Sound card not detected...

The system sound card is no longer present. Aside from a driver reinstall is there anything else I can do...

*sigh*

I made it 2 days before there was a problem.

I ran a full Dell diagnosis and it found no prolems. I tried uninstalling the creative software and reinstalling it but it won't reinstall because the device isn't present.

Only nvidia audio devices are listed in the device manager.

Doing an alienrespawn. If that doesn't fix it I guess I gotta call Dell.

I did the restore and it still wasn't working.

I closed the lid and opened it and again, because that's what I did when it stopped working. I closed the lid and went and did something and came back and opened it and the sound card was missing and my mouse wasn't working. I restarted the system and the sound card wasn't there.

I tried to shut down and it stalled on the windows shutting down screen.

After I closed and open the lid again the sound card was there but the speakers and headset weren't working. I restarted and the restart stalled. Held down the power button to force shut down and when it came back everything is working.

I know the mic pick ups are on the lid by the web cam. Is there any other reason that closing the lid would kill the sound card? I hoping I don't have a loose connection in the hinge that is shorting out my sound card.

 

24 hours and it hasn't happened again. Here to hoping the respawn cleared it up and I just needed a reboot to make it stick.

 

when this happens does the the volume icon in the lower right hand corner of the task bar have a red mark out over it ? Are you plugging in external speakers, headphones, HDMI connections etc ?

 

It has a red x. It's happening with or with out headphones plugged in. If you go into the Device Manager the Sound Blaster Recon 3di is no longer listed under Sound, Video and Game Controllers.

 

When you right click on the volume button in the system tray you should get a menu, and one of the menu options should be "playback devices" when you click that option you should have a window pop up with the types of playback devices you have. Make sure you have a Green Check mark on the "Speakers/Headphones IDT High Definition Codec" It should say "Default Device" in gray underneath. Have you checked that ?

If you dont see your device, you can also right click and show disabled or disconnected devices. If it still dose not become available then you might have a short/lose connection somewhere ? Let me know how it comes along.

 

When I right click there are no devices listed. There are not disabled devices listed. It's like the sound card is gone, which is strange because it's on the motherboard.

It's working now after a system restore, but I'm worried there might be a short in the wiring going to the mic array on the lid because it happened after I closed and opened the laptop.

 

Well what makes this difficult is you are able to see the card after a system restore, but then it disappears. Can you narrow it down to weather its closing the lid that's causing the issue ? I'm not sure how that could create the short as the speaker wires are not up front with the display. I could be wrong, you might want to ask Brother Stevie or Fox but I'm sure the only wires in next to the display are the actual display power, video and wireless antennas. I've taken the ting apart like 6 times.. I should know this by now! Anyhow Have you tried doing a complete FRESH install instead of system restore ? If the problem continues after that (if you installed all the drivers properly) then I would bet its hardware or a short for sure. And at that point your gonna have to have a tech out to your house.

 

After reboot i got a message about OSD application crash then my sound icon got crossed. When i try to install Recon3d drivers it says it cannot detect device for these drivers. What to do?

AMD Drivers 12.5 Beta modded - tried to reinstall drivers - didn't helped...

I have the same problem for now lol. Just after restart got OSD application crash notification and a red cross on sound icon... Uninstalled recon drivers but i can't install them again because it seems like recon3d is not here What it might be?

Now its working after turn off and turn on... very strange.. maybe thats because of amd drivers?

 

I don't have an AMD card. Something weird is going on.

 

Have you tried to turn off/on or you just did alienrespawn?

 

I rebooted and it was still gone. I did the respawn and it was still gone after that reboot. I did a third reboot and it came back and has been back for several days now.

 

Well that's good to hear. Honestly at this point I would have done my own install instead of using a image. I personally think a clean install is better than a cloned/image install. And from everything you said there is/was something wrong. I'd do a complete CLEAN install using the windows installation disk. Then install all drivers off the utility disk with the exception of the video card (I personally like mine directly from the manufacture) Then if it happens again I'd get Dell on the phone. Is there a reason you keep using respawn instead of clean install ? If your worried about losing the Alienware look and feel I can help you restore all that. Its real easy

 

If I loose the sound again I'll do a clean install, but honestly I've been rather happy with the factory install from Dell. I uninstalled McAffee and Power DVD and everything else has been working great.

