Poor Sound under Vista Home Premium

Hi,

Any help in improving the sound quality of my machine would be very much
appreciated. It is particularly poor (broken up) on such sites as
YouTube although it wouldn't win any prizes either when playing CDs or
MP3 files. I am not very critical sound-wise so it has to be poor for me
to notice. There is a slight issue with my monitor speakers but the
sound is still poor on headphones connected to the line-output socket.

My setup is Vista 32-bit Premium, Audigy SE sound board, Intel 1.8GHz
dual-core, 2GB RAM and an MSI micro-ATX MB. I have loaded what I believe
to be the latest sound drivers although things are actually marginally
better with the on-board, RealTek HD sound chip. BTW, my download speed
is reasonable at about 5MB/s.

If this has already been done to death in this group - apologies.


Cheers - Joe

 

"Joe McElvenney" <ximac@btinternet.com> wrote in message
news:0hg425575m8ft7okvlov5iil30vbu22h6m@4ax.com...
> Hi,
>
> Any help in improving the sound quality of my machine would be very much
> appreciated. It is particularly poor (broken up) on such sites as
> YouTube although it wouldn't win any prizes either when playing CDs or
> MP3 files. I am not very critical sound-wise so it has to be poor for me
> to notice. There is a slight issue with my monitor speakers but the
> sound is still poor on headphones connected to the line-output socket.
>
> My setup is Vista 32-bit Premium, Audigy SE sound board, Intel 1.8GHz
> dual-core, 2GB RAM and an MSI micro-ATX MB. I have loaded what I believe
> to be the latest sound drivers although things are actually marginally
> better with the on-board, RealTek HD sound chip. BTW, my download speed
> is reasonable at about 5MB/s.
>
> If this has already been done to death in this group - apologies.
>
>
> Cheers - Joe

You've got considerations of audio CODECs as well as sound card drivers and
speakers. Either sound card option should be able to play the Vista sample
files flawlessly. Media types not supported by Microsoft (ie. Flash videos
from YouTube) will require 3rd party CODECs or players in order to play
properly. Note that the available bandwidth at YouTube and other such
streaming media sites has as much effect on playback quality as your own
connection speed.

First off, unless I'm mistaken neither of your sound card options
(Realtec-Audigy) has an amplifier in it to drive speakers with. They only
have line-level or digital outputs. They may drive headphones adequately but
both require you to use self-powered/amplified speakers otherwise.

If you aren't going to use the on-board Realtec audio then uninstall its
drivers and disable the on-board audio in the computer's BIOS. That should
help.

Apparently the Vista drivers for Audigy have been problematic from the
beginning but more recent drivers perform better. When you update the
drivers uninstall the old drivers first. Follow Creative's installation
instructions exactly, take no shortcuts.

 

"Joe McElvenney" wrote:

> Hi,
>
> Any help in improving the sound quality of my machine would be very much
> appreciated. It is particularly poor (broken up) on such sites as
> YouTube although it wouldn't win any prizes either when playing CDs or
> MP3 files. I am not very critical sound-wise so it has to be poor for me
> to notice. There is a slight issue with my monitor speakers but the
> sound is still poor on headphones connected to the line-output socket.
>
> My setup is Vista 32-bit Premium, Audigy SE sound board, Intel 1.8GHz
> dual-core, 2GB RAM and an MSI micro-ATX MB. I have loaded what I believe
> to be the latest sound drivers although things are actually marginally
> better with the on-board, RealTek HD sound chip. BTW, my download speed
> is reasonable at about 5MB/s.
>
> If this has already been done to death in this group - apologies.
>
>
> Cheers - Joe
>
Hello, Suggest removal of the sound card. Vista should enable the onboard
sound.
If problem check the BIOS for sound enabled.
Had same setup found the sound card not as good as the onboard sound.
Using a pair of powered external stereo speakers, will help.
Check the onboard sound settings ,"after installing speakers and removing
sound card".
Use the Realtek Audio Manager and volume control to check the set up.
Start with default settings and make small changes to improve sound.
This is what I did and have reasonable stereo sound at this time.

take care.
beamish.

 

I just updated my IDT/Sigmatel drivers (again) no diff, I keep losing
sound.


--
pacinitaly

ASCII stupid question, Get A Stupid ANSI

 

Hi,

Thanks both of you for your suggestions. I have removed the Audigy SE
card/drivers and enabled the on-board RealTek HD chip which has improved
matters. I intend to get a pair of powered speakers but am a little
short on space so will have to find a pair that will fit into my setup.
This still leaves the 'bitty' sound in streaming audio such as YouTube
and BBC i-player. The downloads are buffering OK so perhaps Vista and my
machine are not capable of doing several things at once. Under XP Home,
on the same computer, there wasn't a problem but I don't intend to
revert just because of that.


Thanks - Joe

 

"Joe McElvenney" wrote:

> Hi,
>
> Thanks both of you for your suggestions. I have removed the Audigy SE
> card/drivers and enabled the on-board RealTek HD chip which has improved
> matters. I intend to get a pair of powered speakers but am a little
> short on space so will have to find a pair that will fit into my setup.
> This still leaves the 'bitty' sound in streaming audio such as YouTube
> and BBC i-player. The downloads are buffering OK so perhaps Vista and my
> machine are not capable of doing several things at once. Under XP Home,
> on the same computer, there wasn't a problem but I don't intend to
> revert just because of that.
>
>
> Thanks - Joe
>
Hello,
Check the Realtek Audio Manager and the volume control. Adjustments can be
made.
With your system hardware and software and download ability the problem
should be a adjustment to some setting and not the basic system.
take care.
beamish.

 

If stereo is all you require there are a number of 2.1 speaker systems that
don't need a lot of desk space but have a pretty good range of sound because
of the additional bass speaker which sits on the floor, or on a low shelf.
I'm thinking of the Logitech X series (X-230, X-240) in particular but
there are probably others with even smaller main speakers that may suit you.
Speakers can even be wall-mounted in some cases. Of course if you're one
who prefers ear-splitting sound levels there are options out there for that
too. ;-)

Sound volume levels aren't affected by the connection speed. IIRC the Flash
player plugin for YouTube has its own volume control (icon) that may be set
too low. I suspect that the I-player has something similar. If it isn't
that, the Realtek sound manager (and Windows as well) has settings for what
type of speaker configuration you are using. It could make a difference if
it is set to 4 or 5.1 channel sound and you only have 2 speakers connected,
especially if bass redirection has been enabled and all the low frequency
sounds are being channelled off to a non-existent bass speaker.

"Joe McElvenney" <ximac@btinternet.com> wrote in message
news:nej7255rg3ujhqiehe8h306h1at5kqv7ft@4ax.com...
> Hi,
>
> Thanks both of you for your suggestions. I have removed the Audigy SE
> card/drivers and enabled the on-board RealTek HD chip which has improved
> matters. I intend to get a pair of powered speakers but am a little
> short on space so will have to find a pair that will fit into my setup.
> This still leaves the 'bitty' sound in streaming audio such as YouTube
> and BBC i-player. The downloads are buffering OK so perhaps Vista and my
> machine are not capable of doing several things at once. Under XP Home,
> on the same computer, there wasn't a problem but I don't intend to
> revert just because of that.
>
>
> Thanks - Joe