Audio and sound problems can become nerve racking on Microsoft operating systems. Sometimes your soundcard settings get changed seemingly by themselves and these general tips may help you to get sound working again. Also, these tips are productive on Microsoft Windows XP, Vista, 7, 8, 8.1, and 10.
Besides checking cables connected to your sound card or cables connected to your laptop, I will be covering tips within control panel. Many sound cards come with software besides just drivers. I recommend you install drivers and other software that comes with your sound card.
Many Original Equipment Manufacturers will add an “Audio Control Panel” within Microsoft Windows control panel. Depending on what make and model of soundcard you, you should see some additional sound properties in an audio control panel. Many times you can adjust what type of speakers you have.
Popular choices are:
* 2/2.1 speakers
* 4/4.1 speakers
* 5.1 speakers
* 7.1 speakers
* headphones
Sometimes you will inadvertantly pick the wrong speaker type. For example you only have two speakers and a woofer and you choose 7.1 speakers. This may cause you to not hear any sound at all.
This may cause you to only hear audio in certain programs. Setting your speaker configuration to match your physical speakers is one tip. Some sound card software has special effects that may cause issues.
You can disable these effects in audio control panel. Often times you can change a sample rating, which may cause issues. I recommend 44100 or 48000 KiloHertz.
However, you could also adjust the sampling rate and test out your audio before you finally choose a sampling rate you prefer. Sometimes you can adjust a bit rate. This can potential cause problems if for example a particular software does not support a specific bit count.
As a matter of fact a screen capture program called XShare does not support twenty four bit audio. I have a Sound Blaster Live twenty four bit soundcard in this computer I am writing this blog post with. XShare was my preferred screen capture program I used to make YouTube videos.
However, since this program does not support twenty four bit audio, it fails capturing audio in videos I record. I have not been able to figure out how to force this program to record in sixteen bit. That is a project for my to do list.
Anyways setting an audio bit rate that certain software does not support could be causing you problems. Another place in Microsoft windows operating systems that you can look to troubleshoot sound problems is in Windows sound or mixer. Perhaps it is as simple as your sound card being muted in Windows.
Perhaps you have the wrong soundcard or audio device selected. Another place to troubleshoot is in a “Sounds” tab. Windows XP by default does not have a sound scheme enabled.
What this means is that you won’t hear any audio until you choose a sound scheme. I think Windows Vista, 7, 8, 8.1, and 10 has a sound scheme selected by default. Perhaps by accident a sound scheme is not selected and that is why you are not hearing any sound.
Finally, you can always check your volume mixer in Windows XP, Vista, 7, 8, 8.1, and 10. Perhaps your volume was muted or you just want to troubleshoot why you don’t have any sound. These are just a few general tips, in case for whatever reason, you are not hearing any sound from your Microsoft Windows based computer.