How to change active audio "device" without rebooting

[TheColdOne]

I recently updated my NVIDIA card with audio drivers and now it can make the audio go through my television using HDMI (watching videos). The problem however, is that when I go into the Sound settings and change the default to the NVIDIA "device", I need to reboot windows to activate the change. I have tried going into the mixer and the sound setting and I can't figure out a way to change the active audio device without having to reboot (or even just log out and log back in).

Is there a menu or option I am missing?

 

[fireberd]

In most cases, when you connect an HDMI cable the video card will detect this and Windows will automatically change the default audio playback device from your Speakers (sound card) to the HDMI. When you disconnect the HDMI cable from the video card it should automatically change back to the Speakers.

Do you have the correct NVIDA/Windows 7 64 bit drivers installed? Get them directly from NVIDIA, not Dell downloads.

 

[TheColdOne]

All drivers came specifically from NVIDIA.

And the HDMI cable is connected at all times as the television acts as a third monitor as well, I just want to swap the audio over to the TV while watching movies/tv. Are you saying there is no way (in the software) to change the output on the fly?

 

[fireberd]

You should be able to manually switch by selecting the "Default" Audio playback device, either the "Speakers" (you sound card) or "HDMI" in the Sound Panel/Playback section.

I don't have any experience with this specific video card, but on others that is the way it works. I have an AMD Radeon HD7770 and that is the way my system works. I used to do support on the Dell forum and that is the way most work from what I remember seeing on the Dell desktop hardware forum section.

As this did not come with Windows 7 originally, have you installed any needed drivers from the Dell downloads? e.g. motherbord chipset drivers, PC sound drivers, etc? The Dell downloads have Vista and some limited Win 7 drivers listed. Some drivers are not listed in the Win 7 section but the Vista 64 bit drivers will work for Win 7.

 

[TheColdOne]

So setting the HDMI NVIDIA output as default should automatically snap all audio to that? Because when I do the default switch the system sees it as default, but if I click on the audio icon in the notifications, it still sees the speakers as the audio device.

As well, when I configure the HDMI out for audio, doing the test plays the audio through the TV, not the speakers, even though all audio coming from media sources (VLC Media, Hulu with flash, etc) still go through the primary speakers. It seems like it has to be something inside of windows itself, not drivers pertaining to the on board sound card or motherboard (which are actually all up to date anyways).

 

[fireberd]

If you have the HDMI set as default and the test works OK with the TV speakers, but whatever media players you use do not output to the HDMI it sounds like the problem is in the media players and not the sound devices.

 

[TheColdOne]

But everything changes when I reboot (or re log in), where now everything is playing through the proper audio device (in this case HDMI), and even the audio mixer (and the icon in the notification tray) see the HDMI out as the default device, so it IS windows, I just need to know how to change it without rebooting/logging out.

I just need a way to change the current output (device shown when you click on the audio icon, where you can also change volume) in the audio mixer. Windows seems to have issues jumping between default devices while everything is running still (ie. logged in). If it WERE the media players at fault, either A) They wouldn't work with the reboot or B) I would be able to adjust the settings within them to change the audio out.

 

[fireberd]

If something is using audio and you try to change it, that can be a problem.

 

[TheColdOne]

Ok, THERE was the issue. If a program was already registered with the main speakers, no matter what I set as default it wouldn't change until I completely quit out of the program and reopened it, in which case it would be assigned to the new default device.

Thanks. I didn't realize that stopping the audio itself wasn't enough.