Solved! Realtek Subwoofer Not Working, Missing as "Audio Channels", Only 2 speaker "Stereo" Available

[HelpMakeWorkiTurky]

The subwoofer is not being recognized by the system. There is a small electronic click when you plug it in or restart the PC. There is no other sign of the subwoofer except for a Realtek notification which tells me it's been plugged in or unplugged. Other than that notification, it doesn't seem to be recognized by the system.

Under "audio Channels" there is only one option listed "stereo", but this is a 2.1 (or 4.1? - I'm guessing 2.1 because its a laptop with 2 internals and an external sub).
It also doesn't show up in the "sound" >"configure" image, nor "test" .

In previous months I've messed with all sorts of things I didn't understand (registry, services.msc, windows updates) trying to solve some other non-sound issues.

I've already installed the drivers again (in 2 or 3 different formats), both by normal uninstall and restart with device autodetection installing them from whatever's included on the PC, as well as downloading them from Asus and letting it's wizard do it's thing.

What can I do to get to the root of this? Where is the 0h.1 of my 2.1?

 

[hang-the-9]

Need some info about the speakers you are using. From the post you just have the sub connected and trying to use it the laptop speakers with an external sub? Not sure if that will work properly, what exactly are you connecting? Has it ever worked?

2.1 is setup is really just left/right with a sub, made for speakers sold together that use the crossover in the amp part to send low end frequencies to the sub and the rest to the satellite speakers. Like these https://www.amazon.com/Klipsch-ProM...ocphy=9001809&hvtargid=pla-381252489348&psc=1 That is why there is no 2.1 option but just stereo. If your soundcard had a dedicated sub output then you may be able to configure it for a sub and two other speakers individually.

Even if you can get this working you will need some sort of filter for the sub so it only plays low end frequencies and using laptop speakers with it would be horrible sounding since the there is a huge range over the sub but under the laptop speakers ability to play back audio that will be missing.

 

[HelpMakeWorkiTurky]

This is the standard make that came with my computer model: It's a laptop with a small hand held sub-attachment which plugs into the laptop via the only non-headphone analog jack. It has worked wonders for me for two years or more. I only plug it in when the normal speaker audio can't get loud enough to cover the environmental noise of the room. I once opened the laptop and saw that inside there are two speakers, one left, and one right. The drivers which came with it might have been accidentally wiped. The headphone jack also does not register to the system and doesn't even appear when asking it to discover new hardware but I was figuring on making that a later post as I use a USB headset now and I know the headphone jack has been off for many months, where as I used the sub successfully no more than 2 months ago.

The laptop has harman/kardon printed on it, but the sub says SonicMaster https://dlcdnimgs.asus.com/websites...Xt6t2h/images/sound/subwoofer/subwoofer02.png

 

[HelpMakeWorkiTurky]

THANK YOU @hang-the-9 ! 😃

Because of your insight to seek out the name of the sub (I hadn't noticed it had a name because it'd rubbed off). That lead to searching for and finding https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us...ndows-10/05518e9a-befe-4ab0-ad7d-1e3de9a89eb7 which mentioned the ICE software. I'd tried that from Asus the other day but it didn't seem relevant as the program is deceptively not driver like and more "quality filter" style in appearance (it has only a few big buttons for different environmental effects). That said, I might also have been using the wrong version yesterday. Asus lists 2 versions for my model and this time, I tried the older version: ICEsound_Win10_64_VER10111 and the sub works perfectly.

Download for anyone who needs them:
https://dlcdnets.asus.com/pub/ASUS/nb/Apps_for_Win10/ICEsound/ICEsound_Win10_64_VER10316.zip
https://dlcdnets.asus.com/pub/ASUS/nb/Apps_for_Win10/ICEsound/ICEsound_Win10_64_VER10111.zip

It does not show up visibly in the Sound>Configuration but it does work on mine with v.111 installed so I guess it's not meant to be a visible device on the system.

I suppose I had uninstalled it as unused bloatware.

Thanks for heading me in the right direction. 😅

 

[hang-the-9]

This is the standard make that came with my computer model: It's a laptop with a small hand held sub-attachment which plugs into the laptop via the only non-headphone analog jack. It has worked wonders for me for two years or more. I only plug it in when the normal speaker audio can't get loud enough to cover the environmental noise of the room. I once opened the laptop and saw that inside there are two speakers, one left, and one right. The drivers which came with it might have been accidentally wiped. The headphone jack also does not register to the system and doesn't even appear when asking it to discover new hardware but I was figuring on making that a later post as I use a USB headset now and I know the headphone jack has been off for many months, where as I used the sub successfully no more than 2 months ago.

The laptop has harman/kardon printed on it, but the sub says SonicMaster https://dlcdnimgs.asus.com/websites...Xt6t2h/images/sound/subwoofer/subwoofer02.png

That is a very rare setup, that is why we need details about what you are using. I just thought you were using a normal sub trying to get extra bass to the system.
I have never heard of a laptop having a dedicated sub out port on it like this. Harman/Kardon is not a laptop maker nor a model of laptop, they make audio equipment and just partnered with the laptop vendor.