# ARG! 5.1 sound test? right speakers not functioning



## ColbyWolf (Nov 3, 2007)

So, I'm at a loss. 

Here's a bit of back ground information:

My husband got a computer from Compaq juuuust under 3 years ago. 

He upgraded the onbourd sound card to a Soundblaster Audigy 2 ZS. 

Creative's 'auto detect' fuctionaliy (for upgrading software) reads it as a "Sound Blaster Audigy 2 ZS, DR release 2.9.16"

I am not certain if he bought the speakers withthe computer, or purchased them later, but he has a 5.1 Altec Lansing VS-3151 (I belive) speakers.

The computer came installed with Windows XP Home edition, originally.

Alright. 

My husband has been working with computers for the last several years with a local company--maining doing backups and such. He's learned quite a bit about networking and such in that time.

Enough so that he decided--especially with Vista's impending release--to go on ahead and purchase copies of XP Pro for our home computers. (Ironic! Since this was the man who, 2 years ago, was completly confused as to why *I* had XP pro on my PC  )

So... That brings us to today, I think.

My PC (a decidedly well behaved Dell) is pushing 4 years old. His is nearly 3 (and has been a troublesome little thing). It was time, we decided, for a new computer. His had been acting up badly (though we now belive that maybe we were over taxing the power supply) and had several upgrades already installed (my PC hadn't been upgraded [except for a second hand video card that came from my husband's PREVIOUS computer!] due to having older and more expensive techknowlogies... that we wouldn't be able to take out of the computer and put into a new one (who uses DDR ram anymore?)). 

So, we decided that he would get the new PC, and his upgraded computer would get another chance at life, mostly because running World of warcraft at 12 FPS was completly intolerable and that was exactly what my dell was providing me. My dell will become a file server, and music station for the livingroom. 

Anyway. So, we get the new computer, ctonstruct it all from scratch, blahblah. We reformat the compaq, and install Windows XP pro SE (after a fun adventure involing Windows genuine advantage, but that's another story)... Tonight I sit down for the first time, and fiddle around to give us some music while we rearrange the rest of the computer room. I notice something faintly alarming: Neither then right front or fight rear speakers are making any noise. 

My husband gives me a very weird look when I tell him this and promptly scoots back under the desk to see if he wiggled something loose over the course of getting our monitors switched (he may have the new computer, my *I* have the new monitor!!)

Anyway, over the course of about an hour,, well.. let me also explain... I found a video on metacafe that claimed to ba a sound test for a 5.1 system. It NEVER played sound for the R-F and R-R speakers. I've since listened to it on another computer and discovered that it actually doesn't seem to HAVE audio for those speakers. but I trusted it, perhaps foolishly. 

Right now, I am looking for a REAL sound test I can use to determine if my speakers are set up correctly and working okay. the computer originally came with one, with it's XP home installation, but it's burried on the compaq CD. and the only way I know how to get to it is to reformat and reinstll with it 

I would think that perhaps this is all a result of my own foolishness, but the fact remains that I was sittign there listening to an MP3 and was geting no sound out of the right side of my system... 

at this point the only think I can think of to do is jsut start over and try to get a program that'll help me test speaker configuration and go from there.

help?


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## Pulstar (Nov 3, 2007)

tl;dr.. Sorry but your post is just too long for comfort. Try this software and hopefully someone will get around to reading all that.


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## ColbyWolf (Nov 3, 2007)

Sorry  I'll go back and bold the 'important' bits. However, I felt it was important to touch over all of the important features of what had happened. I'll admit I got 3/4ths of the way through typing all of that though, before realizing a problem in how I had diagnosed the problem. I thought about deleting it all and starting over, but it was already 5am and I was tired. and in the event the intial percieved problem still existed, I figured I'd keep the whole post, rather then delete all of it  

I'd always been taught, after all, too give too much information, rather then not enough. 

Thank you very much for the software link. That looks like what I need. I'll post back in a few hours to report up on my situation.

Thank you.


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