Laptops General - Read Only

[andremadar]

Hello all, I've read the Latitude forums for hours now and can't find anything that helps.

Had to swap out the motherboard of my Latitude CPiA366XT, BIOS A15.  Followed it with a wipe of the hard drive and clean install of WinXP Pro SP2 while the machine was docked in a C/Port II APR. I can get audio just fine from the headphone jack on the CPiA itself and from the built-in speakers, but no matter what I can't get any audio from the line-out jack on the side of the C/Port.

Based on posts I've read here so far, I've removed and reinstalled the audio driver for the NeoMagic sound card.  Downloaded and installed an "alternative" driver (nm256av.zip) from DriverGuide.  Tried Control Panel > Sounds and Audio Devices > Advanced > Speaker Setup but the drop-down list doesn't have a "Use Dock Speakers" or anything like it.  Tried setting the BIOS to "System Video" instead of "Docking Video" and also tried changing the Docking IRQ from "Optimized" to "IRQ11."

Obviously nothing's working yet...can anyone help?

[used2]

well the driver that worked for the other person with the c/port II worked for me so if it isnt the same card it uses the same driver what are your bios settings? using plugnplay os or not?

[andremadar]

I disabled the NeoMagic sound card for the "docked" profile and tried installing the driver (from the link in previous post) directly from the C:\Dell\Drivers folder & did the mandatory reboot.  No luck -- no sound card ever shows up in Device Manager.  I wonder if this has to do with the fact that we're talking about two different docking stations?  You have a C/Dock II, but I have a C/Port II.  Maybe they have totally different sound cards in them?

[used2]

winxp won't recognize it- just run the driver executable and it will install the driver automatically then look in your device manager and you should see the sound card

[andremadar]

used2 -- thanks for the bump.  I disabled the NeoMagic driver "in this profile" as you suggested and then installed the above-referenced file, but no matter how much I coaxed, I couldn't get WinXP to recognize any sort of sound card built into the C/Port II, and so I couldn't install any of those Crystal drivers.  XP does recognizes the ethernet adapter that's inside there just fine though.  It's a mystery.

I think my poor little CPiA and its docking station -- working in such harmony before I swapped out the Latitude's motherboard --- seem doomed to be mortal enemies forever.

Message Edited by andremadar on 06-28-2005 10:53 PM

[used2]

thanks for this post - found the sound card and driver info for the c/dock II expansion station

Andre- did you even try to use that file? What you are in need of are the drivers for the soundcard within the c/dock station which should be the same as the rest of us. Unfortunately the admin guide pdf and hard copy paper version omit the actual type of soundcard included within the expansion station but it is using a crystal CS4205 driver.

Basically the docking station has devices that duplicate those in your laptop, those being the network adapter and soundcard (among others) the devices often show up using the same system resources aka IRQs memory addresses device ids etc

I disabled my onboard sound in the device manager and hit rescan for changes but it would only refind my laptop soundcard - until I chose the option of "Do not include in this hardware profile" then used that driver program and voila sound from the expansion station


your laptop's soundcard and your docking station most likely use the same resources and do not cohabitate well - disable your laptop card- and see if winxp sees your docking statiomn sound card. If it still isn't recognized, download that driver listed above and that should get you going.

Good luck

im on a latitude c640

Message Edited by used2 on 06-21-2005 08:44 PM

[andremadar]

No luck solving this problem for my CPiA, although I'm glad you figured out your issue with the C400.  I wasn't able to find any drivers specific to the NeoMagic sound/video card posted on the Dell site, you're lucky!  I've already tried everything I could, so at this point I'm just hoping some fellow CPiA owner sees this thread and can help me...

[aedanh]

Success!!  I downloaded and installed the Crystal CS4205 Audio drivers per the link below and the audio now works on the C/Port II with my Latitude C400 docked.  Also has some different Master Volume control options, including "Dock CD Volume".  Not sure why letting Windows check the hardware and installing the audio drivers all by itself doesn't work.  Another Microsoft mystery.  Anyway, this worked for me and may help others.

http://support.dell.com/support/downloads/devices.aspx?c=us&cs=19&l=en&s=dhs&SystemID=LAT_PNT_P3_C40...

[aedanh]

Did you ever resolve this problem?

I started having this problem after my IT tech updated my Latitude C400 from Windows 2000 to XP.

All the other features of the C/Port II seem to work but no sound.  Very annoying.

Let me know if you fixed it and how and I'll keep looking myself.