Greetings to all forum members... In Jan 2008 I bought a laptop of type: ACER ASPIRE 7520-5971 Systems Specs: AMD Athlon 64 X2 384MB Nvidia Geforce 7000M 4GB DDR2 MOTHERBOARD: MANUFACTURER: Acer MODEL: Fuquene CHIPSET: NVIDIA nFORCE 560 BIOS: Brand: Acer, V1.33 SOUND DEVICE: Realtek High Definition Audio. PROBLEM: Six Months Ago, the Sound Device Stopped Working, I get the following message (No Audio Output Device is installed): It is as if NO audio device is installed on the motherboard. Here's the catch: Sometimes when I START my computer the Device Works, and Sometimes It doesn't. If I restart the computer like 20-30 consecutive times (IF I'M LUCKY) chances that in one of these restarts the device MAY Work. Sometimes i go weeks without Audio. Here are *some* things I've Tried: 1) Format the System: Different OSs I've tried: Windows XP Home/Pro, Vista, 7 and Linux. The expirience the same problem with all these OSs. So It's not an OS thing. 2) Installing drivers from the manufacturer, Installing drivers from Microsoft, Installing different drivers. 3) Flashing the BIOS to the latest Version. 4) Searching Google: I found like 100 threads on this problem but none of them helped me solve this particular problem. Here's another Catch or more like a Trick, that makes the device works but only on Windows Xp, and it has to be done on every system start: In Windows Xp, If I go to "Safe Mode", and then open "Device Manager", and then expand the "Audio Devices" thingy, and then click on "Audio Device", Disable it, and then Enable it, it asks me to restart my computer, then the device WORKS FINE ! It worked every time. This is the only way I could get the device to work on Windows Xp. But now I have Windows 7 and this trick doesn't work on it, I'm back to starting the device 20-30 consecutive times and if luck is on my side the audio device may work or it may not. Sorry for the long thread, But this problem is driving me crazy, and I wanted to make it as unique as possible from other similar threads with the same title because its quite a unique problem.
Welcome to bit tech In your device manager, is there a warning next to the sound device? Does it say that the driver is OK but there is a problem, or does everything look OK in device manager, but just no sound? Does it work with headphones still? Is it still under warranty?
Thanks great forum. No, In fact the Sound Device disappears from the Device Manger. On the right bottom of the task bar the audio icon says the following ( No Audio Output Device is installed.) It's as if the motherboard didn't recognize the on board audio device. But as I've mentioned in my previous post, If I restart my computer like 30-40 consecutive times and IF I'm lucky, the audio device may start working again after one of these restarts. It doesn't work with headphones, and I only had a 1 year manufacturer warranty, and it expired 3 months ago.
If you've re-installed drivers... and even the OS, we can pretty much rule out a software problem. If it's actually not even listed in device manager... not even as a problem, then it actually isn't there (unless there's a BIOS option to disable it at a low level). My money is on the sound chip actually being dead (or dying). I had a similar problem with a DFI motherboard. It started by intermittent device manager problems, then eventually just disappeared from DM altogether.
It does sound like a hardware problem. I had a Gigabyte motherboard that had similar symptoms in the past. I plugged in a cheap sound card to resolve it. You could see if Acer would fix it for free (or at a very reduced cost) even if it is just out of warranty. Arguing the case that it shouldn't have broken so soon, Acer may be sympathetic. Otherwise your options may be an external sound card - a selection here to consider: http://www.scan.co.uk/Index.aspx?NT=1-0-42-54-0
If that is the case then do you think there's any solution to it besides changing the whole motherboard? (I might as well buy a new laptop, but i can't really afford a new one). Before I wrote this post, I restarted my computer and the device started to work fine, but after another restart the device wasn't recognized. Frustrating. I don't know what is it about restarting the computer that makes the device work (sometimes), and If you read my original post I said something about a trick I used to do with Windows Xp. I'm not an expert but I think if it was dying then the sound quality (whenever the sound device works) would be bad, but that's not the case, because whenever the sound devices starts to work, the sound quality is superb.
The problem is that it's a laptop, not a desktop, if it was a desktop I would have bought a new sound device, and tested it to see if that was the problem. If there's an external sound device that i can connect via USB that I'm not aware of, is that what you meant?
I understand that. I was just giving an example. The faulty sound on the Gigabyte motherboard I mentioned was an on board Realtek device. The link I put in was to give you some samples of external sound cards so you have an idea of what your options are. Don't rule out trying Acer. They may be kind to you.
The problem with buying an external audio device is (portability), it would suck to have to carry the sound device around and plug it in whenever I need sound. I really hope acer is kind enough to fix it for free or (reduced cost) as you said. Thanks for the Advice ! Cheers!
Yep, that could be a pain, but if you have to, this one isn't very big: http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/Creative-SoundBlaster-X-Fi-Go!-External-USB-Sound Just a thought. Good luck with getting it sorted.
On mine... when it did work, the sound was fine... it just kept dropping out of device manager. All I can suggest is some kind of external sound device, or contacting the manufacturer and see if they can do anything to help.
I have the same problem Hello, first tell them that I'm Mexican and I have the same problem with a laptop computer Acer Aspire 7520 - 5626 AMD Athlon processor tk-53 at 1.7 GHz frequency. Well the thing is that I have the same problem, this laptop computer came with Windows Vista, I gave format and pass it on to Windows 7 a while the audio does not recognize me, I get a sign that says "no output device audio installed "when I pass the mouse over the icon of the horn, as the fellow above, the sound grabs you turn sometimes, sometimes not. It is possible that a software problem and / or drivers because you eh formatted and the problem persists, the trouble with me is that neither in the Windows OS or the BIOS recognizes my DVD player then I think that if a hardware problem on the motherboard (as you call it motherboard or logic board), a technician told me that this be done by changing the processor, I want to ask how the problem was solved? Why it having to be carrying the USB audio device is complicated everywhere. Well I hope I can help, greetings from Mexico.
chucho-renegado, try installing this driver. It's from the Acer Website and it's for the Aspire 7520.
