cm8738 pci sound problem

Rav77 · #1 12-17-2004, 01:26 PM

First I'll get this out of the way. I have the newest WDM drivers from c-media (0639), and I have Directx 9.0b. I have tried to leave a feedback with c-media, but there webpage is not working right, and can't submit it.
Now, all has worked fine in the past, but since reinstalling windows a few months back, I have had an odd problem, which I believe to be a Windows/Directx problem.
I am running Win98se, and what I think is an oem cm8738 pci sound card, and the only name the box is Elephant. All windows sounds work fine, but some movie files have no sound (they did before), and Quake3, and Tribes2 have no sound. UT2004, works fine except for some breaks in sound now and then (didn't use to do that). I have check DirectX support, and they had a blip about turning off the hardware acceleration setting in dxdiag. This does work, I can get sound in Q3 and T2, but dxdiag also says that the card does not support hardware buffering, only software buffering. This is BS, since it worked before reinstalling windows, and I didn't have to change anything.
If the acceleration in dxdiag is left at full, I get "DirectSound test results: Failure at step 17 (Play): HRESULT = 0x80004001 (Not implemented)". I move the slider back to 'Basic' and the message disappears but gives me the hardware buffering message above.
At the time this card was an improvement over the onboard sound of the motherboard (Realtek should stick with making NIC chipsets imho). And before someone says it, I'm NOT getting a Creative card. They are too expensive compared to other cards that can do the same thing, and I don't need all the junk software that they insist you have loading.
If someone could give me some suggestions, I would appreciate it. I don't see why it's not working right, when it did before.
Thanks ahead.

Play_The_0dds · #2 12-17-2004, 07:15 PM

if you have a speaker icon by your clock, double left click it, if not go to the control panel, sound options and put one down there.
once you have the sound controls open click options, then properties, on the screen that comes up put a check in everything on the list click apply and ok, or ok and now back on the main window click options again. select advanced controls.
now look across the sliders and make sure only the mic is muted. make sure all the volume sliders except the main volume is all the way up. open advanced controls under anything that has the option and remove the checks from crap like spatial, and 3d crap....just makes your sound like it is in a barrel. the mic boost or gain needs to be checked. i would assume either one of the voulme controls is either all the way down, or it is muted.

Rav77 · #3 12-17-2004, 08:56 PM

Hmm, yeah, ok. But still doesn't work unless I change the setting in dxdiag. And I have to do that everytime I boot.
What has crossed my mind is, before I got this card I was using the onboard sound which was based on a Realtek chipset using AC97 codec. I disabled the onboard in favor of this card, and all worked fine. Could the old drivers/dll's that would have still existed in windows have helped this card? I have seen nothing to indicate this as an AC97 type chipset, but it is really the only difference since having to reinstall windows.... the old AC97 stuff does not exist now. This is probably a good question for someone with some programming experience.

jasonsos · #4 03-02-2005, 06:51 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rav77

Hmm, yeah, ok. But still doesn't work unless I change the setting in dxdiag. And I have to do that everytime I boot.
What has crossed my mind is, before I got this card I was using the onboard sound which was based on a Realtek chipset using AC97 codec. I disabled the onboard in favor of this card, and all worked fine. Could the old drivers/dll's that would have still existed in windows have helped this card? I have seen nothing to indicate this as an AC97 type chipset, but it is really the only difference since having to reinstall windows.... the old AC97 stuff does not exist now. This is probably a good question for someone with some programming experience.

Ok pal, I know the answer, as I have been there 4 or 5 times and am there again tonight: I, too, use Windows 98 SE. If you re-install using the Windows 98 SE CD--and you have a more recent sound card; you need to find the 'unoffical' Complete Windows 98 Updates. It's about 10.5 MBs, and is FREE. You'll have to run a search for it, as I lost the addy when I got this secong hand computer, but I had saved the software on a back up CD, and also; you will have to decide if you want to run a few risks that the Geeks want you to know that they won't be held accountable for, shopuld something go wrong with your system. In 4 years; I've only had the problem of not rebooting properly from time to time, but turning off, then on again and having ye olde Blue screen run fixes that. Trust me: this is your problem and the fix. Without it; you will not be able to run the 'sound recorder.' 'Right? Other problems too, so find it, and no worries.

Rav77 · #5 03-02-2005, 09:20 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jasonsos

Ok pal, I know the answer, as I have been there 4 or 5 times and am there again tonight: I, too, use Windows 98 SE. If you re-install using the Windows 98 SE CD--and you have a more recent sound card; you need to find the 'unoffical' Complete Windows 98 Updates. It's about 10.5 MBs, and is FREE. You'll have to run a search for it, as I lost the addy when I got this secong hand computer, but I had saved the software on a back up CD, and also; you will have to decide if you want to run a few risks that the Geeks want you to know that they won't be held accountable for, shopuld something go wrong with your system. In 4 years; I've only had the problem of not rebooting properly from time to time, but turning off, then on again and having ye olde Blue screen run fixes that. Trust me: this is your problem and the fix. Without it; you will not be able to run the 'sound recorder.' 'Right? Other problems too, so find it, and no worries.

Heh, I'd basicly forgotten I'd posted here. I resorted to going back the onboard sound. My sound problems disappeared once I got it working, but defeated the point of getting the card (onboard sound uses more cpu).
Thanks man, I'll check that out, probably over the weekend. I'll try to
remember to drop back in with the results. Take care.

Rav77 · #6 03-08-2005, 12:17 PM

Jasonsos,
You on the money. Cmedia card works like it suppose to now. dxdiag doen't gripe, and I have sound in the games that gave me problems. I wish I knew what part of the update fixed it, but as long as it works, it's not really that important. Thanks for the help.

P.S.
For others that are looking for the update, I found it at....
http://www.softpedia.com/get/System/...ice-Pack.shtml