Audio services not responding

[Ledbetter92]

Hi to all,

at some point in time and after no particular events, my laptop (Pavilion x2 - 10-n109nl with Win10x64) began not to recognise audio device. It displays a red cross nearby the "Volume" icon in the notification tray as if no audio device is installed and lists an "unknown device" in the device manager. Find out that this unknown device was "Intel SST Audio Device (WDM)" and managed to install it with Intel drivers dated back to 12/01/2016 so at the moment I got all audio device correctly install and functioning, but the red cross won't disappear and if I try to run Windows troubleshooting service it states "Audio services not responding". What can I try to do to get the problem solved?

Thank you all,

F.

[EmeraldAvenger]

Welcome to the HP Support Community @Ledbetter92, 

You have come to the right place to find suggestions, solutions and a helping hand with the Audio Services Not Responding error message and that red x on the volume icon. 

Did you happen to try the audio troubleshooter? It might be able to fix your issue automatically.

Have you tried updating the audio driver?

Have you tried using the HP Support Assistant to update all of your drivers?

Have you tried to uninstall the audio driver?

If not, please use the following steps:

• Go to the Device Manager
• Click on Sound, video, and game controllers
• Right click on each Sound driver
• Click Uninstall
• Restart your Notebook twice

The Intel Chipset, Graphics, Camera and Audio driver pack is what you need. It provides drivers to support the hardware installed on systems with Intel processors: sp74358.exe. You can download the link directly from here, or you can look at your HP Pavilion x2 - 10-n109nl (ENERGY STAR) Software and Driver Downloads page and find the drivers that work for your specific Notebook. 

Check and see if the red x is gone and if the sound works. If not, here are some steps from Microsoft that may help. Please go to: 

• Control Panel
• Administrative Tools
• View Local Services
• Look for Windows Audio NOT "Windows Audio Endpoint Builder"
• Right click on the Windows Audio service
• Choose Properties

You will see 4 tabs,

• Click on "Dependencies"
• You will see This service depends on the following system components box and it displays 3 services
• Expand each + in the list.
• Make sure that all the 6 services (3 main, 3 child) have the "Started" status in the "Services" window you opened earlier

If one of those services is not running, start them, then try to start the "Window Audio" service from the "General" tab.

Source: "The Audio Service is not running"

If you are still having trouble, please follow the Fix: Red X Volume Icon documentation. 

If you feel this post has helped you, could help others joining in and looking for a solution or you just want to say cheers, please click the Accept as Solution button and/or the Thumbs Up. 

If you require further assistance, please re-post with the results of the troubleshooting and I would be more than happy to do my best to provide another solution. 

Have a great day!

[Ledbetter92]

Thank you for your reply.

I've tried to follow all of your suggestions but same problem is stil there.

To be more specific, first of all I've uninstalled the 2 devices under "Sound, video, and game controllers" in the Device Manager and reboot the pc twice: at that point it listed "Conexant I2S Audio Codec" under "Sound, video, and game controllers" and an "Unknown Device". The hardware id of this device was "acpi\ven_8086&DEV_22A8" that corresponds to "Intel SST Audio Device (WDM)". Tried to get the problem fixed by installing driver from sp74358.exe as you suggested, but the "Unknown Device" was still there.

Eventually, after many attempts I only managed to install the device by using drivers found at the following link:

https://downloadcenter.intel.com/download/25729/System-on-a-Chip-SOC-Driver-Package-for-Intel-Comput...

After that, I tried to update system drivers by using "HP Support Assistant" and "Intel Driver Update Utiliy" too, but both the two didn't find any update for audio devices, so it seems that I got the correct and latest driver installed. 

About "Windows Audio Service", I've followed your instructions and I can say that the service is running correctly, even its dependencies. Only difference is that it lists only 2 dependencies, and not 3 as you stated. This dependicies are "Remote procedure call (RPC)" with 2 children and "Windows Audio Endpoint Builder" with no child at all. 

Finally, I tried to run the "Audio troubloshooter" but it only states that "Audio services are not responding" without giving any solutions, and then even the "UEFI Hardware Diagnostics" and the audio test was correctly passed.

Please, let me know what I can try to do next to get the problem fixed.

Thank you again,

Ledbetter92

[EmeraldAvenger]

Hey! 

Thank you for getting back to me. 

After you uninstalled the drivers in the Device Manager, then restarted twice, but before you downloaded another driver, how was the sound? Did the red x remove itself?

You can try to set the speakers as the default audio device:

1. Open Search.

2. Type Change system sounds.

3. Select Change System Sounds

4. Go to the Playback tab

5. Select your playback device

6. Click the Set Default button. 

7. Click the Configure button.

8. Click your speaker setup in Audio channels.

9. Click the Test button to send sound to each speaker

How did that work? If sound is missing from all or one of the speakers, or if the configuration type was changed, continue with speaker setup by clicking Next. Follow the on-screen instructions to complete the speaker setup and then try testing for sound again. 

If you have tried the troubleshooting steps and your sound is still not working properly, please try a System Restore. Please restore your Notebook back to a time when everything was working fine. 

If the System Restore does not work, please back up all of your files and then try to use the HP Recovery Manager to restore all the system files back to a time when the sound was working properly.

[Ledbetter92]

Hi EmeraldAvenger,

thank you for your patience and suggestions. During the previous troobleshooting process, unfortunately the red x has never gone away.

