Inspiron 6000 Win 7 NO SOUND SigmaTel Driver - Dell can u hear me

Read this:

http://www.sevenforums.com/drivers/8439-dell-inspiron-6000-audio-drivers.html

Download the Sigmatel R99254 audio driver. Unpack it (unzip) but cancel the installation process. Go to the hard drive to:
c:\Dell\Drivers\R99254
Find the setup.exe file and right click on it. Select the Properties. Find the compatibility tab and select Vista compatibility. Finish installing.

The link does not work and appears to be for  a Dell latitude.  I have installed the driver - Inspiron 6000 xp driver and updating thru device Manager-  rather than running the installer - driver installs but I still have no sound from either the built in speakers or external speakers.

Does anybody have this working and get sound from the builtin speakers or external speakers under Windows 7 Ultimate?

Thanks

The link does not work and appears to be for  a Dell latitude.

The link works for me  -- I'm using Firefox but it should also work with IE. The driver is for the following models:

Inspiron 6000
Inspiron 9200
XPS/Inspiron XPS Gen 2
Inspiron 1200
Inspiron 2200
Inspiron 9300
Latitude D410
Latitude D610
Latitude 110L
Latitude D510
Latitude D810
Dell Precision Mobile WorkStation M70
Latitude X1
Dell Precision Mobile WorkStation M20
XPS/Inspiron M170

Hi,

Well I have spent ages on this problem.  Have deleted all drivers reinstalled using the let me choose the driver and going to the folder etc.  Still no sound. I wonder whether anybody else has had this problem as I still do not get sound out of the Laptop - either thru the built in speaker or external speakers.  The driver appears to be installed OK - In Control Panel I have a Sigme Tel Icon with some basic options, under Device manager Sounds there is an item SigmaTel Audio with the driver installed saying item is working and there are no conflicts.

The only other query I have is that if I look in device manager under System Devices and look at the item System Speaker > properties> general tab it says there are no drivers installed for this item.  If I then look at the driver tab for this it says there is a Microsoft driver installed.  Not sure if this has some impact on my problem but I am running out of options to look at!

Help and guidance is appreciated - especaillay if you have your Inspiron 6000 sound working with Windows 7.

Thanks

Jim,

I did see the note but perhaps after I installed using XP compat mode.  On looking there are three choices of Vista mode - will anyone work or should I use a specific option -Vista, Vista sp1 or Vista sp2.  As this was an acquired laptop no diagnostics or Cd's and have reformatted the drive and installed Win 7.  If I uninstall the driver Windows 7 wants to automatically install it - how can I avoid this?  Dont have the resource CD but no doubt I can download it.

Thanks

If I uninstall the driver Windows 7 wants to automatically install it - how can I avoid this?

When you download and unpack a Sigmatel audio driver, it creates a new folder on the hard drive for the files. By default it is in this location:

 c:\dell\drivers\R...

When you "uninstall" the driver that folder remains on the hard drive and when you reboot then Windows re-creates the driver from those files. There is an an option to delete the driver files when you are uninstalling the driver and that will remove the folder, but if there is a different or earlier version of the driver on the hard drive, when you reboot Windows will re-create that version of the driver. So the best way to dlete the driver files is to go to

c:\dell\drivers\

and expand all folders and subfolders there. Delete all folders that have a subfolder named "WDM". Those will be the Sigmatel files folders. You should not need to reboot. If you had had HD audio --which all new computers have had for several years -- both Vista and 7 have a generic Intel HD audio driver which would be installed when you reboot after deleting all of the Sigmatel files. But your mother board has the older AC97 type of audio and Vista & 7 do not have a generic AC97 driver which is why you have to try to get an old Sigmatel driver to work. The reason for using the Sigmatel R99254 driver is that it is a Vista driver (as well as XP and Win 2000) and Vista is similar to 7 in the way audio is handled. As far as I know it makes no difference whether you use SP1 or SP2 compatibility. I would use SP2 (run as administrator) and if that does not work redo using SP1.

If still having problems go to Intel to get the 7 chipset software for the 6000. It will be the Intel® 915 Express Chipset Family. I don't think this is necessary but it can't hurt.

http://downloadcenter.intel.com/Detail_Desc.aspx?agr=Y&DwnldID=18494&lang=eng

You can get the Dell Dignostics from the Inspiron 6000 downloads page. Diagnostics does not run in Windows -- you have to boot up into the Diagnostics which normally is on a hidden partition on the hard drive. I have not tried it but I think the best version for you (there are several versions) might be the ISO image. It looks like it might make a bootable cd from which to run Diagnostics. But if you had audio before installing 7 then you probably do not have a hardware failure, but you never know.

Thank you so much for the advise! 

Download the Sigmatel R99254 driver. Unpack it but cancel the installation process. It will unpack the files and store them in a folder on the hard drive at c:\Dell\drivers\R99254, and that folder will have a subfolder named WDM. Open Device Manager and expand System devices near the bottom. Find the PCI Device entry with a ? next to it (or if that is not there then look for "Multimedia Audio Controller") . Go to the properties and choose to update the driver. Choose to manually find the driver and don't let Windows look for it. Browse to c:\Dell\drivers\R99254\WDM With any luck it should detect some new hardware and one of them should be the Sigmatel. Sigmatel R99254 driver: http://support.dell.com/support/downloads/download.aspx?c=us&l=en&s=gen&releaseid=R99254&SystemID=LATITUDE%20PRECISION%20M70&servicetag=&os=WW1&osl=en&deviceid=6466&devlib=0&typecnt=0&vercnt=2&catid=-1&impid=-1&formatcnt=1&libid=3&typeid=-1&dateid=-1&formatid=-1&fileid=128550

check this links it worked for me dell inspiron 6000

http://download.cnet.com/Realtek-AC-97-Driver-Windows-Vista-Windows-7/3000-2120_4-10962344.html

all other drivers are windows 7 including wireless

Thank You! This did the job for me.

Glad it helped.

This worked perfectly.  Thank you. 

Just upgraded to Win 7 pro  and i have  now no sound