For one reason or another, the Windows operating system sometimes forces you to resort to reinstalling it. And very often a very unpleasant problem arises for the user. Which one? Sound does not work after reinstalling Windows 7. This article will help you complete the steps to return the sound. By the way, all of the following is suitable for more recent versions of the operating system.
Possible reasons
So, why doesn’t the sound work after reinstalling Windows 7? Problems may concern the hardware of the computer. For example, a sound card may fail. In this case, it is most likely necessary to replace it with a working one. But this article deals with software problems, as it is understood that the sound does not work after reinstalling Windows 7, and before it everything was in order.
Search and install sound drivers
Often the sound on the PC disappears after the operating system has been re-installed. This is due to the lack of necessary drivers. Of course, more often the system independently selects the necessary software, and everything works as it should, but there are situations when you need to install the drivers yourself. This is especially true when the user has some kind of non-standard or rare model of a sound card. In addition, updating drivers is never superfluous.
Where to look for a driver?
- Included with a laptop or computer motherboard is usually a disk with all the necessary software. But recently, for some reason, such disks are not attached.
- The driver can be found on the manufacturer’s website. In order to find out the model of the sound card, you will need to use a special utility.
- The simplest option, when the sound does not work after reinstalling Windows 7, is to use special programs that automatically install the necessary drivers. The choice among such utilities is great. Their main advantage is that they are able to automatically determine the manufacturer of the equipment used, search for a driver for it, download and install the user on the computer, which requires only a couple of mouse clicks.
One of the best programs for automatically installing drivers is Driver Booster, which is a small utility that requires just one launch. After that, the computer will be scanned and the drivers that need updating or installation will be offered to the user for installation. At the same time, the release date is indicated opposite each of them, and there is also a note about whether an urgent update is needed.
After selecting all or only one driver and user consent, the update process starts. By the way, the entire installation takes place exclusively in automatic mode. And previously, a recovery point will be created for the situation if the new driver turns out to be worse than the old one. Then the user will be able to roll back the system to a previous state at any time. After the whole procedure is completed, you need to restart the computer.
Sound settings in the operating system
It happens that the latest drivers are installed, but still, after reinstalling Windows 7, the sound does not work. What to do then? There may be two reasons why it is not:
- The wrong driver for the sound card is installed.
- Another audio device selected. For example, a computer can send sound not to the speakers used, but to headphones, which actually do not even exist.
First of all, you need to pay attention to the sound icon, located in the tray for about hours. There should not be any red strikethrough on it. Some users complain that the sound does not work after reinstalling Windows 7 and in such a funny situation when it is simply set to the minimum value. It will not be superfluous to make sure that this is not the problem.
Next, you need to open the "Control Panel", and then go to the "Hardware and Sound" section. Next, select "Sound." There is a tab "Playback", in which, most likely, there will be more than one device that reproduces sound. Here you will need to choose. And often the sound does not work after reinstalling Windows 7, just because the system selected the wrong device. As soon as the speakers are selected and the changes are accepted, the user will hear the long-awaited sound.
If it is not very clear which device to choose, then you can simply start playing any audio recording, turn up the volume and take turns checking each device from the list displayed in the tab.
Lack of codec
If there are sounds when working with the operating system itself, but they are absent when listening to music or watching video files, then most likely the computer does not have a good multimedia codec installed. It is recommended that you install it to fix the problem. Great for KLM.