Toughest Computer Problem Yet - I'm Completely Stumped!

[NetCadet]

Hi Guys,

I think I've finally found a seemingly simple problem I can't solve with anything shy of a reformat...

It started with a friend's computer not playing sound anymore. A quick look in the device manager reveals that the sound card has an exclamation point next to it. Windows reports that the card cannot be found, or all the drivers are not installed properly. Fine, I decide to simply re-seat the card in the ISA slot and reinstall the drivers...same problem.

Hrmm...alright, I'll just swap it for another sound card. (The original was an old Sound Blaster Pro, FYI) First, I decided to swap it for a Sound BLaster 16 PNP - Windows detects the card on startup - victory! Drivers install flawlessly - no exclamation points or anything in device manager. I plug in headphones to test the sound, and I hear a lot of background "hissing" noise. Alright, well, let's try playing a sound anyway...Windows reports that the sound card is in-use. What? In-use? But all its doing is hissing!

I get fed up after trying about everything I could think of, and throw in a third sound card, this time a Yamaha, which should be able to play multiple sound streams. Once all the drivers are installed, I hear the same "hissing" sound on the headphones. Trying to play a sound reveals no error message, but also no sound - just the same hissing.

I have scoured the internet for similar problems with no luck, and have tried everything I can possibly think of shy of reformatting the system. I can't figure out why it would affect ever sound card I install in the system! Could it be that some of the DLLs associated with playing WAV files were corrupted or erased?

If any of you have any ideas, please post them!

Thanks!

 

[tornadobox]

ok let's start with the simple stuff (you most likely already have done all this, but it's good to check them off just incase):


when you put in the new cards, did you remove all the drivers/software from the previous cards?

are you sure you have the headphones plugged into the correct spot on the sound card?

are you sure the sound outputs aren't muted in the sound control panel?

 

[NetCadet]

Yes, yes, and yes.

I've just looked at the system a little more. I've installed the SB16 PnP, as I believe that will be the easiest to get working (however I also believe that all three cards not working is linked to the same problem). MIDI files play fine, as well as CD audio, so I know the card is configured properly and the headphones are plugged in to the right port.

Any attempts to play a WAV file result in Windows reporting that "Another program is playing sound" blah blah blah and refuses to work. Looking in the Volume Control window, nothing important is muted, and the Wave Out slider has a green bar beside it to indicate the level of sound being played through the Wave Out channel. The green bar should of course be completely unlit unless I am playing a sound file, however it is reading about 30% of max constantly - this is the "hissing" which I can hear over the headphones.

I've just tried disabling all the startup programs - perhaps one of them is playing a sound file that has been corrupted or something and is not exiting properly. I find this doubtful, however, as the hissing seems to start just before Windows finishes loading (probably right about the time Windows loads the sound drivers and components).

 

[NetCadet]

Alright - one of the startup programs was attempting to play a sound file, but that is not the problem.

Whenever a WAV file is played in any of the sound programs in Windows: the slider does not move, the "hissing" that I spoke of before returns, and the file never finishes "playing" no matter how long the WAV file is, until I click the stop button manually. So, from this I can conclude that the program playing the WAV file on system startup suffered from this same problem and would just never stop playing, creating the error message stating that the sound card was already in use. So, that mystery has been solved.

Now, I have to figure out why it is doing this. I still believe that the culprit is an incorrect DLL or driver file...however I have no idea which one(s) are responsible. I have run the system file checker and all the system files check out okay. I don't understand what could be causing this...

 

[Hanpan]

In that case I would make sure that all your old sound drivers are completely removed.

 

[NetCadet]

Yep, I've made sure that none of the settings are conflicting....thanks though!

 

[kd7fhd]

Is the microphone plugged in and "hot"?

 

[NetCadet]

I don't have a microphone plugged in.

The previous sound card was completely removed from Device Manager before the new card(s) were installed. Drivers don't seem to be the problem...

I'm thinking now it could be something that was changed in the system.ini file...possible?

 

[Dreadogg]

did you try reinstalling directX or updating it ?

 

[spanky]

dude.. i had a similar problem before... i switched speakers and low and behold... problem solved. wierd... try it.

 

[NetCadet]

Alright - I had just given up and decided to do a reinstall of Windows when they told me that the sound disappeared shortly after they installed their new HP Scanner. On a whim, I tried uninstalling the scanner software and boom, sound works fine once again!

Now to figure out why sound + scanner = death!

Thanks for all the help guys!

 

[AKA]

Heh.. some of you guys dont read very well.

He could play audio cd's and midi just fine. Hence his sound card, speakers, headphones... etc are fine.

He couldnt play Wav files. So it means something with Windows is screwed up.

First go into sounds and set sound schemes to none. Could be the windows login sound is corrupt.. making it so you cant play any other afterwards.

Could be it has something to do with your sound codecs or something.

If you boot into safe mode and look in device manager under sound you might see alot more things you dont usually see in normal mode. Remove all those and restart to let it reinstall everything.

 

[MadRat]

Its more likely a resource conflict that Plug'n'Pray is unable to rectify.

 

[ahsumdude]

Delete all drivers from previous sound card install. Ie remove everything associated with the multimedia device. Then insert the card into a different slot on the MB. Win 98 really is Plug and pray. No pun intended.

 

[Ark]

Similar problems I had some times ago on different PCs:
- on-board sound chip got enabled
- on-board modem got enabled and conflicts with sound
- check autoexec and config for sound drivers - should not be anything, but sometimes junk in

 

[FishTankX]

Tip:Startmenu>programs>accessories>systemtools>systeminformation>tools>system file checker
This will scan for corrupted/altered system files.
Give it a go.