Sound problems

For the past few weeks iv noticed my pc beggins to lagg/crash randomly after around 1 hour.

The gameplay screen laggs.
The sound or music i listen to will start lagging/crashing, sounding sort of like the [Diel-up ringtone]

The computer used to be windows xp but around october last year i got it upgraded to windows 7 Ultimate. I did this on my own.

I dont use any sound cards. Sound is part of the motherboard.

A few months ago i used software called "Driver Genius" to update my computer.

Computer Specs

The software probably downloaded and installed the wrong driver. There are so many sound cards out there that it's very possible you are running the wrong version. You'll either need to revert to an earlier driver or wipe them out and reinstall them. This isn't a huge deal and can take anywhere between 5-20 min.

For starters, which operating system, motherboard and sound card are you using?

I know how to roll back the drivers so thats fine.

Im running windows 7.
I dont have a soundcard, the music is created through the motherboard.
Im not sure what motherboard im using, or how to figure this out...


What i should have mentiond it that my games are also beggining to crash. I seem to be getting a lot of screen lagg and it can be frustrating sometimes.

Personally iv come to the conclusion that its the thermal paste that needs replaced or something but obveously i can be compleatly wrong.

If you're not using a dedicated sound card then the drivers are installed with the chipset drivers, so that's most likely your problem. To find which motherboard you are using, download and run CPU-Z from www.cpuid.com and click on the Mainboard tab. CPU-Z will display all of the board's information including the manufacturer, model and chipset. From there, you will want to record the data and then go looking for the correct drivers.

Ok i updated the drivers for audio through the motherboard manufacturer's website...

My motherboard is: Gigabyte Technology 8I945GZME-RH

What i did was download the driver, install it. I didnt uninstall anything because i assume it would overwrite everything. Though my pc used to be Windows xp HE and now its Windows 7 HE

Often the case, but not always... Look in Ctl Pnl->Programs and Features and uninstall the soundcard software from there. Then try install one more time

(fyi...When you install a driver from an EXE file it may contain more then just the driver. Audio, grahpics and network "driver" EXE file installs usually include application level software as well as the actual driver (e.g. control panel applets, notification / status icons, hotkey functions, etc.).

The application level uninstaller knows how to uninstall the actual driver as well. It will uninstall both appl and driver stuff as well as removing the files. Which is why you want to uninstall from Add/Remove programs (using the application level uninstaller) when it exists there

That's why you often find for audio, graphics and network devices
> When you uninstall them from Add/Remove Programs, the driver is uninstalled and driver files deleted so next reboot Windows says no device driver found
>But simply uninstall them from Device Mgr, the driver is uninstalled but the driver files are not deleted. So next reboot, Windows reinstalls the driver. Also, device level uninstaller doesn't know about or how to uninstall any appl level stuff

You might also try testing your sound under a non-Windows OS. Might help indicate if a Windows vs. a hardware problem. Knoppix has a multimedia player you could use to test sound. To create a bootable Knoppix CD ee step #2 in How to recover your folders/files when Windows won’t boot

Ok il do that but i should mention...

I can hear the sound perfectly normal for the first hour or so and after about an hour it starts to crash. Thats why i thought it was the cpu itself but i will try this first and hope it fixes my problem.
The graphics laggs after about an hour too but this might contribute to that?

Anyways, i know i should have mentiond all this at the beggining, i wasnt thinking, just wanted my problem fixed fast.


Edit:

Ok i didnt see any installed software for audio in the programm/uninstall section.
When i went to device manager and looked at the audio device details, the driver was installed the same date i installed windows 7. There are no updates on the web for this as i cheked.

Now im a little lost...

I dont use a sound card also, its on the motherboard.

Should i look into buying a soundcard?

OK. Then sounds like your installation is driver level only

Under the audio device, Driver tab what Driver Provider and Driver Version number is listed?? Is the Provider Realtek? and waht's the version # and date listed? (as i wonder if Windows 7 may also include generic drivers from Microsoft, is a guess)
> I'm assuming you downloaded and tried reinstalling the driver on Gigabyte site for your mobo? (which i saw was from Realtek). But just double checking

You're currently using an "onboard sound card" may also referred to as "integrated sound" as there's a sound card among the chips integrated into the motherboard

That might be the ultimate solution (also called "addon" or "off-board" sound) tho i think is also worth booting into Knoppix (or other non-Windows OS). Knoppix includes a media player. I think is worth checking if the problem is unique to Windows or not