Determine the DCH (UAD) Realtek driver needed for your Audio

ddelo · 13 Oct 2020

Although discussed and implemented long before, starting from early 2018, a new type of Windows drivers has become the de facto standard for new PCs.

The DCH (Declarative Componentized Hardware supported apps) drivers.

Windows DCH Drivers are driver packages that will install and run on Universal Windows Platform (UWP) based editions of Windows 10.

As their name implies the new DCH drivers are componentized. Meaning that the driver is not a big file containing all required components (Software components, Extensions, Driver control app), but just the driver itself, whereas the other required components are stored in separate files and can be updated individually.

For the audio device the new DCH drivers are replacing the legacy HDA (High Definition Audio) drivers. These new DCH drivers are also called UAD (Universal Audio Driver) by the dominant Audio codec Manufacturer, Realtek.

Differences between the old legacy HDA drivers and the new DCH (UAD) drivers
There is not really a better one compared to the other. Functionality-wise they are the same, it's just a different driver architecture. And it's much easier for Microsoft, who imposed the new architecture, to test just the base driver's compatibility and provide updates much faster, than having to test the enormous number of different implementations from every system Manufacturer, including numerous different third party drivers.

If you are using Windows 10, it is recommended to use the UAD drivers, if your hardware is compatible, as they are more futureproof and the ones updated regularly those days compared to the HDA ones.
HDA Drivers use Win32/Legacy apps, (Realtek HD Audio Manager) whereas UAD Drivers use UWP apps downloaded from the Microsoft Store (Realtek Audio Control).
HDA Drivers have a system tray icon, which you can disable, whereas the DCH drivers don't have a tray icon.

Each system manufacturer uses different components to provide audio. Besides the Realtek base driver itself and the required Realtek software components, OEMs might include third-party audio components in their audio implementation (Nahimic, Sound Research, Fortemedia etc).

Since the DCH driver is componentized, different audio components can be updated at different times.
The basic guideline for installing an audio DCH driver, if your system is compatible to the DCH architecture (i.e. is built after early 2018), is to first use the OEM provided driver package to install the DCH driver.

For audio drivers (display drivers are a completely different story and they should be updated according to the Manufacturer’s instructions), once the recommended by the Manufacturer DCH driver has been installed, the driver can be updated in one the following ways:

Download and install the provided by the manufacturer update package.
Use third-party created update packages (like the ones provided by the audio driver guru Mokichu)
Since not all manufacturers are offering an updated driver that frequently, users can create their own update packages from the Microsoft Update Catalog. To do that use this very informative post Tutorial for updating DCH/UAD drivers.

How to run the PowerShell scripts
To run each of the following PowerShell scripts, please follow these steps:

Download the script, save it on your Desktop (or any other convenient folder) and unblock it.
Open PowerShell as Administrator and run the script.

To run the script you must first make a note of the folder where the script has been saved. Once you know where it is located you can run it in any of the following two ways:
In PowerShell, either navigate to the folder where the script is located and run it from there. e.g. if you want to run the script of Option 1, if it is saved in the Downloads folder you type the following two commands:
cd $env:USERPROFILE\Downloads .\Check-InstalledDCHComponents.ps1

Or

If you want to run the script from your current location in PowerShell and the script is saved in your Downloads folder, type the following command:
& $env:USERPROFILE\Downloads\Check-InstalledDCHComponents.ps1

If you haven't already changed the PowerShell ExecutionPolicy to allow running scripts, you need to do it. So before running the script (or any other script, from a source you trust), run the following command to allow the script to run in the current PowerShell session.

Set-ExecutionPolicy Bypass -Scope Process

Remember that closing the PowerShell window your ExecutionPolicy returns to its defaults, for every new PowerShell window (session).

Warning

It should be noted that the following methods apply only to standard Realtek DCH (UAD) driver installations and not to any forced non-standard/unofficial drivers or legacy HDA ones.

For the legacy HDA drivers refer to Determine the HDA Realtek driver needed for your Audio.

Contents

Option One: Detect the installed driver and all audio components, with PowerShell
Option Two: Check if your Audio device is compatible with a downloaded Realtek driver or audio driver package, with PowerShell

Option One

Detect the installed driver and all audio components, with PowerShell

To determine which are the already installed audio components and their driver version, in order to search the Microsoft Update Catalog for updates, you can run the following script:

Check-InstalledDCHComponents.ps1

Download

Release Notes of Version 1.03 (23-Nov-2021)

Fixed detection of Audio control application.

