[nicthemighty]

Asus p7p55-m mobo, windows 7 64bit:

I updated my BIOS to attempt to fix a video issue, as suggested by XFX. Now my onboard sound isn't outputting anything. Latest drivers installed, windows recognises card, BIOS has enabled onboard sound. Green bar shows in Windows volume control when I'm playing music, but no sound on speakers. Speakers work fine on a different input source.

[aliasme]

Judging from your description of the problem, your audio hardware is properly installed, so the problem is most likely to be driver-related.

Try this for a quick fix: uninstall your audio driver, then reboot the system. Next, download and reinstall the LATEST audio drivers; the ones you're using now might not be compatible with the BIOS upgrade you just performed. With a little luck, that will solve the problem, but if it doesn't, read on...

Download the motherboard chipset drivers from the motherboard website (XFX, is it? Good products, from what I've seen of them), then reinstall the chipset drivers. As a registered user at XFX, you won't have any problem getting the chipset drivers...

There is a SLIGHT chance that reinstalling the chipset drivers will "break" other component systems; the video might revert to 640 x 480, the audio might not work, and so on. IF that happens (NOT LIKELY, but you never know with Windows drivers), simply reinstall the affected drivers.

Keep this in mind; Windows does a LOT of housekeeping every time programs or drivers are installed or uninstalled. REBOOT THE SYSTEM EVERY TIME you do an installation or uninstallation of drivers, or you could have ALL KINDS of weird problems. Don't say I didn't warn you; REBOOT WINDOWS to finish deleting old files every time you make those types of changes, and you'll avoid conflicts caused by mixing old and new driver files. NOT rebooting is the single biggest cause of problems when installing and uninstalling drivers, and complicated programs such as AV and firewall utilities.

Be sure to let us know how this turns out.

[nicthemighty]

Sorry, should have mentioned - XFX is my graphics card (8600 gts). Asus is mobo.

I will uninstall/reinstall latest audio and chipset drivers for mobo - and see what happens.

Out of interest, is it possible that the BIOS update messed up the onboard sound, or will this definitely be a driver issue?

[aliasme]

Well, there are only a FEW ways that the BIOS update could have caused this:

1. The BIOS update PHYSICALLY damaged the onboard soundchip; NOPE!

2. The BIOS update PHYSICALLY damaged the motherboard chipset; NOPE!

3. The BIOS update is incompatible with the audio drivers; POSSIBLE

4. The BIOS update is incompatible with the mobo chipset; POSSIBLE

5. The problem is COMPLETELY unrelated to the BIOS update; VERY POSSIBLE

Regardless of the cause, reinstalling the audio drivers will PROBABLY fix the problem, so whether the BIOS caused this or not, the problem will most likely be solved. You updated the BIOS and the sound stopped working, even though the hardware seems to be detected by Windows; that indicates that the BIOS update is at least partly to blame for this problem, though it isn't carved in stone. Windows breaks FREQUENTLY; why? because it is WINDOWS, not Linux. Windows can break because the moon changed phases; it can break because a butterfly died, it can break because of the worldwide global conspiracy against... wait, did I type that out loud, or only think it?

The point is, Windows breaks; all operating systems do at some point or another. We'll probably never know whether the BIOS update broke the audio or chipset drivers, or if an AV update did it, or a Windows update running in the background killed your sound, or WHAT the actual cause was, unless someone can duplicate the exact same problem using the exact same hardware and software installed on your system. IMO, it simply isn't worth losing sleep over. Let's try to fix it without resoldering every component on the motherboard; if installing the latest drivers fixes the problem, you can call this one SOLVED and prepare for the NEXT time Windows decides to break. It WILL happen...

Good luck; let us know how this turns out.

[nicthemighty]

Hi, I got home today and reinstalled the drivers - uninstalled, rebooted, installed, rebooted.

Still no sound.

I noticed when Windows starts up, it makes a pop when it should play the startup noise.

I also made an Ubuntu live cd, and that makes the same popping noise when it should be making noise.

Any ideas what could be wrong now? Thanks so much for the help so far though!

[aliasme]

Using the Ubuntu live CD was a smart move; I hesitated to suggest it, but I'm partial to Puppy Linux anyway... Now we know that the hardware is the most likely culprit. Still, it was worth a shot to eliminate the drivers before looking for bad news...

Try to play a MUSIC CD, then a DVD movie (if you have one handy), then an MP3 file directly from your HDD. If your optical drive has a headphone jack, plug in some headphones while a disc is playing music; do you hear anything? Next, plug the headphones into the headphone jack on the back of the motherboard; do you hear anything there? Make notes of when you hear sound, and when you don't; you might not hear sound under ANY conditions.

