Front panel microphone jack buzzing sound after Windows Update v2004

Hi everyone,

I updated to Windows 10 v2004 yesterday and the front audio jack for my microphone only made a constant loud static/buzzing noise, even when not trying to talk (no voice input was registered at all). The rear microphone jack was still working fine.

I tried everything, change settings, reinstall audio drivers, troubleshoot, but nothing could fix this problem.

Today, I did a rollback to the previous version (v1909) and everything is working fine.

Does anyone have had a similar issue ? How do I fix this ?

Now, from my tests, this is obvious that it is a driver/software issue since everything is working fine after the rollback.

More info on your PC will help. Without it we are just fumbling in the Dark. Also did the PC come with Win 10 or was it some older OS?

Of course !

I built my PC and bought a W10 key.

Motherboard: AsRock Z370 Extreme4
Sound chipset: 7.1 CH HD Audio (Realtek ALC1220 Audio Codec) Supports Purity Sound™ 4 & DTS Connect.
Current High Definition Audio driver: 10.0.18362.356

I saw some people on the Microsoft forums having the same problem as me with drivers after v2004.

I would give 2004 another shot. And only use Realtek driver from ASRock for your motherboard. If you are also using an ASRock supplied sound enhancement app that could be an issue.

If the buzzing returns, make sure the ASRock driver is still installed. If it is, recycle Realtek. Uninstall it in the Device Manager, DO NOT uninstall the Driver, then Restart the PC and when Windows starts it should detect and reinstall Realtek.

10.0.18362.356 is Microsoft's generic audio driver means that you never got the OEM realtek drivers installed.

Go back to the asrock's website, download the OEM driver and USE the installer exe

Unfortunately the AsRock drivers are outdated (2018) and sound really bad when using the microphone. This is really annoying, especially when talking to people online. Could I use other recent drivers ?

AFTER you installed the OEM realtek driver from asrock, then do this.

Latest Realtek HD Audio Driver Version [2]

Thanks for this Sandy ! I will update to v2004 and try it again. After reading your post, I found this recent driver: Realtek HD Audio (UAD) Drivers Version R2.8x (8947.1) WHQL (Asrock)

Could I apply this driver directly after doing OEM realtek driver ?

I understand the Microsoft generic drivers are not working yet for my sound chip + mobo in v2004. Is there any advantage of using realtek drivers ?

You don't seem to understand the most basics of Windows 10 updates.

There are literally thousands of web articles on how outdated drivers screw up windows 10 updates. How Microsoft has to block certain computers with outdated drivers from updating windows 10. Update drivers FIRST, then update Windows 10 LATER.

@Niitro

here's a v6.0.8967.1 UAD ASRock RTK driver from ASRock that certain users with some modern ASRock boards can try out