Is my Onboard sound card screwed?

I have onboard sound (Asus A8N-SLI- Premium Motherboard) and all of a sudden none of the audio connections work.

If I plug something in (or use) the RealTek Sound Manager pops up and under "connector sensing", everything comes up as failed, including jacks which don't have anything in them (ie: the front panel)

I've taken the machine apart and checked that none of the wires have come loose or anything, and everything looks in order.

I've disabled and re-enabled the sound card (ASUS AC97).

I've updated the drivers - although they were the latest already.

According to the Windows System Panel and DXdiag there are no issues.

I've got a USB headset and plug that in and everything sounds fine. I've also tested the speakers and they work fine.

Has anyone else had something similar and know how to fix it?

Or is it just screwed?

And could this be a sign that my mobo is on the way out? Because that will REALLY suck

I don't think I've ever heard of onboard sound failing itself. That's not to say it couldn't happen...

Can you look again on your motherboard and look at all the capacitors? Just check that none of them are bulging on top (or worse, leaking).

I had this same problem once, and I'm pretty sure I fixed it by checking some of the jumpers on the board. Check your manual and see If you have any relating to sound. Your Mobo shouldn't be on the way out though. At least I hope not because I have the exact same model as yours.

I have had the onboard sound go before.

I just put in a PCI sound card.
Fixed.

I don't know why it was faulty but it definitely was a hardware fault.

Rare but it happens.

Anything can fail. I've seen tonnes of mainboards with faulty on-board sound.

But having said that it still could be caused by software - a Windows reinstall is the first thing I'd do before fucking around with any hardware.

There are also 2x jumpers on the FP_AUDIO pinblock which need to be shorted for the rear-output sound to work. If you have a case which has front audio jacks, the connector for this plugs onto the pinblock and does this for you but if it may have been removed then the 2x jumpers will need to be in place.

I once played a really odd sample-rate file through my M-Audio card which caused a continuous high-pitch squeal to come out the speakers until I shutdown the PC, on next boot I had no sound output but a driver uninstall and reinstall fixed that.

ok, so I decided to forget about the onboard sound and buy a cheap card from dick smiths, and when I plug that in windows won't even boot up!

Gonna try my old soundblaster live card from my old pc... If that doesn't work I'm going to try hitting it with a hammer.

Did you disable the onboard AC97/HDAudio in your BIOS before putting the PCI soundcard in? If still no booto, try putting the card in a different PCI slot. I'm guessing the Dick Smith card has a C-Media chipset (probably a x738) because they're cheap and nasty.

Go the SB Live option. It is better than your CPU-intensive Realtek chipset anyway.

Yeah, you're right about the Dick Smith being a x738

But the SB Live isn't working either... everything comes up as ok in the diagnostics, but no sound comes out. Checked my speakers and they're fine.

I uninstalled the onboard stuff via the device driver before putting the new cards in, but might check the bios bizniz... however I was having issues with this sound card on my old PC...

I'm going to buy a new one tomorrow regardless. Maybe even an external one - my USB headphones work so at least that's something!

If several soundcards aren't working it could be a windows problem. I know this sounds obvious but check all your sound stuff is set properly in the control panel. I.e. nothing is muted and volume is up, and also that the hardware settings in the sounds and audio devices is set to what you want.

Did you install any new/updated codecs for video or audio recently?

nope.

hmmm...

installed a soundblaster 5.1 card, but having no luck with that either

I just get no sound at all.

It's like something is muted somewhere, but I've checked all the programs I use and they're all ok and not muted, the actual volume is all the way up. the speakers work...

I might have to re-install windows... 

Well, after kicking the crap out of my desk because the sound card wasn't working, it started working.

See, smashing up inanimate objects works!

Sounds like an intermittent fault in the Motherboard then.


My pc is playing up at the moment and I find that sometimes I need to slap it on the side to get it to boot up.

Quite satisfying but it will prob get worse rather than gaining discipline.

Can you make it stop working again by moving your case around?

Some physical connection must be dodgy.

The guy who put it together must have been shifty 

I agree.


Actually! Wait a minute! 

actually I meant I got the SB 5.1 working...

I shoved it in a different PCI slot to the crappy Dick Smith card I returned, and it worked.

Well, it didn't at first, I had to kick some things and restart the PC 3 times whilst praying to Buddha, Allah and Humphrey B Bear for it to work.

You know, the usual method of getting PC stuff to work properly

And who said praying to pant-less idols had no benefits?