Unable to get sound out of 3.5 jack, out of ideas on what to do.

Cyber Akuma

Cyber Akuma

Gawd
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Jan 3, 2009
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This is about a prebuilt Asus desktop.

My cousin mentioned that the sound suddenly stopped working on his computer. So far, from everything I have seen, it appears to likely be a hardware issue, but I would like to know for sure I have exhausted every other option before we drop money for a new soundcard. This is specifically referring to audio coming out of the 3.5 inch headphone-like jack.

So, I tried to look into it, but the system was so massively infected I couldn't even get some malware scanners to finish scanning even after running for days, and they were finding literally over a thousand infections, so we agreed it would be best to just reformat and start over. I figured with the mess the system was in, with dozens of programs and popups ads appearing on boot and being unable to open any webpage due to all the browser hijacks, some of those were likely messing with the sound.

I reinstalled Windows 7 and Ubuntu, setup as dualboot. I let Windows Update download the drivers for the sound card, and it was identified as Realtek HD hardware, no surprise there since it was built into the motherboard.

So I tried plugging the system in through HDMI, and I got sound in Windows.

I tried Ubuntu, and still got sound over HDMI. So then I tried the 3.5 jack in Ubuntu, both the one in the back and the "headphone" jack in the front of the case..... and nothing, it didn't even identify any other sound hardware.

I figured Ubuntu might not recognize the sound hardware properly (it definitely had issues with my Sound Blaster Z on my own desktop) plus I am not that good with Linux, so I booted into Windows..... and still nothing, neither front or back. When I went into Window's sound settings it showed both the front and rear jacks in the settings, but claimed nothing was plugged into them no matter what I plugged in.

I could hear nothing out of the headphones I was plugging into the abck at all, not even static, though I could hear static out of one ear from the front jacks. Messing with the volume or other settings on the PC didn't have any effect on the static.

So then I decided to go to Asus's website and download the audio drivers, it installed some Realtek Audio Manager app. Installing these also made the front ports disappear from sound settings.

Still nothing, either port. I opened the Realtek app to take a look, and it showed a visual representation of the rear and front ports on the right of the app's window.... all greyed out. Plugging anything into any of the ports didn't show any response. Furthermore, it only showed tabs to adjust sound settings for the optical sound port, not the 3.5 inch ports.

I opened it up and checked for loose cables. The front jacks are the only ones with any wires, since the rear ones at soldered onto the motherboard, I tried unplugging and replugging them to make sure they weren't loose.... nothing.

Finally, I also checked in the BIOS settings, and the on-board sound is indeed enabled.

At this point, I am out of ideas of what else I can try, if there is anything else I can try.

Does anyone have any other ideas on what I can try to test to make sure it's the hardware and not something else? Or is it pretty much guaranteed to be the sound hardware failing at this point?
 
I dont use onboard so excuse my vagueness.
Some Realtek chips have the ability to use a standard output or an HD output, there are distinct different outputs on the motherboard for the front connections.
But I dont know how this impacts the ports on the rear.
Only one of the types can be selected.

Look through the software for an option to change between these 2 output types.

Its possible you have a faulty driver or one that doesnt work well with newer OS updates.
If I were you I would look up exactly what the motherboard is and find the latest driver for the exact audio chip.
There are a lot of different Realtek chips.
Station Drivers will help you get the right driver once you know the chip.
 
That HD versus AC97 config comes to mind, but that requires a pretty deliberate change that the user of the computer should have noticed (BIOS change, physical header pinouts). It sounds like it was working fine and then one day stopped.

I've never had onboard sound go out. I've had it be staticy and all that, but not plain give up. But it is possible the Op Amp that is driving the jack could have gone bad, which would affect both front and back.

If you have a multimeter, you could try measuring DC voltage across the headphone jack outputs.....might be easier on the header pins on the motherboard since sticking the probes in the headphone jack would probably be impossible. I don't know if it would give you any closure, but if you see DC voltage, at least you know you are electrically connected to the Op Amp. I would expect 10-50 millivolts of DC, if anything more then that, then it could be a sign the Op Amp is toasted.

Just wild guesses on my part though.
 
I would hunt down the driver from the manufacturer.

I don't trust Windows drivers unless they are for actual Microsoft hardware like mice and keyboards etc....

I would goto Realtek first and ASUS second.

Look for some BIOS settings about the on-board audio, maybe something got changed. Users who have infected machines notoriously lie about what they did or didn't do to the machine.
 
westrock2000 said:
That HD versus AC97 config comes to mind, but that requires a pretty deliberate change that the user of the computer should have noticed (BIOS change, physical header pinouts).
Click to expand...
He has since reset the bios and re-installed the OS, those settings could have been reverted.
The original problem may have only been a software screw up/corruption due to the malware infested OS.
Lots of unknowns atm.
 
OP, your sound panel looks like this? Well your's would say Realtek Super Duper Sound instead of Sound Blaster E1.

SQ6A5n0.jpg
 
Not even using HDMI had no effect, and it shows the rear audio jack in my control panel, but not the front ones, and claims nothing is plugged into them even if there is something plugged in there.
 
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