No Audio on PC After Using Audacity HELP

[chelseabunz]

Hi there.

I hope someone can help me. I was using Audacity and after reading an online guide on how to lower and increase volume with the program I tried the instructions and now my whole laptop has NO audio.

I opened Aud. then opened my .wav audio file "Select All" then "Effect" and "Compression". I increase to 4.2 then let the program work. After my clip had no audio. Now, nothing has audio. I tried going back with the clip and lowering the compression but that did not work. I have rebooted, uninstalled, and still nothing. HELP. I can't get any audio to work and this has never happened before.

Also, I dont have any restore points to go back to so I am really in a bind here. Any thoughts?

I am running XP Service Pack 2
Toshiba, Intel Celeron M CPU, 80GB hard drive
1.60 GHz

[chelseabunz]

Please I really need help here. What can I do? I need my laptop to have audio and it is totally gone, any ideas would be appreciated.

[steve]

I opened Aud. then opened my .wav audio file "Select All" then "Effect" and "Compression". I increase to 4.2 then let the program work. After my clip had no audio. Now, nothing has audio.

I think that what you were doing in Audacity is just a coincidence. The compression effect has no control at all over your computers sound system - it just manipulates the data within Audacity. The same is true of all effects in Audacity, they do not communicate with the sound card driver in any way.

What we need to look for is what has gone wrong with your computer sound system.

Open the Windows Control Panel (Click Start > Click Settings > Click Control Panel) and open the Device Manager (In the Control Panel double-click the Systems icon > In the System Properties window click the Hardware tab > Click the Device Manager button)
Look for the Audio devices and check that your sound card is correctly installed and that there are no problems indicated for it.

Next, open the "Sounds and Audio Devices" icon in the Control Panel and go to the "Sounds" page. Set the system sounds to Windows Default, then select an item in the list that has a sound associated with it (there will be a little loudspeaker icon next to the item) and test the sound to see if it plays.

If you hear no sound, check your headphones, check that you have the volume turned up, check that your headphones are correctly plugged into the right socket, check that you do not have the sounds muted in the sound card control panel/Windows Mixer (loudspeaker icon near the system clock).

[chelseabunz]

I appreciate your attempt to help me but I do have a basic knowledge of audio and have checked all of that before. Nothing works

Although you say that it was not Audacity related, I disagree. I have many pieces of software and use audio on my system everyday.

The audio was working beautifully, I hit "Compress" in Audacity, then WHAM - no audio anywhere. That's not a coincidence, if you ask me. Could you help more? Thanks

[acampbell]

I have just installed Audacity to use with an iTTUSB Turntable. After following all the online directions, I was able to create the mp3 file I wanted to make. Now there is no audio on the PC. The mp3 file 'plays' silently in Windows Media Player. I gave up on it for a few minutes and checked my email. Someone had sent a link to a YouTube video, which I clicked and it played loud and clear. I was rather surprised and went back to try the mp3 and another known good mp3 and they both 'played' silently in WMP.

I am not too familiar with all the audio drivers and such, but this is apparently due to Audacity because my computer too was working fine before I put Audacity onto it and recorded from the USB turntable.

HELP, please!!

Alice Campbell

ps Am using Audacity 1.2 6, Vista SP1 32-bit

[steve]

and have checked all of that before.

Oh, I didn't know that.
I also don't know what sound card you are using, if you have a standard or custom install of Audacity, what other software you have on your computer, what other programs were running at the same time, whether you are running XP with an Administrative or limited user account, if you have taken any other remedial steps..... I only have the information that you provide.

Although you say that it was not Audacity related, I disagree.

I said "I think that what you were doing in Audacity is just a coincidence. The compression effect has no control at all over your computers sound system - it just manipulates the data within Audacity."
Why do you disagree? What do you know that you are not telling me?



@Alice, When you connect a USB audio device to a Windows computer, Windows will generally hand over full control of the sound system to the USB audio device, for recording and playback.However, you are trying to listen to sounds coming out of your sound card, but Windows is no longer using that, it is trying to play through the USB interface (even though the turntable is a recording device only).

To enable Audacity to play while the turntable is connected, go into Preferences (from the Edit menu) and in the Audio I/O tab, select your sound card as the playback device instead of the USB driver. If you want to be able to hear the turntable while it is recording, you will also need to enable "software playthrough", but note that software playthrough is somewhat slower than hardware, so there will be a slight delay before the sound comes out - typically around half a second delay.

To hear sounds from other software, or system sounds, you need to either;
Go into the Windows control panel and in the "Sounds and Audio Devices" section, change the playback device to your sound card, or;
Disconnect the USB turntable ("safely remove hardware" should set everything back to normal, but if not you may need to reboot).

[acampbell]

Thanks! I rebooted before I got your reply and that fixed everything. I'll try again tonight and use your suggestions. I set the settings to listened to what I was recording and was able to hear it. It's just that when I killed Audacity and unplugged the USB turntable, I couldn't hear anything else except a YouTube video. Wonder why I could hear that and nothing else?

Alice

[steve]

Wonder why I could hear that and nothing else?

The software (an Internet browser plug-in?) that was playing the YouTube video must be accessing the sound card directly, rather than through the Windows Sound Mapper. The problem is caused by Windows mapping sound input and output to the USB port, which means that anything that is using the Windows Sound Mapper will not play through the normal sound card.
When you go into the "Sounds and Audio Devices" settings in the Windows Control Panel, it is to tell Windows to map the sounds to the correct device.

[elloco]

Hi, I just installed Audacity and am experiencing a similar problem... but the solutions mentioned here have not worked for me.

I installed Audacity, opened up an mp3 and was playing around with input volume when suddenly there was no sound on playback - even YouTube videos are silent. I tried changing the I/O settings in Preferences, but that didn't help.

I would love some help if possible. I am using XP SP2.

Thanks in advance.

[steve]

When you go into the "Sounds and Audio Devices" settings in the Windows Control Panel, it is to tell Windows to map the sounds to the correct device.