When run as described above, the script will give you all the audio components you currently have installed for your Realtek Audio device along with each component’s driver version.
You can use this list to search and update your Realtek driver and all Realtek and third-party audio components.

Example of script output:

Determine the DCH (UAD) Realtek driver needed for your Audio-check-installeddchcomponents.png

In addition, the script will create a log file named DCH-Components.log on the user’s Desktop, which you can examine or post in this thread to verify that the results produced are accurate.

Example of the log file, the script creates on the user's Desktop:

Determine the DCH (UAD) Realtek driver needed for your Audio-dch-components_log.png

When the script finishes, it will open in the default browser one tab for each audio component to be updated. Each tab will be on the Microsoft Update Catalog having searched for the respective audio component. Refine each search (year, OS, HW id), so you can find the latest version of the audio component.

Two very important notes:
1. The Audio control app, is not available in the MUC, but needs to be updated from the Microsoft store, as it’s a UWP application package. The update of the Audio control app should be done after updating the "Realtek Hardware Support Application" Software Component.

2. Any installed extensions found by the script, are provided for reference only and cannot be updated via Microsoft Update Catalog, as these updates are not yet available by Microsoft in the MUC. They will be updated automatically by Windows Update at a later time.

The script has been tested and runs well (many thanks to @Cliff S for his time to test it), but like every piece of software, the more people run it and give feedback the better it will become.
It will not harm your system, as it doesn’t make any changes to anything and if it doesn’t provide accurate results, you can post the contents of the log file it creates on your desktop, to find the reason it failed.

That's it. You now know, which Audio DCH driver components you have installed. Find the appropriate driver for each audio component and update to the latest version!

Option Two

Check if your Audio device is compatible with a downloaded Realtek driver or audio driver package, with PowerShell

To check if a downloaded DCH Realtek driver or package of drivers is compatible with your audio device, follow the instructions given above on how to run a PowerShell script and run the following script.

Check-DCHDriverCompatibility.ps1

Download

When the script is run, it will open a folder picker window and ask you to provide the location where the downloaded Realtek driver/package has been expanded/extracted.
The folder you choose, can be either a folder with a single driver (e.g. just the base Audio driver) or a collection of subfolders with drivers and or packages.
Please note that the driver(s) should be expanded, as the script doesn’t look within compressed files (.cab, .zip, .rar etc)

Determine the DCH (UAD) Realtek driver needed for your Audio-folderpickerdrivers.png

It will then check in the selected folder(s), if the required audio components' files are present and include your system’s Realtek audio device Hardware ID and provide the path of the "Compatible” driver to be used for updating each of the audio components, from Device Manager.

Determine the DCH (UAD) Realtek driver needed for your Audio-check-dchdrivercompatibility_all.png

That’s it.

HTH.

Dimitri

Cliff S · 13 Oct 2020

So you feel it's now ready for prime time @dimitri

Have fun fielding all the questions now

ddelo · 13 Oct 2020

Cliff S said:

So you feel it's now ready for prime time @dimitri

Have fun fielding all the questions now

I will Cliff.... but I won't be alone. I have good friends like yourself, who I know will help!

Not Bob · 13 Oct 2020

I'll be the first to ask… what driver do I need?

now seriously…
I asked over on the HDA thread regarding my driver situation, but it is probably more suited to this thread.
My laptop is an Acer NitroBE (vn7-592g). I'm currently running Win10 1809LTSC. My audio device is: INTELAUDIO\FUNC_01&VEN_10EC&DEV_0255&SUBSYS_10251039.
I haven't been able to find any DCH drivers from Acer (both from Acer directly and Station Drivers) that will install and so far the only DCH I have been able to get installed and kinda of running is the generic one from MajorGeeks. Unfortunately that driver is kind of gimped for me (has issues with detecting headphones being plugged in).
My major question would be if any Acer users with the same audio device have been able to get an "official" (ie. from Acer) driver installed?

I have ran the script you wrote and it did give me a link from the MUC, which I will give a try later. The script also popped open about 20 of the same tabs regarding software components, not sure if that's a bug or just because I currently have HDA drivers installed.

