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March 15th, 2014 11:00

Alienware M17xR4 speakers and headphones not working

Hello,

After I plugged in an Apple headset (like those that come with the iPhones) into the headset jack the audio stopped working. Even after I replugged the headset into the jack, the earphones nor the speakers don't work. I've tried different earphones as well, but they still don't work.

When I went into the the sound control panel (windows 7) I see the 'speakers' and 'digital output' from Sound Blaster Recon3di. When I try playing some sounds it plays through the 'digital output' and not the speakers. I've also tried disabling the 'digital output' but it still doesn't play through the speakers and only through the 'digital output'. The speakers are set the default device. 

please help

February 10th, 2015 08:00

I am an owner of this laptop (M17x R4), and have learned that it has some fundamental flaw with the motherboard and bios drivers / configuration.

I have had my motherboard and charging cable and speakers replaced several times now by Dell and the problem keeps coming back.

Either the sound doesn't work (speakers / headphones etc.) or the charging cable (power adapter) is not recognized as a valid cable and therefore will not charge the laptop.

I wanted to share something that works 100% of the time for me now to fix this. Sadly, I consider this faulty equipment by Dell, but they won't acknowledge this.

Keep the Motherboard A12 Bios drivers handy that Dell has for download on this model. Any time this problem happens, re-install the A12 drivers. When the machine reboots, the problem is gone... at least for a while.  Give it a few days, or a few weeks, but it will come back.  When it does, re-install the A12 drivers... problems go away again... temporarily.

Something is corrupting the drivers or MOBO config, or something.... 

Just re-installed A12 for about the 15th time, and boop, there are my speakers again, working as expected. This priced laptop should not have such horrible problems.

I really hope that Dell realizes that failure to address this root cause of the problem, will result in losing brand loyalty in their customers.

March 16th, 2014 06:00

now my spdif jack is also glowing red

1.8K Posts

March 19th, 2014 14:00

Hi!

I recommend you update the BIOS to the latest version and follow the troubleshooting steps on this article.

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