Spectre x360 speakers not working in Windows (Speakers work in BIOS and headphones work in Windows)

[jaymeetee]

Hi

The inbuilt Bang & Olufsen speakers on my HP Spectre x360 notebook no longer work in Windows
== They are correctly plugged in to the motherboard (verified during recent battery replacement)
== The speakers both work fine during BIOS testing (verified multiple times)
== Headphones (plugged in to the audio jack) work fine in Windows
== Bluetooth speakers work fine in Windows

Device: HP Spectre x360 ae003na (product number 2QF92EA#ABU)
Specs: Core i7-8550U / 16GB RAM / 1TB SSD
Purchased: 23/11/2017 (out of warranty)
OS: Windows 10 Pro 64-bit (version 20H2 updated 23/12/2020)

I have spent many days trying to diagnose this. I have taken the following actions:

Restarted the notebook (many times)
Hard reset the notebook (many times)
Installed HP Support Solution Framework
Run HP Audio Check from HP Support Assistant
== Initial Test - No Issues Found
== Secondary test - The speaker, headset or headphone is unplugged
Run the Windows Audio Troubleshooter
Tried everything in Control Panel > Sound
== Realtek High Definition Audio (SST) is set as default device
== it is not disabled
== The volume is up
== spatial sound is off
Tried everything in Control Panel > Bang & Olufsen Audio Control
== Interestingly Bang & Olufsen Experience is now greyed out
Updated BIOS from HP Support site (F.34 Rev.A Nov 23, 2020)
Updated Audio driver from HP Support Site:
== Realtek High-Definition (HD) Audio Driver (Windows 10 v1709) 6.0.8940.1 Rev.B == May 5, 2020
== Attempted to revert to Realtek High-Definition (HD) Audio Driver (Windows 10 v1803/1809/1903) 6.0.1.8703 Rev.B == Jul 30, 2019 (this failed as current versuon of Windows does not support it)
From Control Panel > device Manager
== Updated driver
== Disabled and Re-enabled everything
== Uninstalled and reinstalled (through scan for hardware changes)
From BIOS > Load Setup Defaults
From BIOS / Startup F2 System Diagnostics > Audio Test (works fine)
From HP PC Hardware Diagnostics
== Systems Tests 1+2 (completed without issue)
== Component > Audio > Audio Playback Test (claims test failed once I confirm I couldn't hear anything) although this generates Failure ID 9TV6KS-8SDAG4-MFPUQK-21UN13

If anyone can help me I would be truly grateful - thank you!

[jaymeetee]

After a significant amount of fault finding by the HP engineers we have concluded that this is, in fact, a hardware fault. Whilst I am able to hear audio in the BIOS on more careful listening the audio is limited to the right hand side of the machine and it transpires that there are four speakers on the device (left and right, front and back) so I am certainly down 2/4 and may be down 3/4 speakers. I should add that the HP engineer who worked with me over many hours on this - including multiple attempts at older drivers and even a complete Windows reset, was an absolute star. I have spent more time with Joshua this Christmas break than my own family and I am genuinely grateful for his support. Amazing considering the laptop went out of warranty two years ago. Sorry I can't help you fix this if you have a similar issue - except to say that the new Dragonfly Elite G2 is on it's way and the specs look mighty fine so if you were looking for an excuse to upgrade...