A couple other questions that folks may be able to help with…
1: see this post. Windows 10 popping sound in speakers. This has been driving me nuts since I bought this laptop.
2: A general question. I see some folks suggesting drivers from StationDrivers, other saying to avoid them like the plague. Just wondering what the deal with them is.

Cheers

ddelo · 13 Oct 2020

Not Bob said:

I'll be the first to ask… what driver do I need?

now seriously…
I asked over on the HDA thread regarding my driver situation, but it is probably more suited to this thread.
My laptop is an Acer NitroBE (vn7-592g). I'm currently running Win10 1809LTSC. My audio device is: INTELAUDIO\FUNC_01&VEN_10EC&DEV_0255&SUBSYS_10251039.
I haven't been able to find any DCH drivers from Acer (both from Acer directly and Station Drivers) that will install and so far the only DCH I have been able to get installed and kinda of running is the generic one from MajorGeeks. Unfortunately that driver is kind of gimped for me (has issues with detecting headphones being plugged in).
My major question would be if any Acer users with the same audio device have been able to get an "official" (ie. from Acer) driver installed?

I have ran the script you wrote and it did give me a link from the MUC, which I will give a try later. The script also popped open about 20 of the same tabs regarding software components, not sure if that's a bug or just because I currently have HDA drivers installed.

A couple other questions that folks may be able to help with…
1: see this post. Windows 10 popping sound in speakers. This has been driving me nuts since I bought this laptop.
2: A general question. I see some folks suggesting drivers from StationDrivers, other saying to avoid them like the plague. Just wondering what the deal with them is.

Cheers

First of all, you never mix HDA with DCH drivers. Meaning you uninstall all of them.

Then you try official Audio driver from Acer for your laptop.
If it's HDA, which to my opinion is the most probable, try this Determine the HDA Realtek driver needed for your Audio
If it's DCH you stick with this thread. If so, it would be much more helpful if you post the output of the script, either from the screen or from the log file, to try to see why you got 20 tabs in your browser and try to help you with the DCH driver.

Finally regarding the source of driver updates.
I would go with the Manufacturer first.
If I cannot get an updated driver from there I would go to the Microsoft Update Catalog.
I'm not saying that Station Drivers is not a valid source, as I have used them a lot. The problem is that from this kind of sources you get legitimate drivers, but you need to figure out yourself the one suitable for your device. This becomes even harder with the DCH drivers, as they are quite OEM specific, where each OEM makes its own audio implementation, which in turn complicates the choice of the correct audio components.
That is the main reason I created this post. To try to help users to understand which audio components they have installed and try to get the most suitable drivers for their setup.
This is just my personal opinion.

Not Bob · 13 Oct 2020

ddelo said:

First of all, you never mix HDA with DCH drivers. Meaning you uninstall all of them.

Then you try official Audio driver from Acer for your laptop.
If it's HDA, which to my opinion is the most probable, try this Determine the HDA Realtek driver needed for your Audio
If it's DCH you stick with this thread. If so, it would be much more helpful if you post the output of the script, either from the screen or from the log file, to try to see why you got 20 tabs in your browser and try to help you with the DCH driver.

Finally regarding the source of driver updates.
I would go with the Manufacturer first.
If I cannot get an updated driver from there I would go to the Microsoft Update Catalog.
I'm not saying that Station Drivers is not a valid source, as I have used them a lot. The problem is that from this kind of sources you get legitimate drivers, but you need to figure out yourself the one suitable for your device. This becomes even harder with the DCH drivers, as they are quite OEM specific, where each OEM makes its own audio implementation, which in turn complicates the choice of the correct audio components.
That is the main reason I created this post. To try to help users to understand which audio components they have installed and try to get the most suitable drivers for their setup.
This is just my personal opinion.

ATM I'm HDA only. I've been trying to figure out what I'd need to go DCH (or even if its worth bothering for that matter). I was hoping your script might give some insight into what I should look for.
The problem with Acer is that they haven't updated anything for ages (~2017) and even if I enter my HWID into MUC I only get drivers from that era.
In the DCH update tutorial thread the OP mentioned using drivers from a newer model initially to get their Acer onto DCH, I was hoping that anybody would be able to share if they've managed to do the same (preferrably with the same HWID as me), since I haven't been able to find a model that has the same HW & DCH yet.

