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How to install a driver for sound. Search for audio drivers (for example, Realtek)

Good hour everyone!

In most cases, there is no sound on the computer due to the lack of an audio driver. It would seem that there is nothing easier to solve the problem: determine which one is needed, find it, download and install ...

But in most cases, it is not so easy and quick to do this (especially for a user who does not often encounter this), there are always little things that you have to focus on. In this article, I, just, want to make out in detail all these nuances ...

And so how to install sound drivers ...

Remark!

To search for and install the driver in automatic mode, I recommend the following utilities: //ocomp.info/update-drivers.html

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Search and install sound drivers

Saying: for many, everything is simple - until they encounter it in practice ...

How to find out if there is an audio driver on Windows

  1. The easiest way is to look in the tray: is there a sound icon from your audio driver there, next to the clock. In most cases, when installing the audio driver, a new icon should appear there (example in the screenshot below).

    Audio Driver Sound Icon (Windows 10)

  2. The second way is to go to Control Panel Windows (how to) and open the " Hardware and Sound ". It usually always contains a link to the audio driver settings.

    B&O Play Audio Control

  3. The third way is the most relevant and reliable - go to device Manager (the fact is that the tray icon or link in the control panel may not always be there, especially if Windows itself installed the universal driver). Note: how to open the device manager - //ocomp.info/kak-otkryit-dispetcher-ustroystv.html

    How to Open Device Manager - Windows 10 (Windows Control Panel)

    Next, open the section " Sound, game and video devices "and see if there are any exclamation points in yellow, which may indicate a problem with the driver (it is possible that unknown devices for which there are no drivers will be in the "Other devices" or "Unknown devices" section) .

    Checking the Audio Driver (Device Manager)

    Recommend : update all drivers so that there is no hardware with exclamation marks in the device manager (example - ).

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Determination of the sound card model / mat. fees

  1. The fastest and easiest way is use the documentation for your computer (laptop). By the way, along with the documentation, you may find a disk with "native" drivers, which will immediately make life easier and exclude all further operations.
  2. You can open the system unit and look at the motherboard itself , the model is always indicated on it (although this method is not always convenient: firstly, it is not a fact that you have a sound card built into the motherboard; secondly, if the PC is easy enough to disassemble, then the laptop is very problematic to disassemble; - third, for novice users - various nuances may appear (they will look in the wrong place ...)).

    Model mat. boards - ASUS Z97-K

  3. The easiest way to find out the model is to run some utility to view the characteristics of the computer (I wrote about such utilities here: //ocomp.info/harakteristiki-kompyutera.html). For example, I like the AIDA64 utility, with the help of it I determined the necessary characteristics: laptop - HP Pavilion 15-cw0xxx, sound card - Realtek ALC295 (example below).

    AIDA64 - view laptop model and sound card

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Search for an audio driver (3 ways!)

  1. The first option is the most reliable: knowing the manufacturer of your equipment - just go to the site and find the section with drivers in the support ... Note that the AIDA64 utility I recommend even has a link to the official manufacturer of your hardware.

    Official Manufacturer / AIDA 64

    On the manufacturer's website, find your device (model, in my case Dell Inspiron 3542), specify your Windows OS - and just download the required audio driver.

    Download audio driver

  2. Another search option is use sites , on which hundreds of different drivers are laid out. Knowing the model of the motherboard (sound card), you can easily find the required driver by the name. I recommend the following sites: //devid.info/; //driver.ru/

    Driver search on Devid.info

  3. Driver search by ID. You can search for a driver knowing the device ID (more precisely, its VID and PID values). These are special parameters that are unique to each equipment! To do this, first open device manager (the article above describes how this is done) and open the properties of the required equipment (just right-click on it, select the tab in the context menu properties ).

    Equipment properties

    Then open the " Intelligence "and in the properties select" Equipment ID "(see screenshot below). Next, copy the value.

    Copy equipment ID

    Well, and the last step, type in Google search or on the website with drivers (e.g. Devid.info) the line you copied. If your hardware is not too rare, then dozens of all kinds of drivers for different Windows operating systems (including 32/64 bit systems) will be found.

    Found drivers for all versions of Windows

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How to install the sound driver correctly

Basically, audio drivers are installed in the same way as any other drivers (sorry for the tautology). Perhaps, in most cases, it is almost the same as a regular program.

Briefly step by step:

  1. First, I recommend completely uninstalling the old driver. This can be done through device Manager ... Just right-click on the desired equipment and select the function " delete ".

    Removing the audio driver

  2. If the downloaded driver file is an Exe file : just launch it and follow the wizard's recommendations.
  3. If the downloaded file is a ZIP, RAR, etc. : unzip it and run the file install.exe or setup.exe ... To unzip you can use the free 7Z archiver - //www.7-zip.org/.
  4. If automatic driver installation is not provided (for example, there is no setup.exe file) : in general, this is extremely rare today. First you need to open device Manager , then right-click on the desired equipment and select the function " Update drivers ".

    Update drivers

    Next, a window will appear in front of you in which you need to select the place where the driver will be searched for. In our case, we choose the second option - " Search for a driver on this computer ".

    Search for a driver on this computer

    Then just specify the folder where you downloaded and unzipped the driver (the " Overview ", see the screen below.) Next, Windows will search for the required driver in this place, and if it is found, Windows will offer to install it (you just agree and that's it ...).

    Selecting the folder where the driver was downloaded and unzipped

After updating (installing) drivers - you need to restart your computer (laptop). Actually, if the appropriate drivers have been downloaded and installed, everything will work as needed for you, and sound will appear!

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This concludes the article.

For additions and additions on the topic - in advance merci!

Good Luck! 👋

First publication: 11/27/16

Correction: 01/20/19

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