Now, I've tried to do as you suggested but I've to stop immediately because no audio device is displayed in the "Change System Sound" tab and instead it says "No audio device installed" but, I repeat again, in the Device Manager windows all audio devices are installed and stated as correctly functioning. 

Not only I've already tried a system restore, but I've also formatted my system drive and made a clean operating system installation using native Windows10x64 version before writing here. I was thinking about an hardware problem, but that doesn't explain why the "UEFI Diagnostic Test" worked fine and the testing beep were crearly audible. It most likely seems to be a kind of incompatibility between the hardware and the operating system: what's your opinion about? It's also true that I can't explain why at the beginning everything was working fine and then suddenly audio stopped working.

Let me know if there's something else I can try to do.

Thank you again,

F.

[EmeraldAvenger]

It is hard for me to say without seeing the Notebook myself. What I can tell you is that generally speaking, you would be correct. If the BIOS testing passed and you hear the beeps while doing the testing in the BIOS, which is before the Microsoft operating system loads, it would seem that hardware isn't necessarily the problem. 

Even though repetitive, can you please try these in the following order: 

• Start you Notebook in Safe Mode (you can use with Networking)
• Try to play something to check the audio. 
• Does that work? 

If not, please: 

• Boot into clean boot mode
• Uninstall all of the audio drivers in the Device Manager again
• Restart your Notebook twice.
• Take a screenshot of the Device Manager with the audio expanded. 

Note: Please do not download any drivers from other sources. 

• Please try this download: Download 64-bit Intel Chipset, Graphics, Camera, and Audio Driver Pack.
• Restart the Notebook twice. 
• Check the sound
• Take a screenshot of the Device Manager

Again please do not download any drivers from other sources. 

Please let me know how this goes and provide me with the screenshots and maybe they will indicate for me better what may be the conflict. 

Thanks! 

[Ledbetter92]

Good morning,

here we are again! So, I've tried to check for audio functionality in "Networking Safe Mode", but it was impossibile to test because "Windows Audio Service" was shut down. That's because one of its dependencies, the "Windows Audio Endpoint Builder" can't be started in safe mode and so nor is "Windows Audio Service". So, I've gone on by unistalling the two audio devices and then restarted my notebook twice and the following screenshot displays the situation after this operation:

As you can see, "Conexant I2S Audio Codec"  automatically reinstall itself while I got an unknown device. That's the famous acpi\ven_8086&DEV_22A8  that I was talking you about yesterday. Then, I've tried to run the package that you suggested and restarted my notebook twice, but after that the situation is still the same as the screenshot above. So, at the moment I'm stuck with this unknown device waiting for you to kindly suggest the next steps to take and obviously audio is still not working. If you need some more informations about my notebook, just let me know and I'll provide you as soon as possible.

Thank you,

F.

p.s. hope the screenshot is enough visible. Sorry if the informations are displayed in italian language but, you know, I live in Milan....

[EmeraldAvenger · Accepted solution]

Hey @Ledbetter92,

The Conexant Audio Driver is the one that is listed in your drivers page as the Audio driver for you. So that part is good. 

Thank you for being patient and following all of the steps! I really appreciate the co-operation while trying to find a solution 🙂 You have done great! I wanted to make sure that I told you so. 

You can try to do a BIOS reset. Complete the following steps to reload the factory installed BIOS Setup settings:

1. In the BIOS Setup utility, select the Exit tab.

2. Select Load Setup Defaults.

3. Select Save Changes and Exit (pressing F5 and the Enter key will also load the Setup Defaults).

4. Press Esc and then Enter to exit Setup.

Source: Reloading the default settings

Here is the HP Pavilion 10-n100 x2 Detachable PCs - No Sound From Computer Speakers And Audio Output Connector document that was created for this specific problem. You will see below that I have included the document context and the version numbers for each driver that you would need. Could you please double check the versions you currently have installed on your Notebook?

Here are the steps from the document: 

No sound is heard from the computer speakers and the audio output connector when headphones or external speakers are connected. An exclamation mark (!) is displayed in Device Manager on the audio device. This issue is exhibited on Windows 10.

To resolve this issue, follow the steps to download and install the following SoftPaqs to update the BIOS and install the device drivers:

1. Download and install the BIOS update.

2. Download and install the Intel Chipset, Graphics, Camera, and Audio Driver Pack.

3. Download and install the Conexant Audio Driver.

HP Notebook System BIOS Update (Intel Processors)

• File Name: SP73945
• Version: F.06
• Revision: A

Intel Chipset, Graphics, Camera, and Audio Driver Pack

• File Name: SP72830
• Version: 604.10146.2652.361
• Revision: A

Conexant Audio Driver

• File Name: SP72855

• Version: 1.58.0.50

• Revision: A

Let me know how this goes 🙂

[Ledbetter92]

Yes! It works! Thank you, man!

After flashing and updating the BIOS with the sp73945 you provide me, the system has finally accepted the driver from sp72830 for the "Intel SST Audio Device (WDM)": the unknown device has disapperead and the accursed red x has gone too.

Thank you for the appreciation you made about me in your last post; I work in an IT staff too and I just happen to know how it's important to be methodic and patience when trying to troubleshoot and fix a problem.

Have a nice day,

Ledbetter92