Missing drivers and unknown motherboard.

Hi all.

I dislike to add another missing drivers question to the forum, but I don't seem to be making much progress on my own and would really appreciate the help.

We have a fairly old MECER Laptop running XP Home. I reformatted it not too long ago but I'm having a bit of trouble installing the correct sound drivers again. I have installed a program by the name of Everest and attached the report from that.

It seems a little worrying that Everest can't figure out what the name of the Motherboard that the computer is running is. I hope that isn't a problem?

Oh, and I also found this code via device manager: VEN_8086&dev_24c5
and this code via startup: i845-1ABHI016-Y2KC

(I'm just trying to provide any useful information, sorry if I provided the wrong stuff!)

Any help or ideas will be much appreciated!

 

See if this driver works for you. It would help also if you could give the subsys number after the device.

For Example VEN_8086&DEV_24c5&SUBSYS_03028086

http://downloadcenter.intel.com/Det...indows XP Home Edition*&DownloadType=Drivers

 

@tgell - I tried downloaded and tried to install the driver you suggested, but get the error message: "Device Object not present, restart the system and run setup again."

A bit more info:
VEN_8086&DEV_24C5&SUBSYS_90111584&REV_02
VEN_8086&DEV_24C5&SUBSYS_90111584
VEN_8086&DEV_24C5&CC_040100
VEN_8086&DEV_24C5&CC_0401

From underneath the laptop:
Mecer Personal Computer:
Model No. 755118

Thanks the help.

 

See if this driver works for you. It has the same Vendor and Device ID. Also the subsystem number.

 

Hmm. I tried and it installed fine, and restarted.. but it doesn't seem to make any difference. The computer is still not playing any sound whatsoever.

 

Is the yellow exclamation mark under sound still in Device Manager?

 

Nope. It shows up as if it was perfectly installed (normal icon) under 'Sound, video and game controllers.'

(A note: I tried the realtek AC97 drivers earlier today. They installed, but showed a question mark or exclamation mark next to the device in Device Manager.)

 

Is the speaker icon showing up in the system tray? What happens when you run dxdiag? Does it show any errors?

 

By speaker icon, I guess your meaning volume control? I can see that.

Dxdiag doesn't give any errors display any errors when I run it. I can't hear any sounds when I click test sound, though.

 

If you double click on the speaker, you should get another window showing a mixer. Select playback. Are all of the sliders at maximum? When you go into sounds in Control Panel, is a playback device selected?

http://smart-butler.com/images/sounds_applet_bluetooth.gif

 

A playback device is selected in Control panel, and the sliders in volume control are also set to a max. (I made sure I was looking at playback, too.)

I've attached a screenshot of what I see.

 

If you go into Services, is the Windows Audio Service enabled?

 

Yeah, it seems to be running fine. I stopped and started it to see if it did anything and I still don't get any sound.

 

Go into Device Manager and Right Click your sound device. Under the Driver tab select update driver. Check "No, not at this time" and select next. In the next window check "Install from a list or specific location". Click next. In the next window check "Don't search, I will choose the driver to install". Click next. Then Uncheck "show compatible devices" In the left pane, is there a listing called "Intel"? If so, highlight it and in the right pane look for something called Intel AC97 controller. Highlight it and select next.

 

We have progress of sorts. At first it didn't seem like anything had changed, but I decided to try my headset.. which works, hearable, but a bit soft compared to what it sounds like when plugged into my desktop PC. I unplugged my headset and noticed the laptop is actually emitting sound.. although incredibly softly that it is hard to notice.

I'm a little confused as to whether it was working before now or not, as it is honestly hard to pick up that anything is actually playing unless your using the headset and I must just not have noticed.. or perhaps we are just on the right track?

 

This is about the last thing I can think of that might work. In that zip file you downloaded, the 14.8MB download (post#4), there is a folder called WinXP. Extract that to the desktop in an admin account. Go into device manager and select update driver. Then do everthing as before but instead of selecting Intel from the left pane, press the Have Disk button and then browse to the inf file in the WinXP folder. There are two in the folder. The one you want to select is the VIAUDOEM.INF file, not the other one.

 

Boy, did I ever mess up. I googled your computer and came across this.

http://www.mecer.co.za/

Then I went to the drivers page.

Notebooks > Discontinued > 755IIx

And here is the audio driver. Along with all the others.

http://downloadcenter.mustek.co.za/list.php?dir=Repository/Notebooks/Discontinued/755IIx/Ver1.2/

I am downloading the audio driver to verify that your vendor and device ID are in the inf file.

 

I'm not too sure if that changed anything. The laptop is still playing very very softly, though well enough via headphones.

I'm happy with this, though! I usually use headphones, regardless, so to have sound again is wonderful. If anyone does find anything related to fixing it completely, I'll be very grateful.

However.. perhaps the internal speakers are just old and dying? The laptop is a good few years old.

Thank you for all your help, time and assistance, tgell. It is much appreciated!

 

Did you see my previous post about drivers for your laptop from the manufacturer?

 

Hehe, yeah. I just saw that now. The post I made was in regards to the one before that.. I'm downloading the new drivers now and will let you know if it works.

YOU messed up? I messed up! I feel like a bit of a nut for not looking properly on mecer's website myself. Lets hope this works!

 

Sadly, no change. It is still very very soft through the speakers and decent through the headphones. It was worth a shot, though. The driver turned out to be a version of the via driver we had tried earlier.

Just a question though, besides from this audio driver.. I haven't really installed anything since I reformatted. Do you think the low volume problem could be a result of a chipset or something else that is needed?

Now that I have that mecer page I can install pretty much all of them.

Regardless, though, thanks a ton!

 

That is a good point. It couldn't hurt to try the Chipset install to see if it helps. I was just wondering. Is there any key on the laptop that adjusts speaker volume?

 

Oh.. good grief..

...
....
......

I just had a very good look at the laptop.. and what do you know, there is a volume slider on the right side. Turned that up, and bingo.. sound!

I'm just going to go hide under a rock and cry..

Seriously, though.. I'm so so sorry for not thinking of that. Forgive me? :<
On the bright side, you've still helped me locate the driver page for this old machine, thanks!

Still.. to the rock I go!

 

No problem. Glad you got everything sorted out. Computers are known to cause high blood pressure. :-D

 

Aye, I can believe that.

I just feel a bit like those people in those stories who phone tech support about problems starting their computer only to find out they needed to plug it in.

Argh.. still, I'm very happy this is all sorted out.
Thanks again!