My new computer has Win 7, which I dont like very much. It came with a soundcard on the motherboard. When click on the mixer icon, I get a very limited set of controls provided by the built in soundcard. (Realtek)
Can anyone tell me how to get the familiar Windows mixer back? Or maybe there is a real good 3d party app that will take the place of what I have now and become my system mixer. Do y'all know of any such thing?
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That's a good question. I love Windows 7, but you are correct, the mixer is different and there's not much to it. An add-on soundcard would come with its own mixer (which is called by the Windows mixer) and I'm not familiar with RealTek's. Post if you find a solution, and good luck.
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Some seem to like this one, some don't. You might see if it does the job for you.
Quote:
First released in July 1999 and updated regularly since, Sound Control is a freeware replacement Windows Sound Mixer applet which together with most of the features of the standard Windows mixer it also allows you to add hot keys to adjust any combination of your sound mixer volumes. Support to control Winamp (and compatibles) with a series of hot keys, CD Player and an On Screen Display is also included. Supports Windows 95 / 98 / Millennium-Me / NT4 / 2000 / XP / Vista and 7.
If you are going to use Sound Control with the Windows Vista / Windows 7 platform please ensure you review the compatibility notes for important instructions.
On my lappy with Win7 Home 64, in the lower right corner system tray under the speaker icon is the word 'mixer' and poking through there leads one to sliders for each potential sound source in the lappy.
I don't believe this is specific to the soundcard.
I'm pretty sure that's not the mixer he's looking for. XP with a SoundBlaster card had a mixer of 4 or 5 sliders under the basic speaker icon. I believe that's what he's looking for.
If you Google "XP Sound Blaster mixer", and use the Image option, that's what I think he's looking for, but flatfoot can correct me if I'm mistaken.
On my lappy with Win7 Home 64, in the lower right corner system tray under the speaker icon is the word 'mixer' and poking through there leads one to sliders for each potential sound source in the lappy. I don't believe this is specific to the soundcard.
I know where the icon is. What I get is a set of sliders provided by my soundcard. The functions are very limited. I want the old Win mixer back, or something like it.
Flatfoot sez: Call me when 'Talent-in-a-Box' is ready to ship! -- [8{>
I had a soundblaster card, but the mixer with it only worked with it (had the 'what you hear' slider). I switched to KX drivers and never looked back after that until I switched to a firewire I/O device and used it's mixer, and now a USB Tascam US-800 and use it's own mixer application.
When you right click on the Realtek icon isn't there a "Sound Manager" selection option? And when you click it don’t you get something like..
each tab has its own slider (just not side by side. Yes, I know - not as straight forward as XP or SB mixers and I still haven't gotten use to it and I've been using now almost 2 years)
Last edited by Larry Kehl; 08/07/1307:23 PM.
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Yeah Larry. I have something like that and I want to be rid of it. Different color scheme and a bunch of stuff I dont want, like echo effects and quadrophonic. It bears the HP logo.
I want simple hands on manipulation of all inputs and outputs and nothing more.
Flatfoot sez: Call me when 'Talent-in-a-Box' is ready to ship! -- [8{>
Yeah Larry. I have something like that and I want to be rid of it. Different color scheme and a bunch of stuff I dont want, like echo effects and quadrophonic. It bears the HP logo.
I want simple hands on manipulation of all inputs and outputs and nothing more.
There's a chance that you might be able to uninstall the HP driver/applet set that HP provides for that model, and install a standard Realtek driver set instead. This would take a bit of research around the web, after first identifying the exact model Realtek sound the machine has in it. May not need to do an uninstall if you find a .exe Realtek driver installer, possibly a generic Windoze Vista driver, just run it.
It is only software, so if that idea were to fail for any reason, you should be able to go ahead and download the original HP drivers for your machine from their support website and return what you have now. Only loss for this is your time.
Here's another hidden 'gem' of Win7, that I didn't know about until today. I'm having a different issue trying to record the video AND audio while my DAW is live. For the Berklee class I'm enrolled in, one of the things that we have to do for assignments is show how one accomplishes various different course topics in our DAW. Suggested technique is to post YouTube vids.
Every screen capture program I've tried (Jing, Cam Studio, You Cam, Microsoft endeavor? capture) will only use the mic on the lappy, even though I've stated I want the screen capture to grab what is sent to the speakers. It's possible that this link may hold the key to doing this:
Still didn't work. Cam Studio reports an error when trying to find the audio source and defaults to the built-in mic. Period. Off to try MS expression encoder.... Nope again - MS Expression encoder reports that I can't access the soundcard because a different application is using it (of course, my DAW application which I want to record the screen and audio).
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