When I give the MUC driver a try I'll post a log if I get the multiple tabs again running your script

ddelo · 13 Oct 2020

Not Bob said:

ATM I'm HDA only. I've been trying to figure out what I'd need to go DCH (or even if its worth bothering for that matter). I was hoping your script might give some insight into what I should look for.
The problem with Acer is that they haven't updated anything for ages (~2017) and even if I enter my HWID into MUC I only get drivers from that era.
In the DCH update tutorial thread the OP mentioned using drivers from a newer model initially to get their Acer onto DCH, I was hoping that anybody would be able to share if they've managed to do the same (preferrably with the same HWID as me), since I haven't been able to find a model that has the same HW & DCH yet.

When I give the MUC driver a try I'll post a log if I get the multiple tabs again running your script

The script will work, only if you have a DCH driver installed and only a DCH driver. Not a mix HDA/DCH.
If you want to try a DCH driver from a newer model or from MUC, you need to uninstall the existing HDA driver.

Please post the output and I'll be more than happy to see what you're getting.

Not Bob · 13 Oct 2020

So I uninstalled the HDA drivers via DDU.

The driver from MUC was a no go. No compatible device or something along those lines.
I went ahead and installed the generic DCH from MajorGeeks and got this:

Code:

Audio Device INTELAUDIO\FUNC_01&VEN_10EC&DEV_0255&SUBSYS_10251039 is controlled by a DCH Driver.

Audio Device Driver
-------------------
Realtek(R) Audio [6.0.8924.1]

Audio Control Application*
--------------------------
No Audio Control Application is installed.

Software Components Drivers
---------------------------
Realtek Audio Effects Component [11.0.6000.821]
Realtek Audio Universal Service [1.0.0.294]
Realtek Hardware Support Application [11.0.6000.231]
 [2:10.0,2:6.3,2:6.2,2:6.1,2:6.0,2:5.2,2:5.1]
 [2:10.0,2:6.3,2:6.2,2:6.1,2:6.0,2:5.2,2:5.1]
 [2:10.0,2:6.3,2:6.2,2:6.1,2:6.0,2:5.2,2:5.1]
 []
 [2:10.0,2:6.3,2:6.2,2:6.1,2:6.0,2:5.2,2:5.1]
 [2:10.0,2:6.3,2:6.2,2:6.1,2:6.0,2:5.2,2:5.1]

Audio Extensions Drivers**
--------------------------


*  Audio Control Application is available only from the Microsoft Store.
** Audio Extensions Drivers are not available in the Microsoft Update Catalog.



*************************Script results from powershell***************************************

PS C:\Windows\system32> .\Check-InstalledDCHComponents.ps1

Audio Device INTELAUDIO\FUNC_01&VEN_10EC&DEV_0255&SUBSYS_10251039 is controlled by a DCH Driver.

Audio Device Driver
-------------------
Realtek(R) Audio [6.0.8924.1]

Audio Control Application*
--------------------------
No Audio Control Application is installed.

Software Components Drivers
---------------------------
Realtek Audio Effects Component [11.0.6000.821]
Realtek Audio Universal Service [1.0.0.294]
Realtek Hardware Support Application [11.0.6000.231]
 [2:10.0,2:6.3,2:6.2,2:6.1,2:6.0,2:5.2,2:5.1]
 [2:10.0,2:6.3,2:6.2,2:6.1,2:6.0,2:5.2,2:5.1]
 [2:10.0,2:6.3,2:6.2,2:6.1,2:6.0,2:5.2,2:5.1]
 []
 [2:10.0,2:6.3,2:6.2,2:6.1,2:6.0,2:5.2,2:5.1]
 [2:10.0,2:6.3,2:6.2,2:6.1,2:6.0,2:5.2,2:5.1]

Audio Extensions Drivers**
--------------------------
You cannot call a method on a null-valued expression.
At C:\Windows\system32\Check-InstalledDCHComponents.ps1:82 char:5
+     $InstalledExtensions = (pnputil.exe /enum-devices /instanceid "$A ...
+     ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
    + CategoryInfo          : InvalidOperation: (:) [], RuntimeException
    + FullyQualifiedErrorId : InvokeMethodOnNull



