Install sound drivers on your computer. How to find out what sound drivers you need

Installing a Windows operating system, as a rule, requires additional hardware configuration - you will need to install drivers for the processor, video card, network card and, of course, sound. But how can you determine which sound driver is needed, and where to get it?

Why doesn't Windows see the sound card?

Sometimes the Windows operating system cannot independently select a driver for the sound card. In this case, you will not hear the welcome sound of loading the operating system, and you will not be able to listen to music or watch movies on the computer. The reason is usually that the audio device is either too rare or released much later than your version of the operating system. In these cases, you need to install the driver yourself, and there are at least three ways to do this.

Method No. 1: search in the Microsoft database

Sometimes, in order to install a driver, it is enough to use the resources of the operating system itself. To do this, you need to open the properties of the My Computer menu and launch Device Manager. In the list that appears in front of you, select the sound card, usually marked with an exclamation mark, then select “Update drivers” and, finally, “Automatically search for updated drivers.” When the search is successful, click the “Install” button.

Method No. 2: manual search

The operating system does not always manage to find the necessary software for your sound card, and then you have to look for the driver yourself. All you need to do is open a search engine, enter the name of the sound adapter and the word “driver” and select the appropriate set of drivers. How do you know which sound drivers you'll need? This can be done using the device manager - in the list of drivers it will be a realtek device, so you can find out which driver is installed. It is best to download drivers from the sound card or motherboard manufacturer's website, or from specialized driver sites. Once you have downloaded the driver to your computer, open Device Manager, select “Browse this computer for driver software” and select the folder where you saved the driver you are looking for.

Method No. 3: programs for searching for drivers

If you cannot perform a search manually and using the operating system itself, entrust this to the program. Which program to update drivers? You can do this using programs that contain a driver package (installers). These include Sam Drivers, DriverMax, Driver Checker, Device Doctor and many others.

There are quite a lot of questions on the forums about what to do when there is no sound on their computer, and humorous forum users answer them - buy speakers. It would be stupid to deny the advice here; without speakers there will be no sound either, but it happens that the problem is buried in the computer.

Today we will look at how to fix this problem.

Preparation

If the operation was not carried out to reinstall the Windows OS, nothing was changed in it and no important system files were deleted, and your sound simply disappeared for no reason, advice - start scanning your computer for viruses using the free Kaspersky AVP Tool scanners. Dr.Web CureIt! and the like. The procedure is standard for everyone and we will not focus on it, just install the best free antivirus and carefully do a full scan of your computer. Very often, viruses corrupt or delete sound drivers and for this reason it is not possible to play sound on the computer.

After scanning your computer for viruses, go to “Control Panel” - “Add or Remove Programs” and find the sound driver in the window that appears, in most cases it’s Realtec AC97 or C-media and calmly uninstall them. If nothing like this is found, then go to “Control Panel” - “System” - “Hardware” - “Device Manager” and find “multimedia audio controller” and remove its driver.

We reboot the computer. Don’t forget to remove all audio-video codecs from your computer; this can also be done through “Add or Remove Programs” in the Control Panel.

Installing drivers

Next we will install sound drivers. We take a disk with drivers from our personal computer and install them on it. If you have no idea which driver needs to be installed from the disk, then this can be done through the “Device Manager” (“Control Panel” - “System” - “Hardware” - “Device Manager”) in it we look for “multimedia audio controller” click on it with the right mouse button and select “Update driver”:

Click “Yes, just this time”, and then “Next”:

Here we select the item “Install from a specified location” and then “Next”:

Here, using the “Browse” button, select the disk on which the driver will be searched and click “Ok”, and then “Next”. The search for the driver on this disk will begin, and then its installation will begin. After installation is complete, the Hardware Update Wizard will will inform you that the driver is installed and the equipment is ready for use. After installing the drivers, be sure to reboot the system.

Installing codecs

When the reboot occurs, the sound will appear, to check, you can open the “Sounds and Audio Devices” category in the control panel, turn on the speakers and click on the volume slider.

