Sound options in Control Panel unresponsive

amigomatt · 14 Oct 2011

I have only just noticed this issue when trying to open Sibelius 6 (music notation software) or Sonar X1. They both hang on starting and I have also noticed that in Control Panel, the Sound tab itself is unresponsive and won't open the next menu level. The same with 'manage audio devices' in the sub menu underneath it. I have a Focusrite Saffire 6 USB interface, which plays back audio fine. I have tried reinstalling the drivers for the Saffire to no avail, but this seems more like a Windows problem. Has anyone got any clues, as my work relies on me creating music and I just can't see another solution except reinstalling Windows, which would be a pain given the amount of stuff I have installed already

Any advice would be greatly appreciated!

fireberd · 14 Oct 2011

I have Sonar X1c and a Focusrite Saffire Pro 40 (firewire) and an MAudio Fastrack Ultra 8R (USB).
I only use the Saffire Pro 40 or Fastrack Ultra 8R for recording. I have a separate PCI sound card that I use for "regular" PC audio.

I did have some problems with other ASIO devices in Sonar. I used to have a SoundBlaster sound card and that had ASIO drivers. When Sonar started it would look for the SoundBlaster and set that as the default device in Sonar. I finally dumped the SoundBlaster card for an HT Omega Striker 7.1 sound card for PC sound. The Striker 7.1 does not have any ASIO drivers. That fixed the Sonar problem.

First thought with the Focusrite unit is to make sure you have the latest Windows 7 drivers and also that it is showing up in the Windows Device Manager as "working properly", to start. USB devices, if the "Safely Remove Hardware" is not used to stop the device before disconnecting or powering off can cause the device status to be corrupted. When this happens you can connect the unit but instead of it showing as an audio device, it will show up as an "Unknown Device" in the Device Manager USB section. When this occurs, you have to uninstall the device in the Device manager, then physically disconnect the unit from the PC, restart the PC and after Windows starts, connect it and Windows should detect new hardware and reinstall it. This usually fixes this type of problem.