This is my first post here because this forum seems to actually have members that offer help which is rare these days. Sorry about the long post but I'll put some info and links to make life easier on you!

I picked up a case for a friend and swaped out the guts on problem. His seemed to boot fine, neon worked, usb, fans etc. The next day he said he couldn't get the sound working, so I went over and spend hours trying to figure out how the hell this happened with onboard audio.

The board is a FIC AM37 from an emachines box with with the AC 97' Codec embedded in the VIA 8235 chipset. I've tried every driver possible and no sound. Tried repairing the XP pro installation hoping fresh OS files would work. The main issue is that there is a few different drivers for the AC 97' codec that I found and none match up- or at least none work. The bios says VIA-3058 AC97 ￁udio with options Auto or disabled.

The VIA audio and 4in1 drivers didn't work, the FIC support page download was the Avance AC 97' driver, but the AM37 Manual they have states VIA-3058 AC97 also. I tried the Vinyl AC 97' for this chipset on the VIA site, and originally it had the Realtek AC 97' driver installed but it was the 3059 version I think. I've downloaded and tried them all with the setup.exe's and manually in device manager. No dice. There is no error messages just no sound. So it's probably not the driver, then what's the board's problem?

Yes I tried uninstalling it and just about every other software he might have added, and also checked the default sound devices, audio, volume, etc. Could this be an emachines issue? Maybe it shorted out or am I just going crazy? Any help would be greatly appreciated!

You've covered quite a range of issues here but have you checked the system bios to make sure on-board sound is enabled and apart from that, have you checked the audio cables to the speakers?

BTW, :wave: Welcome To TechSpot! :wave: with your first post.

Are the sounds being played, ie is the media player progress bar moving??

If all else fails just put a pci sound card in and disable onboard

One think I might add is the onboard integrated components may be controlled partially by the BIOS. You could upgrade the BIOS. Look for a Chipset Driver CDROM and see what it says on the disk about installing the integrated sound. I am thinking Chipset drivers. Yes definitely check the BIOS Settings.

The motherboard could be damaged and need replacing. Before I would purchase a sound card, I would just get another motherboard. I have one FIC motherboard and I did not like it so I ripped it out and ordered an Asus Motherboard.