Dell Inspiron 7559 Sound Issue

Hello. Test the audio driver by switching between the Realtek driver and the Windows native audio driver.

1. Open the Device Manager (find it in the Control Panel, or type devmgmt.msc into the search box).

2. Expand the "Sound, video & game controllers" and right click on "Realtek High Definition Audio".

3. Select to "Update Driver Software".

4. Click on "Browse my computer for driver software".

5. Click "Let me pick from a list of drivers on my computer".

6. Put a check in the box "Show compatible hardware" if not already checked.

7. In the list of devices, click "High Definition Audio" (the native driver).

8. Click "Next".

9. On the Update Driver Warning box, click "Yes" (install the driver).

10. Restart the laptop if prompted. If not prompted, sometimes you have to restart, sometimes not.

[To get back to the Realtek driver, do it again but reverse the names in steps 2 and 7.]

If you only have the symptoms with one of the drivers, then the other is at fault. If you have the same symptoms with both audio drivers, then it is very probably not a driver issue, and could be faulty hardware. For that, contact tech support.

@jimco Thanks for your reply. Switching the driver did not work for me. So I called up Dell support the the person I connected with tried a bunch of different stuff after taking remote control of my system using the citrix client. When the issue was still present in windows media played and the speaker configuration test, he asked me if I had any other player and when I replied I had VLC installed he refused to give me any further support telling me that installing VLC had voided the warranty on issues related to sound playback even when I told him that I had the issue even before installing VLC. Is that actually true? I was unable to find anything in the warranty clause stating voiding of the speaker warranty on installation of VLC media player.

What should I do in this situation? I'm sure the issue was not caused by VLC as it was present since I first tested my earphones with it even before installing vlc. And I also never go above 100% volume in vlc. Any help would be appreciated.

Hello. Here is my thread on the VLC/warranty issue. The warranty exclusion is undisclosed and as such would probably be shot down in court. Dell can exclude anything it wants to from the warranty, but can't just keep it a secret.

I had made the thread into one of the audio FAQ's, then after Dell stopped enforcing the exclusion I made it into a "legacy" FAQ, thinking it was no longer applicable.

However yours is the 3rd post about this in the last month, so either Dell has returned to this questionable policy, or maybe some techs never got the word that it is not to be enforced anymore and have infected the system with bad information. I don't know, and it is pretty hard to find out. My contact person was Terry B (see the thread), but he has moved on up in the Dell organization and has not responded to a message I sent him a couple of weeks ago. I can try him again.

It is odd that you are not getting any support, because even in the heyday of the exclusion, it only applied to speakers. No way could it make the headphone jack stop working.

At least you still have the option of sending the laptop back as defective, if you do it before the return period expires. By sending it back as defective, you don't pay the restocking fee.

I am trying to contact Terry using a different way than I had done before. Hoping to get some kind of guidance about this.

The Forum has a Customer Care board that should take care of issues like this, but it looks pretty useless to me, more like a customer deflection board.

There is an escalation path for unresolved issues -- don't know if that would help or not.

I had to file a BBB complaint this last time to get my 7559 serviced. Kept getting told the things I was having issues with were my fault do to supposed "abuse" and/or "normal" wear and tear. I hadn't purchased a laptop from them before this 7559 since early 2013 and during that time they weren't blaming owners for everything under the sun to get out of doing repairs.

I think this will be my last Dell laptop after being accused of "abuse" more then once at different times. I never have and never will abuse a laptop I own. Even when the rep called in response to the BBB complaint the first thing he said after verifying my identity was "I understand you damaged your laptop.". I told him it wasn't true and that it was what other dell support agents had been telling me that's what I did to shut me down. It's absolutely maddening.

Got my laptop back yesterday from the depot and now when I unplug my adapter the sound slows down and this weird sound occurs. Trying to Google to see what's going on with that but not getting much when it comes to results about that particular issue.

I think this will be my last Dell laptop after being accused of "abuse" more then once at different times.

Don't blame you.

when I unplug my adapter the sound slows down and this weird sound occurs.

Audio issues that only occur when you run on the battery power are usually due to power management. Power to the audio is reduced in order to extend battery life, but that can cause audio degradation.

Unfortunately there are too many places where you can adjust power management. Windows has power management settings, and there is one in the Dell Audio Control panel (Advanced tab), and a place in the Windows registry to change Realtek power settings. 

I would try the Windows settings first. Look in the Control Panel.

The Dell Audio adjustment is shown in this screen shot:

I downloaded a slightly older driver then the newest one that's out from the Realtek driver thread  at TenForums which fixed the noise issue. When I checked which driver I had installed before downloading a newer version it was the same one I had installed awhile back from that same thread about a month before I sent my laptop off. It seems that the Realtek drivers that don't come from Dell's site make the power management option disappear.I do know how to use the regedit method to change the Realtek power settings.

Since I keep my laptop plugged in mostly I set the Windows power settings to High Performance. It's all kind of weird. Even though I made those noises go away it's like the sound quality as a whole has changed from what it was previously to my laptop's depot visit.   It also seems I have to set the volume to a higher level then I did to get the same level of sound. I know this all sounds crazy since it comes across to me that way when rereading my post.