can't hear audio playback after PC tune-up

[Secret Clubhous]

I'm sure somebody has posted info about this somewhere here but I can't seem to find it w/Search...I also posted this over at cakewalk.com.
Not sure if this is more of a question for the Computer Recording forum...

After having numerous problems w/my WinXP PC, I just had a master programmer check it out. He spent 3 hours diagnosing, cleaning, defragging & optimizing XP. When I tried to playback some CW files to test it, I could hear the MIDI tracks playing as usual thru the keyboard but can not hear any audio. There are plenty audio tracks in the files, they are not muted, & it appears to be playing. I have a Tascam US-122 as the MIDI/audio interface which is configured correctly in Options/audio & Global as well as in Windows Hardware Devices. The driver is 3.2.4.0, which I think is the latest one. (Prior to the tune-up, CW was crashing constantly with both drivers available from Tascam.)Everything is connected properly as far as cables, etc. The junky onboard sound card is disabled. Before this major tune-up of the OS this was not a problem. Is there some little tweak or setting somewhere that we have missed, that we need to change or enable so I can hear the audio? (I haven't even tried recording with it since the tune-up yet.)

The machine had extensive bugs & mixups all thru the OS, which were fixed today. Previously I had done the optimization tweaks on the musicxp.net website, not really understanding many of them, & I wonder if something was misplaced or turned off inadvertently?

Any insights will be appreciated!

[moskus]

Sounds strange! I would first try to reinstall the drivers for the soundcard. Does other Windows sound play?

Do you know spesific what optimization-tricks he used?

[Secret Clubhous]

Sorry, don't know what optimizations he did. It was all automated by the programs he used. He also manually set XP for best performance instead of best appearance. There's no screen saver & he even took the icons off the desktop as that is supposed to free up more memory. Other than that, I don't know what else was done deep in the, uh, bowels of Windows.

Yes, audio will play thru Windows Media Player, once converted to .wav.

Cakewalk tech support said to change ASIO to MME. I tried that, had to adjust the buffer, & then I could hear the audio playback. But the program would not record at all to a properly armed track. Same thing happened when I set it to WDM. What gives? Aren't those lower quality than ASIO anyway?

[moskus]

Originally Posted by Secret Clubhous

Sorry, don't know what optimizations he did. It was all automated by the programs he used. He also manually set XP for best performance instead of best appearance. There's no screen saver & he even took the icons off the desktop as that is supposed to free up more memory. Other than that, I don't know what else was done deep in the, uh, bowels of Windows.

Yes, audio will play thru Windows Media Player, once converted to .wav.

Cakewalk tech support said to change ASIO to MME. I tried that, had to adjust the buffer, & then I could hear the audio playback. But the program would not record at all to a properly armed track. Same thing happened when I set it to WDM. What gives? Aren't those lower quality than ASIO anyway?

WDM is a newer and better standard for drivers than ASIO. If it's better for your soundcard depends on how the drivers are programmed. Don't use MME if you absolutely don't have to, use ASIO or WDM.

Did you reinstall the drivers? I'm betting that would help.