How to turn off HDMI audio?

I just bought a Dell XPS 15 and an external Acer monitor for my wife. The monitor is connected to the Dell by HDMI. When the monitor is plugged in, there is no audio. I'm pretty sure the HDMI connection is pulling the audio signal from the Dell and sending it to the monitor. Problem is, the monitor doesn't have any speakers - so there's no audio. When I disconnect the HDMI cable, audio plays from the Dell - but then there's no external monitor.


Can anybody offer advice on how to send video through the HDMI cable to the external monitor, but keep the audio signal at the Dell?


Thanks in advance for any help!

Hi Clinto and welcome to the forum. Right click the start button, click on Control Panel then click on Sound and set your default playback device to the laptop built in sound as it probably set the HDMI sound as default

Disable the HDMI sound in the Device Manager. Then it will never switch the default audio playback device. It will remain the "Speakers" (the PC sound card).

I don't use HDMI audio and what I've done.

Hi Shimshom and Fireberd. Thanks for the suggestions. I have set the Dell laptop as the playback device. But if the external monitor is connected to the laptop, there is no sound. If I unplug the HDMI cable (so there's no connection between the laptop and the external monitor) then the sound plays through the laptop.

I suspect that when the HDMI cable is connected, the system software just sends audio and video to the external monitor. But the external monitor has no speakers, so I get no sound.

Fireberd, I looked in Device Manager and couldn't find where/how to disable HDMI sound. Can you please explain how to do that in Windows 10?

I already did that (set my laptop speakers as the playback device, and set the laptop speakers as the default device). The problem still exists.

Try looking here in Device Manager to disable the HDMI:
Attachment 78516

and, make sure the laptop speakers are set to default in the Sound control panel. Also, the HDMI audio device will only show in control panel/device manager when using the HDMI connection.

It's working now! I disabled the laptop speakers then exited the control panel. Then opened the control panel and re-enabled the laptop speakers and made them default - and now I'm getting sound from the laptop.
I'm pretty sure I did that at least once before, but... Now it's working.
Thanks again to everybody for your help!

Glad it worked and please mark it as solved