Experiencing (Very) Low Sound Output on ASUS A8He

Hello, members of Seven Forums!

Well, I upgraded my laptop's operating system from Windows XP (Professional) to Windows 7 (Ultimate) on November 2013. The experience was great except for frequent slowdowns, but I guess I'll get used to it.

Going to the query: I use a VoIP software called "Teamspeak". I plugged in my microphone and speak. The people in the channel I'm in told me that they cannot hear me properly. So while fixing my microphone, I decided to test the microphone settings from the Teamspeak's sound capture settings. It's positive, I can hear myself but it's very, very low. I twisted the microphone jack to see if that will fix it, but nothing happens.

I then traced that it is using my laptop's in-built microphone. Meaning, the microphone jack is not working. I tried to use other microphone, but it's still the same. So as an alternative, I used a USB sound device and the microphone worked.

However, I don't want to use a USB soundcard. I tried to resolve this problem by searching for solutions through Google, but I don't find any results of a similar problem. So I decided to download the driver of the laptop's sound card from the OEM website. However, there are no drivers for Windows 7, so I used the available driver for Windows Vista. The driver installed successfully and the microphone works again. HOWEVER, the sound output (playback) is veeerrryyy low. I maximized the volume from the volume control and the headphone's volume, but it's still the same.

Since I was annoyed, I uninstalled the driver, and the sound was back to normal. I'm not sure if this is called by the driver (because it's a Windows Vista driver), although I can say that this laptop is old (7 years old). It is still working though.

TL;DR:

When using the default "High Definition Audio Device" (no driver installed):

• Sound output is excellent
• Microphone jack does not work
• Uses the laptop's built-in microphone

When ASUS' sound driver is installed (although it's a Vista driver):

• Sound output is very low
• Microphone jack is working; input volume is good; built-in microphone is used when a microphone is not plugged in.

Does anyone know any solutions? I'm thinking about modifying the driver file so it will install only the microphone, but is that even possible?

Looking forward for your response. Thanks!

Thank you for the response, fireberd!

fireberd said:

You can only have one driver installed. Two drivers installed, even if it were only one function, would conflict.

fireberd said:

If you have the ASUS driver installed, uninstall any other sound driver (not just disable it) to avoid conflicts.

There are three sound drivers installed:

• SoundMAX Integrated Digital HD Audio (The sound driver);
• Unimodem Half-Duplex Audio Device (seems to be connected to "Motorola SM56 Speakerphone Modem", which is the dial-up driver);
• Virtual Audio Cable (should be self-explanatory)

I already installed the SoundMAX driver even before Virtual Audio Driver was installed. I'm not sure about the Unimodem though. Is it safe to uninstall that driver?

fireberd said:

What is the actual sound chip? e.g. Realtek ALC888, IDT, etc?

Hmm.. How do I find what's the actual sound chip of my laptop?

fireberd said:

On a different subject, you only list Malwarebytes as your Antivirus. That is not an Antivirus program, its just for malware/spyware. If this is the case you need to install an Antivirus program. The free Microsoft Security Essentials is a good Antivirus program.

Noted. Thanks for the advice!

fireberd said:

The Virtual Audio Cable, is another issue. It MAY be causing some of your problems. Disable that and then reboot and see if it makes any difference.

It seems that it doesn't make any difference. Everything is still the same, sadly.