Did I bugger my sound?

This morning I had to plug ALL cables from the back of my full tower system (reason TL; DR) and then plugged cables back in. And now, audio from my external speakers is no longer working. The speaker output cable looks like an RCA-style jack with a pale green color. I plugged in to the socket on the back of my system that almost matches the plug color.

The same speakers work fine when I plug the output cable into my laptop. My system is a homebuilt rig based on an ASUS X670e Strix E-A motherboard running Win 10 Pro 64. The speakers were working just fine until this morning. All the USB connections are working fine.

So what stupid noob mistake am I making? I build all my own desktops, so I'm hardly a noob. This is actually embarrassing. My wife is asking me how do I get the speakers to work and i don't have a good answer.

v19045

Make sure you are using the right audio adapter in your asus computer. You said it works from the laptop so you must have the wrong audio adapter selected on the other computer.

Either that or you are plugging the cable into the wrong port on the computer.

Malneb said:

Make sure you are using the right audio adapter in your asus computer. You said it works from the laptop so you must have the wrong audio adapter selected on the other computer.

There is a standard for audio jacks. Both the desktop motherboard and the laptop accept this jack.

Either that or you are plugging the cable into the wrong port on the computer.

Well obviously. Not. I tried to plug that jack into all 4 of the speaker input ports on the back of the motherboard. Nothing produced sound, and I verified that all the ports were working properly.

Then I remembered that I replaced the old speaker's on my wife's laptop with a $25 set of USB speakers. Aha, says I to myself. Just reorder the same set of speakers, and to heck the old speakers.

Only in this case, I have successfully installed the old speakers into a docking station that we use downstairs, for either her laptop or mine, or a visitor. This docking station did not transmit sound to the monitor. However, when I plugged the old speakers into the docking station speaker port, sound worked perfectly.

- - - Updated - - -

joeandmarg0 said:

Do you have a speaker icon in your system tray,[bottom right]?
Have you tried ---control panel > troubleshooting > hardware & sound ?
Could you explain ---(reason TL; DR ---

Yes, I had a speaker icon. the TLR was that I needed to move my desktop out of the way for some electricians to work on the ceiling lights, which would produce a lot of dirt and dust. Once they finihsed their work, and I vacuumed the floor, I moved my desktop back to its position next to my desk, and reconnected all the cables. That's when the problem came up.

- - - Updated - - -

JLArranz said:

I suppose the sockets in your computer's back and your plugs are TRS. RCA is very different. The former is for stereo signals, the latter for mono

Yes, My speaker jack IS TRS. I misused the term RCA Jack. Apologies for my lack of technical accuracy here.


and you'd require two (some speakers sets have this, but space is tight in a computer). Here's a cable between the two https://www.amazon.es/dp/B06Y2G2BB3?th=1 . Does USB have something to do with the problem?

[/quote]

I can't be certain, but I am pretty sure that the old sound setup had nothing to do with USB.
[quote\

Was the computer on when you replugged the sound? Some sound solutions ask what are you connecting because some sockets can be reassigned to other devices. Your sound adapter's app should show what is connected to each socket.[/QUOTE]

I went through all that. Rebooted my system several times.

Well if the speakers work like you mention testing them on other devices and they work then it has to be as simple as the wrong audio adapter is selected on the computer or you are plugging it into the wrong audio jack.

Generally there can be upwards of 2 on a laptop and 6 or more 3.5 inch jacks on the back of a computer. Past that start looking in for errors on your devices.

There can be up to 3 audio adapters generally, but may only be two like laptops often switch on one.
- Speakers
- Headphones
- HDMI passthrough
- sometimes mix out / line out

Any past that are added on by the user.

Options to look at.

- Device manager and snap in the event panel to mmc event viewer for the audio adapter just viewing it its device properties alone will show any errors, but snap in a custom view and it will give you a broad timeline of what that device is doing.

- pnputil in cli

Malneb said:

Well if the speakers work like you mention testing them on other devices and they work then it has to be as simple as the wrong audio adapter is selected on the computer or you are plugging it into the wrong audio jack.

Generally there can be upwards of 2 on a laptop and 6 or more 3.5 inch jacks on the back of a computer. Past that start looking in for errors on your devices.

There can be up to 3 audio adapters generally, but may only be two like laptops often switch on one.
- Speakers
- Headphones
- HDMI passthrough
- sometimes mix out / line out

Any past that are added on by the user.

Options to look at.

- Device manager and snap in the event panel to mmc event viewer for the audio adapter just viewing it its device properties alone will show any errors, but snap in a custom view and it will give you a broad timeline of what that device is doing.

- pnputil in cli

Well, I tried out ALL the audio ports on my system and did everything else you suggested except the pnputill in cli. (didn't know about it.)

I don't know if it is hardware or a corrupted Win 10 install. No matter. I recycled the speakers to the docking hub downstairs, and will order a USB-only set of speakers. I noticed that some speakers are USB-powered only and still need an audio jack sound input. I can't order one of those.

pnputil from the command line its a system for auditing devices and drives to see what they are doing, it could shed light on the device. i think if you snap in the audio device it would show if it is having errors, i think if it is not having error then it has to be something less complex.

Audio can be annoying though because of the nature of it. Hopefully you get it sorted.