I moved all my components from one case to a new one. As it was the first time in five years I removed all the components, I tried to carefully get the dust/tar/cat hair off, but I think I may have made a booboo anyway. The audio is completely gone, front and back. I removed the front connector from the motherboard but that didn't make the back connector work. So yeah, I think I must've done something wrong. I've been looking at soundcards but... would that solve the problem? If both the front and back connectors don't work, the problem would be on the motherboard itself, nein? If you think a soundcard could work; does anyone have any good experiences with free software drivers for a certain brand?
Might be worth a check if anything metal in the new case is touching the back of the motherboard. Does your OS register the audio device? does it show any errors?
can you set it up without the case? i.e. set up all the parts without the case and test?this would rule out the case and a possable dead short within the case(but if you had a dead short with the case it proly woudent work at all)you may have killed the onboard sound chip it can happen with a move of conponents(thats just mobos for ya!)the only other test is to fit aother soundcard and see if that will fix the problem if you do that and it fixes the issue then you can say the onboard sound is fu****.hope this helps
I don't think anything's touching what it shouldn't be touching (wow, that sounds wrong). Unfortunately, I'm more inclined to believe that when using a vaccuum cleaner on the motherboard I hit something I shouldn't have. I tried to be careful but, well, our vaccuum cleaner is kind of really really powerful and the nozzle hit the board once or twice. I'll try to find a cheapish soundcard and hopefully that'll work. It's my main PC, which is connected to the TV (Star Trek just isn't the same without audio) - I can get a motherboard from another PC if needs be, but on that PC there's a dirty, propriety operating system installed to facilitate my girlfriend playing the games she played in the 90s. Without sound, those games are even crappier. Ergh. I guess, with or without soundcard, I could try and switch the components (outside of the case). At the same time that would allow me to, without extra hassle (as I'm testing anyway), see if anything's touching anything it shouldn't. This is why I chose not to work in IT. A million tests to find one cause.
Vaccuum cleaners and exposed electronics do not mix. From what I remember, lots of static created. That aside, a soundcard would help you out here, unless you want to diagnose the issue further. As to which card, you didn't outright state it it, but I guess you are running some distribution of Linux? I seem to remember Ubuntu having a list of well supported models on their wiki, but beyond that I'm clutching at straws.
Thanks, I never really thought about static from the vaccuum cleaner. I'll have to be more careful next time (or shave the cat). And yes, I'm running Debian. I'll have a look around its and Ubuntu's wikis and see what's what.
May seem a little obvious but no one seems to have mentioned it yet, is on board audio enabled in the bios?
It is. Unfortunately [edit] I've ordered a soundcard. We'll see what that does in a few days. [edit again] Soundcard didn't help. Other problems arose. This isn't so much an audio problem as it is a "motherboard is FUBAR" problem. I've ordered a new motherboard. And IDE-SATA conversion stuff, as was nearly impossible (bar an overpriced second-hand board) to find a motherboard with more than one IDE connector. (Yes, I am old .)
