Swapping between headset and speakers with usb

[jbray241]

Hi

I have an alienware alpha which I am using as a desktop computer rather than as a console. I'm very happy with it other than one little issue with the audio. The alpha does not have 3.5mm audio jack. I bought both a usb headset (for chatting with friends) and a pair of usb speakers (for general use). I switch by using the going into the playback devices and changing the default device. However in order to do this, I have to close any background programs that are making noise. For instance if I am watching a youtube video and a friend calls me on skype, I have to close both, change my default playback device and then call him and reopen the video (I also get a error message about limited USB resources).

Can you guys think of any solutions to this? I know this is kind of an open ended question but I'm not sure if there is a program to help for this or if I should look into buying a new set of speakers?

 

[basroil]

Those programs are simply calling the speakers by name rather than polling for the default speaker all the time. Not much you can do to change that outside of checking if they allow the use of "default system device" instead of a specific output.