Gateway SigmaTel audio problem

[joecass]

I recently downloaded Windows Vista audio drivers for my Gateway
E4610D Intel-based desktop. While the internal Windows audio works correctly,
I'm having a problem in that the main Input options are for digital audio,
not analog. After installing the SigmaTel Vista drivers, I'm able to configure
the back panel audio jacks, but there is no through-put for incoming audio.
Every computer I've ever had in my life passes the Line input sound to the computer speakers, to be able to monitor incoming audio.
The BIOS is updated, the audio drivers were obtained from the Gateway support site.
There are no options for controlling the sound level that I can find, nor
does there seem to be any way of disabling the motherboard audio chip.
I've thought of buying a Creative PCIe sound card, but I'm not even sure I can successfully install one.
So far the only program I've been able to use to record incoming analog
audio is Nero 7. I had installed Sound Forge 4.5, which works on another
AMD desktop with Vista, and an XP Pro machine. Sound Forge doesn't seem to work with this Sigmatel Audio, when recording, the signal stutters badly upon playback. Although I can upgrade to a newer version of
Sound Forge, I've been using this old version for years without any problems.
I remember reading somewhere about "Vista audio problems", can't figure out if this is a Vista problem,
a motherboard problem, or a software/driver problem. BTW I'm running Vista SP2.
Any advice would be appreciated

[jman98]

I don't know if this is even remotely going to be helpful, but I had a somewhat similar weird situation happen to me recently and I thought that even if there's only a 5% chance this is your problem too, it's worth mentioning.

Basically my nephew's Lenovo laptop lost its hard drive and he got a replacement through extended warranty from Lenovo, but they sent it blank to him. I'm an IT guy and I've got some Windows experience so I got XP installed on his laptop. I could not get audio to work at all on the laptop. I downloaded and installed the official Lenovo sound drivers and still got nothing. I did an internet search and I found quite a few people with this laptop who reinstalled Windows and couldn't get the sound working. A Lenovo tech support specialist explained why on an official website. When you run the "install" program on the drivers, it does not actually do the install. It only extracts the true install program and drivers to a directory. You then have to find the true install program in that directory and run that and then sound will work. Is there any chance that this bizarre bunch of bs has happened to you too? Maybe your install just extracted the files but it didn't install anything. My clue was that when I looked at the Device Manager my sound device had a ? and ! by it and that means basically "it ain't working". Check what your audio device looks like under Device Manager because if you've got the ? and ! by it, your drivers aren't really installed for it.

[joecass]

Thanks for the advice..... there aren't any yellow flags in device manager, the normal Windows audio & video programs work fine. I'm just not used to having adjustments for digital audio, and nothing for analog. Maybe I installed the wrong driver,
there were many to choose from on the support site. I guess I can always try contacting Gateway support and see if
they can help.

[Nelson37]

Jman's story is not at all unusual, happens all the time. Pay careful attention when running the program, it is quite possible you have generic Windows drivers giving some functionality but not the full effect of the manufacturer's drivers. Look for any directory created, try to just extract the "driver" files, see if there is a secondary install.

Next, if there are multiple drivers listed, then at least one and possibly more will work, that means that at least one and possibly more will NOT work. Try to identify your mobo from markings directly on the board to narrow down the choices, or just uninstall, reboot, and try the next one.