To complete this procedure, you need to install new audio-video codecs, which you can download for free from the site dirfreest.ru

Sound cards in modern computers and laptops, like any other installed hardware, will not work without special control software in the system, called a driver. Apparently, absolutely all users know about this. However, sometimes you need to install drivers yourself, update them, or reinstall them (for example, if the device does not function). But how can you determine which drivers are needed for a sound card? In principle, on stationary PCs it is enough to look at the equipment markings by removing the side cover from the system unit. But what if the chip is integrated or access to it is impossible purely for technical reasons, as can be seen in the situation with laptops? Let's try to look at a few simple methods that will help solve this problem.

How to find out which sound driver I need: the simplest way

Initially, we will proceed from the fact that it is not possible to look up the name of the sound card model. To view all the equipment installed on a computer or laptop in Windows systems, there is a so-called “Device Manager”, which can be called, for example, from the computer control section, the “Control Panel” or the program launch console with the combination devmgmt.msc.

How do I know which sound driver I need? To do this, just open the corresponding section with sound, gaming and video devices, and then first determine the name of the sound card itself (its brand and manufacturer). After this, you can simply visit the website of the manufacturer or developer of the corresponding software and search for the required driver by model name. Typically, such software is made freely available. After this, the driver should be downloaded and installed yourself. But it is not always possible to use this option, since for built-in (integrated) type sound cards, the manufacturer’s name is usually not indicated in the “Device Manager”, and the card is shown as a device with support for High Definition Audio.

How to determine which sound driver is needed for an integrated sound card?

First, let's look at the option of searching for a driver for a sound card on a laptop. In this case, the best solution would be to visit the website of the laptop manufacturer and view complete information on your laptop model. The hardware may indicate the card markings, and among the software available for download, the necessary, and most recent, drivers may also be presented. All that remains is to download the required installer, focusing on the type and bitness of the installed operating system, and then run it to install the drivers.

Some manufacturers offer users online testing of laptops. In this case, the matter is simplified, since updating or installing the necessary drivers can be done completely automatically, and there is no need to figure out which drivers are needed.

But let's see how to find out which sound driver I need if automatic installation is not provided even on the manufacturer's website. In this case, if we are talking specifically about the integrated card driver, you can use DirectX tools (the dialog is called from the “Run” console using the dxdiag command).

The sound tab on the left will show brief information on the device itself, and on the left - on the driver (most often this is a Microsoft driver file that is installed by the operating system itself). If you need another driver, move on.

Finding the software that best matches your device

Now let's see how to understand which sound driver is needed for installation, focusing on its absolute and most complete compliance with the sound card model.

In this case, we will again need the “Device Manager”, in which we need to go to the card properties through the RMB menu, and on the details tab, select display equipment ID from the drop-down list. The list may contain several lines containing the values of VEN and DEV, but you need to copy the longest one, and then use it to search for the required control software on the Internet, using special resources with driver databases or other sites where such software can be made available for free download.

Using automated programs

Finally, let's look at how to know which audio driver I need (if at all) when it comes to using automated programs. They can be roughly divided into two main classes: applications with their own databases (DriverPack Solution) and online applets (Driver Booster). The good thing about such programs is that the user does not need to figure out what exactly needs to be installed, but simply trust the program, which will automatically scan all the devices on the computer and install the missing or updated drivers on its own.

Special drivers for working with sound

It remains to add that when using some sequencer programs or virtual sound studios, it may sometimes be necessary to install additional drivers.

In particular, this applies to the ASIO driver set. If we are talking about using plug-in MIDI keyboards and synthesizers, you may need to install the appropriate MIDI driver or virtual sound device (usually, when installing the main software, all drivers are integrated into the system automatically, but only after the user checks the box in the installer itself their installation).

Many users have already learned how to install the Windows operating system themselves. But most often, a regular installation is not enough for stable operation of all the equipment included in your computer or laptop. Problems arise already when you turn it on for the first time. And one of the main problems is the lack of drivers, including for sound devices. There are many ways to correctly and quickly select the necessary drivers, some of which are provided by the Windows operating system itself.