*  Audio Control Application is available only from the Microsoft Store.
** Audio Extensions Drivers are not available in the Microsoft Update Catalog.
You cannot call a method on a null-valued expression.
At C:\Windows\system32\Check-InstalledDCHComponents.ps1:114 char:9
+         $URL = "https://www.catalog.update.microsoft.com/Search.aspx? ...
+         ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
    + CategoryInfo          : InvalidOperation: (:) [], RuntimeException
    + FullyQualifiedErrorId : InvokeMethodOnNull

You cannot call a method on a null-valued expression.
At C:\Windows\system32\Check-InstalledDCHComponents.ps1:114 char:9
+         $URL = "https://www.catalog.update.microsoft.com/Search.aspx? ...
+         ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
    + CategoryInfo          : InvalidOperation: (:) [], RuntimeException
    + FullyQualifiedErrorId : InvokeMethodOnNull

You cannot call a method on a null-valued expression.
At C:\Windows\system32\Check-InstalledDCHComponents.ps1:114 char:9
+         $URL = "https://www.catalog.update.microsoft.com/Search.aspx? ...
+         ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
    + CategoryInfo          : InvalidOperation: (:) [], RuntimeException
    + FullyQualifiedErrorId : InvokeMethodOnNull

You cannot call a method on a null-valued expression.
At C:\Windows\system32\Check-InstalledDCHComponents.ps1:114 char:9
+         $URL = "https://www.catalog.update.microsoft.com/Search.aspx? ...
+         ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
    + CategoryInfo          : InvalidOperation: (:) [], RuntimeException
    + FullyQualifiedErrorId : InvokeMethodOnNull

You cannot call a method on a null-valued expression.
At C:\Windows\system32\Check-InstalledDCHComponents.ps1:114 char:9
+         $URL = "https://www.catalog.update.microsoft.com/Search.aspx? ...
+         ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
    + CategoryInfo          : InvalidOperation: (:) [], RuntimeException
    + FullyQualifiedErrorId : InvokeMethodOnNull

You cannot call a method on a null-valued expression.
At C:\Windows\system32\Check-InstalledDCHComponents.ps1:114 char:9
+         $URL = "https://www.catalog.update.microsoft.com/Search.aspx? ...
+         ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
    + CategoryInfo          : InvalidOperation: (:) [], RuntimeException
    + FullyQualifiedErrorId : InvokeMethodOnNull


Operation completed in: 00:00:09.649

erpster4 · 16 Oct 2020

Not Bob said:

I went ahead and installed the generic DCH from MajorGeeks and got this:

that generic UAD/DCH Realtek audio driver from Majorgeeks is the one from pal1000's uad generic driver packages from github, which are NOT official drivers.

I don't know if ddelo's script will work well with pal1000's unofficial DCH drivers - and using those unofficial generic DCH drivers is somewhat risky on older machines

Not Bob said:

The driver from MUC was a no go. No compatible device or something along those lines.

that's because HWID "INTELAUDIO\FUNC_01&VEN_10EC&DEV_0255&SUBSYS_10251039" is only listed in the HDXSST4.inf file for an HDA driver and that ID is not listed in any INF file of many recent UAD drivers - thus UAD/DCH drivers do not officially support that ID. recent UAD drivers from MUC from 6.0.8907.1 & higher no longer include the generic HDXRT.inf & HDXRTSST.inf files (I guess Realtek figured they cut costs by producing new UAD/DCH drivers without bundling those generic HDXRT.inf & HDXRTSST.inf files).

as a last resort you could try v6.0.8904.1 from MUC, which does have the generic HDXRT.inf & HDXRTSST.inf files.

sandyt · 16 Oct 2020

I don't think that the script is useful for the actual Realtek UAD driver (and its software components) as 99% of the end-users with OEM UAD drivers from their computer manufacturers are going to be covered by the ALL OEM UAD MUC cab file (which for simplicity sake I called it "generic" in my tutorial). The only Realtek HSA component that is specific is for HP computers. You may have some weird cases where your hardware id is in the white inf.

The one incompatible Realtek UAD driver shown above is 9003 driver from Weibu, which I already covered in my tutorial by my "generic" vs "non-generic" update back in September 10. If it is incompatible, it would be obvious (by clicking the left column on the MUC search result) and device manager update by pointing to the newly created folder will also be obvious (it will tell you that you already have the latest driver).

I am unable to find a use case for the script.