Windows 7: New Rig, And Terrible Sound

I just got done building this new custom gaming rig and as of right now I am completely disappointed with the audio quality and I'm simply looking to know if I can do something to fix this. I am running on the MSI P67A-GD65 (Link: Newegg.com - MSI P67A-GD65 (B3) LGA 1155 Intel P67 SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard) motherboard. I have gone through many driver updates on the board as I am currently using the onboard sound and I have yet to find anything to fix this issue.

I'll give an example of my sound levels. On my previous rig, I was running at 20/100 for my normal sound, and as of right now I'm at 100/100 and still wishing for the sound to simply be a bit louder. My microphone is terrible as well and all of the levels are low.

Simply put, I don't know what else to do. I have done all of the driver updates for the MSI board and everything through Windows Update is completely updated.

If anyone might have a possiblie fix for this, please let me know.

~Joshgt2

Have you downloaded the drivers off the realtek site? heres the site page, click the top link and downlaod and install those drivers, if the sound is still low then I feel it could be an issue with the hardware Realtek, I have to warn you that realtek is a Taiwanese company and they don't have european or US servers so it may take a while to download.

First mistake, buying a MSI motherboard. Second mistake, not buying a separate sound card. Buying a good sound card might solve your sound issues, but it won't solve the first mistake.

I do have a separate sound card from my previous build, but I didn't think tht a $30 Creative Sound Blaster would be better than this onboard since the card is almost 4 years old.

And I'm sorry, but what's so bad with MSI? Yes, I would normally go ASUS but this time it simply seemed that the MSI board has a nicer layout.

Since you have it, try it. Obviously, a card of that price range and vintage is not going to give you the best quality sound, but I bet it would beat onboard sound. As for the MSI portion of your question, I'm not going to delve too deeply into that, because it would serve no purpose. I probably should have omitted my previous comment for the same reason, but my dislike for MSI runs too deep for me to keep silent some times.

When you said that you liked the layout of the board, exactly what did you mean...that you liked it's appearance better, or that it had some functionality that you didn't find elsewhere?

I'm a bit picky when it comes to air flow, and on this board I like how the PCI-e slots are positioned with some spacing thanks to the 1.0 slots. As I am currently running only one 460 card right now, I have considered turning to 2 in the near future and again, I am thinking of air control.