"No speakers or headphones are plugged in"

[cscaffidi]

I have found numerous people had this problem. Some found fixes. I have not. Everything worked fine until a few days ago. I have tried so many fixes. None worked. Update and rollback of drivers. Uninstall/reinstall. Disable/enable. Bios default settings and update. Removing recent updates. Hardware Diagnostics UEFI tests (which passed). Speaker and headphone tests on other systems. Nothing has worked. The properties on all of the devices and drivers are showing as working properly. Still no sound and the little red 'x' on my speaker icon. The only thing I can't do is go back to a restore point because I don't have any. I am using a aftermarket backup program that is now not cooperating. I thought I would just ask here before I do a system recovery.   Thank you.

I have still been working on this for two days now with no success. Does anyone have an answer? I even tried installing a external usb sound device. Still got that red 'x' and 'no speakers plugged in'.  The device manager tells me everything is working fine. 

[old_geekster]

@cscaffidi, welcome to the forum.

You did a great job of troubleshooting.  However, you didn't mention checking the Sound Control Panel to assure that your speakers were selected (Type Sound in Search box in lower left corner).

[cscaffidi]

Hi, thank you for responding to my post. Yes, in the sound control panel speakers are selected as the default device. There are two AMD digital audio devices that are associated with HDMI ports, but they are grayed out. Last night I just got tired of troubleshooting, so I attempted to just reset the computer and selected keeping my files, I tried it four times, but every time it only got to about 30% and then reverted back to a blue screen which said there was a problem or error and no changes were made. That is where I stopped because it just got too late in the night. At this point I am thinking of just purchasing a sound card. I think that might be a better idea then restoring the entire system. Please let me know what you think.

[cscaffidi]

Hi, thank you for responding to my post. Yes, in the sound control panel speakers are selected as the default device. There are two AMD digital audio devices that are associated with HDMI ports, but they are grayed out. Last night I just got tired of troubleshooting, so I attempted to just reset the computer and selected keeping my files, I tried it four times, but every time it only got to about 30% and then reverted back to a blue screen which said there was a problem or error and no changes were made. That is where I stopped because it just got too late in the night. At this point I am thinking of just purchasing a sound card. I think that might be a better idea then restoring the entire system. Please let me know what you think.

[cscaffidi]

BTW - I should say that I thought maybe a fix would be re-enabling the onboard audio in the BIOS set up incase it was disabled, however, I cannot access the BIOS set up for this desktop. I can only access a simplified menu that does not list anything related to the audio controls.  I found a post online that said some HP models only allow very limited access to the BIOS. Maybe my 550-310 is one of them? so, again, do you think just purchasing a sound card is the way?

[old_geekster · Accepted solution]

Thank you for the additional information, @cscaffidi.

HP does have minimal entries in their BIOS's.  This is to eliminate many problems that can be caused by members who don't understand the settings.

Personally, if it were me, I would do a full System Recovery keeping my files.  This is because I like the way my computers run after the Recovery is complete.  If you want to go with a sound card it would certainly give you much better sound than with the Integrated Sound.  You have to be the one to make that decision.

[cscaffidi]

Hello Old_geekster. Thanks again for replying. I thought I would close out this thread with what I did to fix the issue instead of just leaving it hanging. I did have to do a full restore. I tried installing a after market sound blaster card. It installed correctly and  was recognized by my system. I was able to have the PC recognize the speakers were plugged in, although, I could not get any sound out of them, no matter what I tried. I spent two more days trouble shoooting the PC and the new card.  

So, I ended up doing a full restore, but I had to back up my files on my own to an external drive, because windows file backup kept failing (shocker). After the restore, the card still gave me problems so I removed it and with a couple more hours of trouble shooting, I was able to get the on board sound configured correctly and to work again. I worked on it for so long, and did so many configuration changes that I am unble to properly describe what steps were taken, nor a workable order, so I apologize for that. But in the end though, the full restore was the solution for me.  

[old_geekster]

Thank you so much for the nice update on your situation, @cscaffidi.  We always appreciate hearing how problems are solved.  It truly can help other members.  In the future, if you have problems with a new component or peripheral, I suggest contacting the manufacturer's Tech Support for help.  They are the experts on their products.  They most likely would have gotten your sound card to work.