I looked for the Nvidia drivers but the geforce.com site says I have to get drivers from my manufacturer and the ones on Dells site are the newest.

 

Just happened again. *sigh* No sound card present. I tried to launch Skyrim and it wouldn't launch properly, so I tried to restart the system and it stalled on the shutting down screen. Held down the power button and restarted it and the sound card is no longer there.

 

I opened and closed the lid about 5 times and the sound card icon in the system tray came back to normal. I tried to play a test sound and nothing played. I restarted and everything is working again.

Anyone have ANY idea why it would be doing this? At least I didn't have to system restore this time.

Possible problems:
1: Short on the mic cable running to the pick up on the lid. I played music and adjusted the lid back and forth for about 30 seconds and there was no interruption. So I'm thinking this is unlikely. If this is what's going on itwould not be good and might need a return.
2: Windows is powering down the sound card when it goes to sleep mode and it's not powering up properly when the system comes back. If it happens again I'll power down instead of just restarting and see if that solves it. I looked through the power settings and the only option that might apply is for pcie Link State Power Management and that is disabled.

I don't want to have to reinstall windows because that is always a PITA.

 

Seems to be an IRQ conflict?

 

There was a announcement on these boards that a bios update would fix this issue for R2 owners. The only problem is that the link they provided is for bios AO1, which is the bios we already have. I'm hoping something proper is coming down the pipes soon when they figure out they haven't actually posted a new bios for us at all.

 

This thread needs to be looked at by Alienware reps carefully.

 

I have this problem with my m14x r2. Sound card loads sometimes and other times it does not. Sometimes the system hangs when trying to shut down and then when you power on again the sound card is gone. Then it stays absent for a while no matter how many reboots. Randomly it will appear when I reboot the following day. Anyway, I tried a clean install with my Alienware windows disk and the problem still persists. Did a Bios update to A03 and it still is happening. Truly frustrating!!

 

Hello Everyone,

I am curious of, what actions you have set in power management when you close lid. Sleep? Hibernate? etc?

Thank you,
Monnie

 

This is a well documented (known) issue. My first M18x R2 with 7970M CF Bios A01 had this issue. The fix was supposed to be the A03 BIOS but it wasn't always successful, you either need a replacement or motherboard exchange/BIOS flash.

 

Try this and let us know if it worked properly.

 

I've been using the A03 bios for a while now and this problem continues to happen. Now that I know how to fix it, (the lid close open 3x trick) I haven't been complaining on here but it would be nice if we could get a bios update to fix this Alienware-L_Porras.

 

Same issue for me. What's this 3 times screen open and close solution?

Also on A03. Out of interest do you have a killer 1103 inside as well?

Wondering about a potential conflict somewhere.

 

I installed the 1103 after I had the laptop for a month and it was doing this before I installed it.

I'm able to get me sound card to reappear if i close the lid and wait for the screen to shut off and then open it and resume the machine.

After I do this 3 times the sound card usually reappears.

It has always disappeared for me after I open the lid and resume it as well. I don't think it's ever disappeared while I was in the middle of something.

 

Resuming from S3 mode has always been problematic for various types of computer hardware. You can have two identical machines and one will sleep and resume without issue and the other can have all manner of problems doing so. Try disabling sleep in your High performance power profile and shut down your machine when you are finished using it. If this cures the problem, look for an option to disable power saving features for the audio device. You may be able to locate an option for that somewhere in the Control Panel utility for the sound card.

 

Yup...seems to be something to do with the source. Putting the PC to sleep and then coming out of it solved the audio problem. Thought it may be related to my 1103 issues (only connects to about 25% of wifi networks) as that problem yesterday seemed to have solved itself...although I then noticed the audio problem. Spent a day working with wifi fine, but no audio. I rebooted a few times over the day to try and fix the audio...late in the day the wifi suddenly stopped working, but then the audio was back. Circles.