You will need

administrator account

Instructions

First, try to select the required drivers using standard tools in the Windows operating system. Open the Control Panel menu and go to Device Manager.

A list of installed equipment will open in front of you. Find your sound adapter and right-click on it. Select "Update Drivers". In the new window, select the first option - automatically search for updated drivers. The process of automatically searching for a driver suitable for your sound card will begin.

Don't despair if you are unable to install the drivers automatically. There are not so many popular sound card manufacturers. Find out the model of your adapter. Visit the website of the official manufacturer of this device.

Download the software and drivers appropriate for your sound card model. Install the software. If the driver is not installed with it, then repeat the operation described in the second step, but specify the path to the downloaded files yourself.

If you cannot find the program you need, use driver managers. As an example, download and install the Driver Pack Solution program.

Launch the program and wait until it completes scanning your hardware and identifying the most suitable drivers. You will be asked to install drivers for several devices, as well as download and install several related programs.

Select the drivers that match your sound adapter and click the Update button. If you decide to completely update all driver sets, click the “Install all” button.

Wait for the installation process to complete. Restart your computer. Make sure there is sound.

Please note Realtek HD Audio Drivers (High Definition Audio Driver) is a free official driver package designed for correct playback of audio streams running Microsoft Windows XP, Windows 2000, Windows Server 2003, Vista, Windows Server 2008, Windows 7 - x86 operating systems /x64. HD Audio (short for High Definition Audio) is a more progressive continuation of the AC‘97 specification... How to determine sound drivers - print version

Today we will look at:

There are various reasons why you need a personal computer. This is not always done using programs with automatic selection of drivers.

In addition, you need to know what sound driver you need for your PC for reasons that may degrade the performance of sound devices on your computer.

Sound card not detected by OS

Let's consider cases when the operating system is not able to independently select a driver for the sound card of a personal computer. During the process of reinstalling the system and its further reboot, this is determined by the absence of sound signals.

The reason for creating such a situation may be the installed audio equipment on a personal computer, which: is rare; The release date is older than the OS being installed.
In this case, you need to manually install the sound driver. There are several ways to determine the required sound driver for your PC.

Help Microsoft identify your audio driver

The computer operating system offers assistance in determining the required sound driver. You need to point the cursor to the “My Computer” folder, right-click (RMB), then “Properties”, then “Hardware”. You can make it simpler: right-click the “My Computer” folder and go to the device manager section.

A list will open in the device manager, select the sound card (there is no driver, there is an exclamation mark next to it). Select the line, at the top there is the “Update driver” option, then the “Search for drivers” item, when everything happens with a positive result, the “Install” window will be offered.

Manual search for sound driver

When the automatic selection of a sound driver does not work, you need to try to find it manually; to do this, go to any search engine (Google, Yandex). Then in the search bar we enter the name of our sound device on the PC and add “+ driver”, in the window that opens we select the one we need.

What driver is needed for a personal computer? This can be easily seen in the Device Manager tab. It is recommended to download the driver from the official website of the manufacturer of the installed motherboard (when the sound card is built into it). It is also suggested to download the driver from a site that specializes in updating this hardware for PCs.

After downloading the driver, go back to the “Device Manager” tab, open “Search for drivers on PC”, indicate the location where you saved it, “Install”.

Installing a sound driver with a program

There are times when it is difficult for a computer user to find a sound driver manually and using the OS, then a special program is offered to search for it. Currently, there are several programs for these purposes: Driver Checker, Sam Drivers, Device Doctor, and other programs.

Working with the interface of programs of this type is understandable and intuitive.

There are different cases in which you need to determine the sound driver for your PC, experts advise:

Determine the model of the installed sound device on the PC (read on the computer). Perhaps the lack of sound is due to the hardware not being installed and its use being prohibited in the BIOS.
When the sound is integrated on the PC, it is recommended to download the sound driver only from the website of the motherboard manufacturer, or, in the case of a separate installation of the sound card, write off the chip markings from it. Use the marking search system to find the required driver.
It is recommended to use the AIDA 64 program, it will not only show the required sound driver, but also all installed equipment, you can also determine the chip markings.