Windows 8 occasional no sound problem. The device is being used by another application.

Anonymous

Hi,

I have been having sound problems with the speakers on an HP Ultrabook running Windows 8. Occasionally the laptop speakers stop working. When this occurs, I go to Control Panel>Sound, select the speakers(only one set to select), select Configure and Test. After selecting Test, I receive the message Device In Use. The device is being used by another application. Please close any devices that are playing audio to this device and then try again. I've gone to Properties for the speakers, Advanced tab and unchecked option "Allow applications to take exclusive control of this device". I've also used Run sndvol to try to determine the application, but it only shows Device:Speakers/HP and Applications:System Sounds.

The only way I've been able to get the speakers to work is to reboot or disable and enable the driver for the IDT High Definition Audio CODEC. Does anyone know of a way to determine the application causing the problem? Thanks in advance for your help.

Gary

Locked Question. This question was migrated from the Microsoft Support Community. You can vote on whether it's helpful, but you can't add comments or replies or follow the question.

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Anonymous

Go to device manager, select the audio device/driver and click scan for hardware changes.

voiala! sounds stupid but works for me.

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Anonymous

On the HP Community forum an HP tech found that uninstalling Microsoft update KB2962407 should fix the problem. This update has a fix that states "Shortened battery life when an idle audio device is not turned off on a computer running Windows". I installed this update on June 19. I don't have any July updates installed, so uninstalling July updates may not fix the problem.

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84 additional answers

Anonymous

2014-07-16T23:35:22+00:00

This worked for me as well and makes no sense. don't know how long it will fix it, but I'll come back it if continues.
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Anonymous

2014-07-16T15:35:21+00:00

Thanks, I assumed that that was the case. Since the problem on my laptop temporarily clears when I put it to sleep, and I don't use sound very often, I'll wait until MS has a fix. If they don't come through in the next month or so, I will unroll the update. I'm guessing that if the HP support folks have noticed the problem, that will eventually get MS's attention and they'll fix it. This incident reminds me of one a year or two ago where MS did an update to a windows media player codec that broke most software that used the codec like Adobe Premiere. The chatter that ensued caused MS to release a fix in a couple of weeks.
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Anonymous

2014-07-16T14:52:29+00:00
Robert,

You have to uninstall KB2962407. You cannot uninstall the one component. Below are the steps from the HP Community to uninstall the update. You must do Step 2 so the update doesn't get reinstalled.

Uninstalling the Windows Update, then hiding it, is the only method of eliminating the issue if it caused by this update. Here is the procedure for uninstalling the update:

Step1:
1. Go into Control Panel, then click on “Programs and Features”.
2. Click on “View Installed Updates”. Look for the update with the ID number KB2962407.
3. Right-click on the update and select “Uninstall”. Restart the computer.
Step 2: Next, here is the procedure for hiding the update:
1. Go into Control Panel, then click on “Windows Updates”.
2. Click on “Check for Updates”. When the process is completed, is should find important update(s) available. Clicking on the message will open a window where the important update(s) is.
3. Right-click on the KB2962407 update and select “Hide Update”. This will prevent the update from being installed next time Windows Updates are being installed.
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