No audio device after latest Widows Update

After allowing an Automatic Windows XP update, my onboard sound devices
(SoundMax Digital Integrated Audio) disappeared. My motherboard is an ASUS
P4S800D-E Deluxe socket 478 board.
In device manager, the integrated sound card is there and "Working properly"
Selecting properties, then the properties tab, shows Audio devices, Midi
devices, and Mixer devices.
Each of these states "the driver is enabled but has not been started." I am
currently using SoundMAX Audio Driver version 5.12.01.3665, which is the
latest driver shown on the ASUS website. I have tried starting each device
under Component Services with no luck.. I have also tried doing a system
restore to the last known working setting and also no luck. Lastly I have
tried searching for and trying other drivers without any luck.

Have you tried to rollback the driver to a later version?
Open Device Manager
Click + next to device
Right click on Device
Click on Properties
Click on Driver Tab
Click on Rollback Driver
Click Ok

You should always check what you are downloading/installing from Windows
Update and never take any driver updates.

If a driver is needed, meaning if the hardware is not functioning properly
than go to the manufacturers website and get the right driver for your
device there.

Remember: if it ain't broke: do NOT try to "FIX" it thinking wrongly that
newer must be better.

If your hardware is working fine: leave it be working fine;)

What do you mean by: I have also tried doing a system restore to the last
known working setting ?

Did you press F8 during boot and have chosen last known goodconfiguration or
did you try to restore the system in safe mode prior to a point where the
problem occured?

There is no driver to roll back to. This is the only driver provided in the
last 3 years.

I did no t download any drivers from Microsoft nor did I download any newer
(there aren't any) from ASUS. Yes, I tried booting to the last known good
configuration. I also tried going back to the last System Retore point befre
the updates.

If you did not use windows update than you are posting in the wrong group.

Check your bios settings if your sound device is enabled.

the driver you need will correspond to the audio codec on your motherboard.
While the vast majority of onboard audio solutions are either AC’97 or HD
audio, a few motherboards also have a separate audio controller that is
connected through the chipset PCI bus.

Therefore in order to figure out what driver you require, you will need to
determine what type of audio solution you have on your motherboard. To do
this please check the following:

1. Look at your motherboard manual OR

2. If you have a "brand" PC, check with the manufacturer OR

3. Look at the specifications for your motherboard on the manufacturer's web
site

If you do not know what your motherboard make and model is, run SiSoft
Sandra and then click on the mainboard information icon and it will list the
details. A step by step guide to using SiSoft Sandra to identify your
motherboard make and model can be found here. Once you know your motherboard
make and model you can find out what audio solution you have by looking at
the details on the manufacturer's web site. You should also be able to
download the complete motherboard manual.
http://www.viaarena.com/default.aspx...&ArticleID=466

Per my earlier message, this all occurred immediately after an automatic
update from Microsoft. What I said was that I did not download any drivers.

My motherboard's bios settings indicate the sound device is enabled. Device
manager shows no errors and indicates all is well. However, something in the
update is preventing the drivers from starting.

The audio CODEC is an ADI AD1888 SoundMAX 6-channel audio CODEC. Per my
original post, my motherboard is an ASUS P4S800D-E Deluxe socket 478 board.
I have the most recent and only driver for this motherboard (SoundMAX Audio
Driver version 5.12.01.3665 released Jan. 2004).

Everything worked fine until last weekend and suddenly I got zilch for
sound. I have used system restore, tried uninstalling updates one-by-one,
and uninstalling and re-installing the audio driver.

Sorry to hear so

It is quite difficult to tell what is causing this problem.

Try uninstalling the updates you took in on that particulair date.

Than Install them one by one to see which one is causing the device
faillure.

You might also boot into safe mode and check in Device Manager - Sometimes an
exclamation point next to device will not show until Safe Mode.

Do you have any error messages such as Code 10, etc..?

