every day, it seems. The old blade doesn't hold its edge quite like it used to...