What was that about a potential mobo replacement - is this the solution needed? Hope not, but I also hope to have a fully functional laptop. It's quite embarrassing when I have to make apologies in front of my clients for my fancy Alienware PC not working like any regular PC would. I've had this several times for the wifi issue and now for not being able to Skype.

 

Hmmmm...methinks this is hardware. I've got a triple boot system, and if I boot into any of them I have the sound card problem. Time to talk to Dell.

 

I changed the action for closing the lid from sleep to hibernate. Might be a bit more time to get going after I open the lid but at least I'll have sound when I do. I couldn't find any setting for the power settings for the sound card. There was nothing in device manager or power settings.

I wish Alienware would respond. The bios update was suppose to fix this. I don't want a mobo replacement because everything else with the machine is fine. On site seems not likely for me because I live in a small town in Saskatchewan Canada.

 

Even if you are already running the A03 BIOS try reflashing it. That fixed the problem for good on my bro's m14x.

 

Hibernation has some problems, too. But, it saves data to HDD and shuts down the system and sleep simply lowers power. I'm glad to know that helped. It proves it is a problem related to sleep, and ultimately a power-related issue. As mentioned, this is a very common problem with all kinds of hardware.

Look for something in Windows Control Panel, not necessarily in Device Manager or the power profile. The M18x R1 has different hardware, but here is an example of something similar you should have in the Control Panel. See example image... The IDT Audio app has a way to disable power management. Your SoundBlaster audio probably does as well.


(click to enlarge image)

 

I updated my M17x R4 bios to A05 and it fixed the problem.

 

Not to keep this thread too active, but I may have come up with a solution. I have flashed A03 twice and the problem still occurs. But I just had a thought that maybe the issue was a conflict in the order of the drivers.

This fixed it once for me (hopefully others can confirm or tell me whether I bring false hope):
- through control panel, disable the HD audio controller that has the yellow exclamation or cross next to it (can't remember how it shows up but simply right click and choose disable).
- right click and disable the HD audio controller that doesn't have an issue.
- then re-enable the one that had issues - on mine it enabled perfectly once the other was disabled.
- then re-enable the second one...also this enabled with no issues

Straight away brought my sound back. Can someone else confirm this works for them?

Not sure of a permanent solution, but hopefully this identifies the source of the conflict.

 

Hi,
I have an Alienware M17x R4.
And I have the same problem.
It happen more than 5 times now even I had Windows 7 Ultimate 64bit and even with my Windows 8 Pro 64bit.
No solution have been found also I have problem with the ejection button of my CD drive it doesn't work on windows 8 only on windows 7.
There is many problems with this computer and specially on windows 8.
Also my BIOS version is A10.
I had also problem with my WIFI killer 1103 network card but I solved easy by re-installing the drivers every time that I had problem.
The same problem that I had with my Ati Radeon HD7970M I solved the problem by re installing the drivers.
But the sound card is dissapeard and the drivers cant see it and I cant re install it.
I don't know what I must to do.
Please if anyone know anything help me.
Thank you.

 

Please send me a PM with your service tag, phone number and I'll check the available options to get a resolution.

 

My m18x r2 does this every few weeks. Removing the battery and holding down the power button to drain the board of charge fixes clears it up. It happens at such odd times I sympathize with Dell tech's frustration with diagnosing and fixing the issue. Personally I've given up on fixing all the little things with my machine (dpc latency still something my machine suffers from for example) since its out of warranty.

Nowadays I just focus my energy on enjoying my machine when it does work. I've uploaded my personal fix for sli flicker, for example, and I'm pretty much burnt out with all the troubleshooting.

Dell has replaced my system several times in the past, so I commend them on trying to make things right. I hope the best for Dell as they go through with tough choices they're currently facing as the company through their latest transition.

To the rest of you seeking perfection from your m18x's, I salute you.

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For further discussion on Soundblaster Recon3Di issue, please visit this thread: http://forum.notebookreview.com/ali...questions-here-m18x-r2-m17x-r4-audio-fix.html