• Some users have recently had their accounts hijacked. It seems that the now defunct EVGA forums might have compromised your password there and seems many are using the same PW here. We would suggest you UPDATE YOUR PASSWORD and TURN ON 2FA for your account here to further secure it. None of the compromised accounts had 2FA turned on.
    Once you have enabled 2FA, your account will be updated soon to show a badge, letting other members know that you use 2FA to protect your account. This should be beneficial for everyone that uses FSFT.

Low volume output - why?

D

DellAxim

Gawd
Joined
Feb 14, 2003
Messages
999
Firstly, I have no idea what sound card I have without digging around, other than it's built into my cheap ECS motherboard. Running XP 64 bit, a lot of MP3 and video files that I have play with a very very low volume. I have the windows volume set at max and the volume of the player set at max, hooked up to headphones.

Now, if I play these same files in my laptop, with the same headphones, it's about twice as loud. Again, it doesn't have any kind of fancy sound card, just a cheap dell from 7 years ago with built in sound.

Why is my computer so quiet? Is this a hardware limitation or a software problem? Is there anything I can do about that short of getting a new sound card? Not looking for amazing quality sound, I'd just be able to like to watch a TV show and hear what they're saying....:rolleyes:
 
In volume control, is the volume for "Wave" all the way up?
 
not totally clear as to what you are asking....

you need to understand that one soundcard my have "x"db output while another may have "y"db output. a x-fi platinum has "109db" out of front line out while a xonar essence has "124db" out of line out. the essence will be louder to headphones out of line out without amplification.
 
wadec22 said:
not totally clear as to what you are asking....

you need to understand that one soundcard my have "x"db output while another may have "y"db output. a x-fi platinum has "109db" out of front line out while a xonar essence has "124db" out of line out. the essence will be louder to headphones out of line out without amplification.
Click to expand...

You are confusing signal to noise ratio with power output.

Sound cards will typically output at 0.5 to 2V. The more the output voltage at the ports, the louder the volume when it hits the speakers.
 
But it seems like his level of output is unusable in the sense that its far too low.
 
450 said:
In volume control, is the volume for "Wave" all the way up?
Click to expand...
Yep.

450 said:
But it seems like his level of output is unusable in the sense that its far too low.
Click to expand...
Exactly. Basically I consider headphones unusable on this computer. The only way to hear it well is to hook it up to my amplified stereo. Last night I was trying to watch a TV show on my computer, and I simply couldn't follow along with the volume so low. But load up the same file on my laptop - sounds perfect.

I understand some sound cards can have more amplification than others, but, I think they should all work just fine with simple headphones, no? It would be more understandable if I was using unpowered speakers or something...

Another way to say it would be that any other computer I've ever used I could turn the headphones up painfully loud, but this one, no way. It's like the volume is just set too low somewhere but all the levels in the windows "master volume" are at the top.
 
Last edited:
The difference between 0.5V and 2V is 4 times the power, i.e., 70% more volume. Just a thought.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top