dalegtr18 Posted September 19, 2003 Share Posted September 19, 2003 I have been having problems with my CD-Rom/Soundcard. I am running Windows 98 SE on an HP Vectra VL6/333 D5737A Pentium II with 192 MB of RAM and a Soundblaster soundcard (sorry, don't have the model info handy but it's one of the lower end SB cards). If I plug headphones into the CD-Rom directly I can hear stereo just fine. Also, I can hear the startup sounds thru both speakers as well. I ran the Soundblaster diagnostics and 8 bit and 16 bit tested fine. The synthesized Bach Menuet came out in true stereo, which leads me to believe the problem is not the sound card. I have also checked to make sure I have the correct wiring for the speakers- stereo plug into the soundcard, mono plug between speakers. I have even tested the plug in all 4 inputs just to be thorough but to no avail. I have checked all the settings for the volume control and they seem in order (one odd thing I noticed is when I unmute the Microphone, the sound comes out booming thru both speakers but still lacking one channel). I have also replaced the wire that runs from the CD-Rom to the soundcard.This leads me to believe that one of two things may be happening. Either the CD-ROM is not sending out a stereo signal to the soundcard or perhaps the connection where the cd-rom to the meets the soundcard is bad (however, the SB diagnostics leads me to believe this is not so).I recall about 2 years ago when I first set this up I had some problems which turned out to be the 'wrong' wire going from the cd-rom to the soundcard (this was the wire that had been used in a previous pc that ran from it's cd-rom to the soundcard). I'm unable to find that original wire but don't think that will help. There is a digital connection next to the analog one on the cd-rom (that runs to the soundcard) but I don't think I ever had this wired that way, as I don't have a wire for it.I've run out of ideas for now and am hoping to avoid tearing it out and installing it all in a similar pc. By the way, long story short, I recently formatted my hard drive and installed Windows 98 and the Soundblaster software (three times on the latter, just in case). I also have a program called CD-Looper which lets me create loops of music and play that back at variable speeds. I have also reinstalled this, just in case but no luck. Any ideas would be welcome and much appreciated. Thanks much!Daledalegtr18@yahoo.com Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gus K Posted September 21, 2003 Share Posted September 21, 2003 I've run out of ideas for now and am hoping to avoid tearing it out and installing it all in a similar pc.That's what I would do. You just have to pop the drive in another rig. No big deal, nothing else has to be set up. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
epp_b Posted September 22, 2003 Share Posted September 22, 2003 Actually, I think that the lack of an analog audio cable to the sound card could be the problem. I would try to get a hold of one. Besides, their as cheap as dirt, and it can't hurt to try Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dalegtr18 Posted September 22, 2003 Author Share Posted September 22, 2003 Thanks for replying epp_b. However, I do have an analog wire that runs from the cd to the soundcard already. This is the one I replaced this week. The connection I was wondering about was actually the digital, for which I doubt I ever had a wire or ever used before. I have looked at identical pc's and so far only found an analog wire conected.Dale Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dalegtr18 Posted September 22, 2003 Author Share Posted September 22, 2003 Thanks for the reply, Gus. I was actually hoping to avoid ripping out the soundcard, cd-rom, and installing SoundBlaster software on another pc. It's not hard, just a pain. However, it should be informative so I should probably bark up that tree. Another exercise I want to try first, however, is to try the original basic soundcard, which I dug out this weekend. I have a funny feeling that I will get true stereo output from it, which will only confuse the matter because that would indicate that the problem is with the soundcard, despite the SoundBlaster diagnostics indicating otherwise. Only problem with the orignal soundcard is that I don't think it can handle the recording capabilities to replay the slowed loops from my CD-Looper program. I will try this first, then your suggestion to install the cd and soundcard into another identical pc afterward and post my results this weekend. Thanks again! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gus K Posted September 22, 2003 Share Posted September 22, 2003 I was actually hoping to avoid ripping out the soundcard, cd-rom, and installing SoundBlaster software on another pc.You don't know someone who has a computer with a SC and CD-ROM? You would only have to swap out the drives. And with an XP rig you don't even need the audio cable from CD-ROM to the SC (you will need a cable for w98). