My computer has audio integrated on the motherboard.

While listening to it last week the right channel started making static which increased over a 30 second period to overwhelm all audio, at which point all sound ceased with a loud pop. Next morning the sound was back, but at reduced volume, sometimes disappearing, and with loud pops at not-quite-random intervals. It seems that any significant "change of state" of the computer, such as starting a new program, tends to generate a pop. The results are the same whether played through my Altec amplified speaker system or through headphones plugged directly into the headphone jack on the back of the computer.

It would appear from these symptoms that I have a hardware problem.

Is this a problem I can fix by installing an aftermarket sound card? I think I have a slot or two available, but do I have to worry about disabling the on-board system or is it smart enough to know there's a new player in the audio game? What do I do now?

tanstaafl.

Yes, a new sound card should solve your problem. You can go USB if you want these days, but I assume internal is better. Windows will let you chose where to send sounds, and so will most individual audio applications. You can also usually turn onboard sound off in the bios.

Matthew

Unless you're gaming then any reasonably cheap USB or internal soundcard will do. Just make sure it has the required inputs and outputs that you want and thats it.

Then, this one would do? Keep in mind that I am running a 32-bit Windows Vista system.

tanstaafl.

That is a very common and popular sound card, shouldn't have any problems with it.

Aaaarrrgggh! Some cretin bought it before I could bid on it. Now I have to spend 28% more for a hideously expensive auction. $8.98 total including shipping.

Done and paid for!

tanstaafl.

Uh, assuming he has a motherboard with PCI slots.

Doug, what model computer do you have?

Yeah, I'm reasonably sure his last desktop was new enough to have PCI slots.

No worries. This computer was built from components in October of 2007, and has at least one PCI slot available.

tanstaafl.

I was thinking it might be new enough to have only PCIe slots.

Wow, scary thought. I still remember when I had to give up my last ISA card...

Admittedly my Mac Pro is an Apple product that tends to shed legacy ports quicker then others, but it doesn't have a single regular, 1993 era 32 bit 33mhz PCI slot in it. It looks like the last time the pro towers from Apple offered PCI compatibility (by way of PCI-X slots) was October of 2005.

I've still got at least one ISA card running in a computer I actually use on a daily basis.

But, to pick a common vendor, there are a number of not-terribly-high-end Dell models that have no PCI slots.

No problems whatsoever with installing the card in the computer. A minor problem in that there are no Vista drivers available for this old card. If you Google for "Vista Driver CT4780" the first 25 hits are all for people looking for this (non-existant) driver.

Surprisingly the sound card does work (sort of) without the driver, in that it produces noise that if you listen carefully can actually be determined to be speech or music, but it is so over-driven (like running speaker level out into a line level input) that it is practically unintelligible, and from the sound of it no frequencies higher than about 80 Hz are coming out of the card.

So, I guess my "bargain" wasn't such a great deal -- there goes $8.98 down the drain (anybody want to buy a CT4780 sound card at a really good price? ) and I guess I need to shop for something a bit more current and no doubt a lot more expensive.

Specific recommendations? Versatility and high sound quality are not priorities. I mean, it has to sound decent, but it is feeding either a pair of headphones or an $80 Altec powered speaker set (with subwoofer) so it doesn't need to be top of the line by any means. I need utility, not "audiophileness".

So far at least it seems like the computer is happy letting the two sound systems coexist -- sound comes out of whichever output I plug into: either the on-board system which has left channel only and occasional loud pops; or the CT4780 without driver which produces unintelligible sound. I can't find anything in the BIOS that would disable on-board sound.

tanstaafl.

Run an operating system with better hardware compatibility?

Do you mean completely without a driver at all, or do you mean that you successfully installed a Windows XP driver?

If you haven't tried the latter, try that. I could have sworn that vista has a mode that lets you run old XP drivers.

Thanks, Bitt. I ordered this one. We'll see how it goes. The only complaints any of the user reviews listed was that it didn't support 64 bit. Mine is 32 bit.

tanstaafl.

tanstaafl.