It IS possible that your audio chipset committed suicide recently (NOT related to the BIOS update), so open the case and find the soundchip. It should be within a few inches of the ports on the motherboard, but that isn't ALWAYS the case. Look at it CLOSELY and CAREFULLY (using a flashlight and a magnifying glass is the best way), to see if it is discolored, burned, cracked, or otherwise physically damaged. I've seen this happen a few times over the years, mostly on Compaq, Dell, E-Machines, Gateway, HP, and Packard Bell systems; the chipsets were from various producers. The board makers don't make their own audio chips, they simply buy them and solder them to the mobos.

As I mentioned in my previous reply, this very possibly could be unrelated to the BIOS update; I've seen audio chips turn crispy right before my eyes, and it is entirely possible that yours smoked without your knowledge. Your system fans would have dissipated the "evidence" rather quickly, and if it happened while you were out of the room, you wouldn't be likely to find out until you actually tried to play sound.

The drivers have been updated, so now the best case scenario here is that the audio jack for the speakers has a cold-solder joint, or is otherwise defective, causing this problem. That can be repaired with a soldering iron, solder, flux, and some common sense; if the chip is defective, you'll have to install a soundcard and disable the onboard chip in the CMOS Setup program.

[nicthemighty]

Hi again,

I could not get any sound from any audio source :-( However, I disabled on-board sound and installed an old pci soundcard - all works perfectly. I'm happy to buy a cheap new creative card and install that.

The thing I'm worried about, is this is a brand new build - and I can't directly see any issues on the board - saying that, I'm not totally sure I can find the audio chip (unless it's under the jack connections?) As for the jacks, the jack detection was working fine, just no sound through them - both back and front ports. Should I go through the ropes and try to get the mobo replaced, or just leave it and use a soundcard?

[Rich-M]

If it were me, I would flash the bios to the old bios and then take other steps to handle any video problems. It sounds a little odd to me to make a bios update to help a pci-x video card anyway. Whatever the issue was, sounds like it was a driver issue or perhaps the card needs replacing. I would worry if the sound was affected, there may be more issues from the bios update.

[nicthemighty]

XFX recommended a BIOS update - so it wasn't that Asus released a BIOS for pci-x. It can't be a driver issue because it spans multiple OSes.

How do I downgrade the mobo bios? I used Asus easy flash to update it, but that won't let me do a downgrade.

[aliasme]

I just realized that I never asked you if you updated the motherboard BIOS, or the videocard BIOS? Both of them have BIOS chips, and each chip is flashable to upgrade the BIOS with a new version when needed. I don't understand why XFX would suggest upgrading the mobo BIOS; are you sure they didn't want you to flash the videocard BIOS instead? Please check into that and let us know...

You should have a motherboard manual from Asus; use it to locate the position of the onboard soundchip. The chip will probably have small connectors nearby where you could connect an analog audio cable. Most soundchips are fairly small, about the size of your smallest fingernail, so try to find it. There are a limited number of chips the right size on the motherboard, and you really should know how to identify some of them, so give this a shot.

I would NOT try to change the motherboard BIOS again just yet; first, find out if the videocard has a newer version of the BIOS available, and see if you can locate the soundchip. You can learn a LOT rather quickly from doing this, so give it the old college try and let us know what you find out.

[nicthemighty]

Sorry, it was the Motherboard bios. This was the message I got from XFX regarding my video issue:

"Hi, thanks for your message, we are not aware of any issues of this type Nic, but best pllace to check fopr known issues may be an AV or video card forum, like the nvidia based NVForum or bjorn3d or Guru3d, which are all popular with nvidia users. Is the asus p7p55-m your new mainboard? Do you have the latest mainboard drivers and BIOS installed? As the 8600 was OK with this monitor previously, this does suggest the new hardware, so i would look at this aspect first and foremost as the cause of the problem? kind regards, james"

The issue it turns out is with the monitor, not the video card - so I never really needed to play with any bios or video drivers - presumably I don't need to mess with video bios either?

When I get home, I'll check the mobo manual for the chip, and post back with the result.

Thanks again so much for your help!

[aliasme]

Well, now we might be getting closer to solving this. If it ain't broke... so best to leave the videocard BIOS alone.

We still need your input about the soundchip, so I'll be watching for your next update. In the meantime, keep punching; you're learning as you go, which is good.

[Rich-M]

The Asus site should have all bios listed not just the newest and it sounds like you need to return to an earlier one, even if you have to do it manually.