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dalegtr18 Posted September 23, 2003 Author Share Posted September 23, 2003 Thanks for the suggestion, Gus. However, the two things I am trying to test are my cd-rom and soundcard, necessitating the swap of these components to test them. I could swap out the harddrive, as you suggest, but this would only test the software install of Windows 98, SoundBlaster and CD-Looper (the latter two which I have reinstalled twice so far). Your point does assist me in one way, however. My daughter has an identical pc (minus the SoundBlaster card) but it is slowly getting in sorry shape due to Kazaa and all the other stuff she has downloaded. I didn't warm to the idea of loading more software on a sorry system to test so I will probably pull the harddrive out as well at some point during the testing, swapping each component one at a time. Looks like I'll just roll up my sleeves this weekend and get busy. I'll post what I find out. Thanks again for your time.Dale Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gus K Posted September 23, 2003 Share Posted September 23, 2003 I didn't mean to swap out the HD, by drive, I was referring to the CD-ROM drive, which is what we have been talking about.You are over complicating matters. Just swap the CD-ROM by itself, if it works in the other computer you now know to look elsewhere (software, SC, connections etc.) on your rig. You have to eliminate things one at a time, when troubleshooting. Basic 6 channel Sound Cards are very cheap these days and can be had for less than $15.On your daughter's rig go here and run this.http://housecall.trendmicro.com/Then download, update and run Ad-aware. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dalegtr18 Posted September 25, 2003 Author Share Posted September 25, 2003 Thanks, Gus. NOW what you said makes perfect sense! Somehow my brain made a left turn when it should have gone right. I guess the coffee hadn't quite kicked in yet! LOL! I would have swapped out CD-Rom drives with her early on but she is having troubles with it reading cd's lately so I (foolishly) abandoned that option. It may just need a lens cleaning or may even be software related. I will swap them out anyway (thus answering two questions at the same time). If that doesn't give me a good answer I'll borrow one from work. Daleps- Thanks for the tips on my daughter's pc. I need to teach her a few more good pc habits. She HAS dumped Kazaa fortunately! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dalegtr18 Posted September 29, 2003 Author Share Posted September 29, 2003 Well, my problem turned out to have a rather simple, though slightly surprising, solution afterall. I replaced my SoundBlaster card with the original Aztech card that came with the box and not only do I get true stereo now when I play CD, I can also play my much cherished "slowed down loops" in stereo as well! The surprising things were 1) apparently there IS a problem with my SoundBlaster card, even though the diagnostics I ran turned up positive (still trying to figure THAT out!); 2) I was able to play the slowed down loops (from the CDLooper program I use) with the Aztech card. Originally (if memory serves), I was unable to do the latter, 'necessitating' my purchase of the SB card in the first place! My best guess is that it was a software or configuration problem that went away when I formatted my drive and reinstalled Windows. I DID, however, get an error when I first recorded a loop for slowing down yesterday but I think that it may simply have been the settings in the Properties of the Volume Control to tell it which card it will use for playback and recording.One final possibility is that the second wire I had to connect the CD-rom to the soundcard will work with my SoundBlaster card. I remember having troubles when I first bought the SB card and tried a slightly different wire which worked. I just moved and hope I can dig it up, otherwise a trip to local pc store should take care of that.Thanks much to Gus and all who took the time to respond.Dale Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Specmon Posted September 29, 2003 Share Posted September 29, 2003 I had what I believe was the same problem a while back with an Abit AU-10 sound card.It had three recepticles for four pin plugs like the one from the analog side of the CD-ROM. Two were labeled "from CD-ROM" and one as "AUX"I simply used the first CD plug, and after much head scratching, I noticed that the pin-out of the two CD plugs were different. Moving the wire to the second plug solved the problem. Does your card have two plugs that look the same without close scrutiny? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dalegtr18 Posted October 1, 2003 Author Share Posted October 1, 2003 Thanks for the post, Specmon. Here's what I found on my SoundBlaster CT45204 pin CD IN J3 (same plug as the Analog plug on the back of the CD-ROM)4 pin Aux1 J54 pin TAD J6 (slightly smaller than the one above)7 pin ? (J7)2 pin PC Spkr JP3And here's a link to a diagram of it.http://www.embeddedlogic.com/TH99/i/C-D/54570.htmI am presuming that the other "mystery wire" that I can't seem to find would plug into the CD IN slot and solve my stereo problem.Dale Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
b2cm Posted October 2, 2003 Share Posted October 2, 2003 You should try out the SB card on your daughter's computer. If the same problem occurs then you could be more certain it's the sound card.If the analog cable is fine, then you also should double-check whether it is attached to the right connector and/or attached correctly to the right connector. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dalegtr18 Posted October 11, 2003 Author Share Posted October 11, 2003 Well, the mystery is finally over. It DID turn out to be the other wire with the two same connectors (the same as the plug that goes into the back of the CD-ROM). Even after I removed the original sound card I had to fuss with it to get it to work- had to reinstalll SoundBlaster twice, it wouldn't correctly read a music cd, thinking it still had a data cd in and wouldn't refresh so i had to reboot, I still got an error saying CD-Looper couldn't record wav files even tho it DID. Not sure if remnants of the old sound card were causing havoc or what but I'm not inclined right now to format the drive and start from scratch seeing as it works finally. If I continue to have problems I will reformat, etc. Thanks much to all who took the time to respond.Dale Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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