Where are the advanced audio settings?

  • Thread starter Thread starter keiron99
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keiron99

I've read in certain places about advanced audio capabilities within
Vista. For example, Digital Room Correction and bass management.

Read about it, for example, here
http://windowsvistablog.com/blogs/windowsvista/articles/450038.aspx
where there's a screen shot of a settings panel.

However, I'll be buggered if I can find any such settings! I've
entered all the key terms in Help too, but that brings nothing up.
Can anyone enlighten me? Thanks.
 
Is your sound card a 'high definition audio device'? In other words can you
connect five speakers to it, and do you have the five speakers connected? If
the sound card deosn't support these options you are not going to see them
displayed. I rarely listen to music on my PC, I also know that my onboard
sound doesn't support 5 speakers (it only supports the standard 2) in which
case none of the options the blog speaks of are available to me either - not
that it bothers me. Many of the advanced features of Vista will only be
available if you have the supporting hardware.

--
John Barnett MVP
Associate Expert
Windows - Shell/User

Web: http://xphelpandsupport.mvps.org
Web: http://vistasupport.mvps.org

The information in this mail/post is supplied "as is". No warranty of any
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mail/post..
 
Is your sound card a 'high definition audio device'? In other words can you
connect five speakers to it, and do you have the five speakers connected? If
the sound card deosn't support these options you are not going to see them
displayed. I rarely listen to music on my PC, I also know that my onboard
sound doesn't support 5 speakers (it only supports the standard 2) in which
case none of the options the blog speaks of are available to me either - not
that it bothers me. Many of the advanced features of Vista will only be
available if you have the supporting hardware.
Click to expand...

Thanks, John.. I'm not sure what would constitute "high definition
audio"? It's a Chaintech AV710. It is 5.1, but I only have the front
speakers connected and also the optical output. It may be low cost,
but it's extremely good quality.

Regardless, how are those settings accessed anyway? I'd have thought I
should still be able to access the panel, but options would be greyed
out. And I'd also have thought Microsoft would have seen fit to cover
the topic in their Help section!
 
Control Panel Home\Hardware and Sound > Manage audio device (under Sound).
When the Sound applet pops up, right click on the available device's icon
(e.g. Speakers) and choose Properties (and also Configure Speakers...).
 
Ah! I always forget to right click!

Nevertheless, the options still don't appear for me. I have a DAC
connected to the digital output, and tried headphones too, but they
don't display. There's also a tab called "Enhancements" in the
screenshot in the link I posted, but that's not available to me
either. Why MS didn't bother to include any reference at all to this
in their help beggars belief.
 
What you see in the Sound applet and its various properties is largely
dependant on your sound hardware driver and its associated files. Look in
Device Manager for your sound driver. Is it a high definition driver?
Possibly it could be updated...
 
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