I have tried everything besides throw the computer out. I get an error everytime I reboot from the scvhost program. I believe this is the core of not having the sound anymore I used not to get that error and it all started since I updated windows. 10Jun07 It won't even play dvd's but regular windows sounds are played just fine. but if its not built in sound its not working.

I had this exact problem after the latest series of update by microsoft. Everything was fine before, then after the update, no sound would play for games or even Windows Media Player. I couldn't even bring up the volumn control because there was no sound device, however the log on/off sound still played normally. I did a check on my sound devices and everything was running normally. So... I googled it.

Aside from this particular thread, I also found a thread of a very similar problem, but for Vista, in which a windows update killed the sound, and that the fix was to remove the erroneous update. So I went into Add/Remove new progams, toggled "show updates" and removed the latest series of updates one by one. When I removed "Security Update for Windows XP (KB935839)", everything worked again (sounds plays normally). I proceeded to install all the other updates except for that particular one, and everything is still working. So I'm guessing that is the problem.

Just thought I would post my results. Hopefully it will be of some help.

I had this exact problem after the latest series of update by microsoft. Everything was fine before, then after the update, no sound would play for games or even Windows Media Player. I couldn't even bring up the volumn control because there was no sound device, however the log on/off sound still played normally. I did a check on my sound devices and everything was running normally. So... I googled it.

Aside from this particular thread, I also found a thread of a very similar problem, but for Vista, in which a windows update killed the sound, and that the fix was to remove the erroneous update. So I went into Add/Remove new progams, toggled "show updates" and removed the latest series of updates one by one. When I removed "Security Update for Windows XP (KB935839)", everything worked again (sounds plays normally). I proceeded to install all the other updates except for that particular one, and everything is still working. So I'm guessing that is the problem.

Just thought I would post my results. Hopefully it will be of some help.

I have exactly the same experience by downloading KB935839 two days ago and
loosing the Video on MS Media Player, Real Player, Nero Player when playing
any avi files.

The culprit was KB935839 as did a restore on my XP home and downloaded each
update in turn (six or more of them) and retested the avi file. It only
broke when I did the KB935839 download with the fault dialog indicating it
had a problem with the ialmrnt5.dll device driver.

The next step was to leave the KB935839 update on board and eliminate any
interaction with all of the startup programs by using msconfig and disabled
all non-MS startup programs and it worked normally!

Now the fun began... by selectively loading 4-5 of the startup programs I
discovered there were multiple interactions but the most distinct culprit was
Nero's NMBgMonitor. I then left off NMBgMonitor and loaded the remaining
startup programs - disaster again ... so something else was causing the
problem. After a good half day doing this stupid game I loaded the basic
programs and my ZoneAlarm firewall and left it for another day. Some times
the problem was 'black screen but played the audio' other times it went full
screen and locked everything up.

I mentioned this to my computer shop and he said this was not a new fault as
something like this came with another (?) update - it could be the KB935839
update but I was not quick in uploading it as I usually want to wait until
the forums have their chance to raise any problems with an update before I do
them.

The problem still exists and I don't have the patience to do this 'load and
see' as I suspect that more than one program is causing interactions and
maybe between themselves as well to cause the problem. e.g. the problem went
away when I excluded on or the other either but was not present with either
of them alone.

If anybody spots a patch / fix for this problem I would be grateful as it
is driving me nuts and my son is not happy about not being able to play his
favourite avi files if I start up all of the remaining programs that each
supplier wants you to do so.

I think that I am several months down the road from when "JoeS" wrote about
having his onboard sound device disappear after that Windows Update. I am not
sure what happened to what appeared under the hardware tab for audio and
video devices. I found that when I clicked on the for the name of the audio
device that makes my speakers work, there was an exclamation point by that
and a message said that the it was not connected or it was corrupt. However,
the name of the hardware device disappeared completely. I cannot even find
that name when I click on the names of sound, video, audio devices in the
control panel. I have no sound and I don't know how to find the name of it,
either. It is something like Windows Straw?

Can you find that post? I have Vista and I'd love to knowwhich update to
uninstall.