Windows 7: Windows Adio Service freezing my shutdown

Hey guys,


I recently built a new computer. Completely fresh OS (Windows 7 Ultimate x64) installation. Everything went well, installed new drivers and downloaded all Windows updates, but one day i started having complete system freezes when i shutdown or restart my computer.

When i give my computer the shutdown command it starts shutting down all my programs and goes to shutting down... screen. "In progress" circle rolls for a while until it freezes and i have to do hard shutdown.

In safe mode my computer shuts down and restarts normally. So i started process of elimination. I went through all my processes and discovered that if i disable Windows Audio Service my computer shuts down normally without any problems. If i enable it and try shutting down I get stuck in shutting down screen.

Funny thing is, my audio works perfectly. I have Soundblaster Titanium X-Fi soundcard and i tried reinstalling its drivers, but it didn't seem to affect the problem. My soundcard is hooked to my amplifier through SPDIF. I use Winamp as a music player and i have WASAPI plugin installed to it. WASAPI plugin bypasses the resampling process that Windows Audio Service does, but i always close Winamp manually and the plugin with it before shutting down, so it shouldn't be the problem. I've also disabled the onboard audiochip from bios. The only settings i've done in Windows Audio panel is that i have Line-In listening to SPDIF and i have SPDIF as default output.

I'm pretty mystified by this problem, any advices would be appreciated.

Although you manually shutdown WASAPI and WinAmp, check the Task Manager processes to see if they actually shut down. Could be they are still running.

No signs of Winamp or WASAPI in processes after i close Winamp.

What happens if you never open the WASAPI plug in and then shut down or restart Windows? Does it still hang?
I've got Winamp, but I don't have the WASAPI plug in but don't have any shutdown problems.

It could still be the SoundBlaster sound drivers. How did you reinstall? The proper way is uninstall the drivers, restart the PC and then reinstall the Creative drivers. Also, do not let Windows install the drivers as you can get an old version. If you just reinstall on top of existing drivers or uninstall/reinstall without restarting the PC whatever problem you had can still be there.

I've heard previously that Winamp can be quite 'buggy'. Any reason you are using this over say Windows Media Player?

It doesn't seem to make a difference if you open up Winamp or not.

I uninstalled my SoundBlaster drivers + all the Creative software that came with the installation. After that i rebooted my pc and tried shutting down, but it still kept freezing. Now I've installed the latest SB Titanium X-Fi drivers from Creative's website, but the problem still exists.

Have you tried uninstalling Winamp to see if the problem persists?

I like the customization in it, plugins & skins for example It can be unstable if you use older plugins with the newest Winamp build.

I uninstalled my WASAPI plugin which is the one I've had some minor crashing issues, but it didn't affect the problem in any way. My Winamp isn't a start up item and it doesn't hang in the processes after i close it, so i don't think it's the problem.

I just spent the greater part of my night trying to figure this problem out. I basically just got my X-fi card yesterday with a pair of audioengine 2 speakers and everything was working perfectly in analogue mode.

I then wanted to test what the x-fi could do when connected to my hardon-kardon / KEF setup using the S/PDIF connecter. It worked smoothly and totally blew away the audioengine speakers, and my own expectations; that's until I shut down my computer.

Long story short for some reason which i haven't figured out it didn't like my configuration. After messing around with the settings for a long time and reading troubleshooting events logs I realized it's the digital connection. I switched back to analogue and voila!, comp shuts down normally.

Frankly, this isn't a good solution, I want a digital output if possible. Anyone got any ideas?

P.S. I'm Jon


Edit:
Oh and I don't think this problem has anything to do with Winamp. I actually (do) use Winamp too, but the fact it went away when reverting back to the analogue connection pretty much singles Winamp out.

Hey.

I couldn't really fix my problem, but i found a way around it. I created simple .bat file that would shutdown Windows Audio components before starting the shutdown process. Thus circumventing the freezing issue.

Open notepad and write down the following commands:

@echo off
echo Shutting down the following process: "Windows Audio"
pause
NET STOP "Windows Audio"
echo Shutting down the following process: "Windows Audio Endpoint Builder"
pause
NET STOP "Windows Audio Endpoint Builder"
echo Processes deactivated...
pause
shutdown -s -t 2
exit

File -> Save As -> Save as type: All files
Save file as: shutdown.bat

When i want to shutdown my computer i run shutdown.bat file. You can drag it to your start menu for easy access. If you want to create restart.bat file, just modify the shutdown command: shutdown -r -t 2. -r as in restart. Hope this helps!