M17x R2 No onboard speaker output after windows 10

Long story short... I upgraded to windows 10. Had everything working except xfire for certain games. I am 99% sure I had internal speaker audio after the upgrade. After windows showed activated, I reinstalled with clean install from USB media tool. After setting everything up and benchmarking a few times I started having display distortion when using crossfire. (had this issue before in windows 7 but I narrowed it down to the Xfire cable.) Disassembled the laptop and pulled one of the 7970m's to sell. After this is when I went to play some games to test stability without xfire and noticed I had no internal audio. The only other thing worth noting is when I was removing the one gpu, I damaged the power board ribbon cable so now I have to tilt the power board up and push the power button to turn the laptop on or the laptop will not power up. (new cable is already on the way) Now I am back on windows 10 everything functions except internal speaker audio. The strangest part of the whole issue is that even with no internal speakers working, as soon as I plug in headphones the IDT drivers recognize them and switch over and they work perfectly. so the sound card and sound board are working properly but the speakers have no output. Anyone have any ideas where to start?
Forgot specs.
m17x r2. 720qm, 8gb ram, 240gb mushkin ssd, 7970m clevo v1.2, RGB LED 1200P.

 

Interesting....

I would check to see no cables to the speakers have been detached as priority 1.
The location is towards the front of the unit which will require you to remove the plastic section where touchpad is. There are a few screws underneath near battery for those.

But then again if it was working before the upgrade then it should work after the upgrade so look for connections from speakers onto mainboard become loose or disconnected.
It will require time and effort but persevere it is a great notebook and this message was brought to you from one of the m17xr2 workhorses out there..

Good luck.

 

Like already said you can check the wires. However could be also linked to drivers related issues.
I experienced myself (on a M17xR4) some issues too with the audio and W10 ( see here for details at the end of the post). One easy and basic action you can start with is to check if your soundcard driver performs fine. Go into devices panel and select it; then change its driver in choosing to install (as a driver available on your machine) the "Windows Audio HD Device" (not sure it is the exact name).
Perhaps it can solve your issue even if you will likely also loose some options of your genuine soundcard driver (in my case I didn't care of them).

 

So heres the update. Tried reinstalling windows 7... still no speakers. Headphones and everything work with the dell drivers but no speakers. Tried reseating the GPU and checking the cables. Still nothing. Got the ribbon cable today, threw it in. Now all my volume controls work and the touchpad and power button are all back to normal. But still no speakers. Checked for gunk in the headphone port too. still no go... Im losing my mind here... please someone help me out.
One other major note, when booting the laptop and pressing F2 to get into the bios the laptop responds and goes into the bios but there is no "beep" like there usually is to signal that you pressed a key at boot. so i think this is way beyond drivers.

 

Well it seems i figured it out. I got super pissed off and just started gutting stuff lol. problem was quite obvious once i pulled back the black plastic protective coating on the sound card circuit board. [/IMG]

That is one completely burnt chip... being that its right beside the chip labelled IDT I'm willing to bet it has something to do with the sound card. Anyone with more knowledge here let me know but either way I've ordered a new board... hope it doesnt blow up too :S

 

Wow...

Terrific you found the cause


That chip(maxim) is a dual translator so it has an important function in voltage translation from the sound card.. Seems like someone accidentally dabbed a soldering iron onto the chip and fried it...

Let us know how the new board goes.
Good luck..

 

Nope. it actually blew from the inside out. I had to take the black plastic tape stuff off to view the damage and it had never been off before. I think what happened is my speakers that came with the laptop were blown. When I booted the laptop the first time into windows 10 the bootup noise was so loud i almost had a heart attack. This is I assume when it blew up. Swapped in new speakers and a new board and now even my card reader drivers are working too! These never would install in windows 10 before the new board... I have to assume it was due to this entire board being shorted out by the bad amplifier chip seen in the pic.
Everything is in and I am 100% windows 10 happy. (on 2 of my 3 alienwares now lol)