Submitted by Anonymous on Wed, 13/12/2006 - 22:13.

Question relating to...

Soundcard

Asked by: mr.wonderful

Okay, so recently there were a lot of power outages because we had bad floods in my area. The power would come on and off multiple times a day. I turned off/unplugged the power strip to my computer so that it wouldn't get ruined.

however, when steady power resumed, the output to my stereo (my computer plays through it) was extremely distorted, even at low volumes. I was worried about my stereo, but it played CD's from itself without distortion at all, so i figured it was probably the cable (from stereo to computer, it is quite long...And homemade...Lol)

tonight i plugged headphones into the computer and was surprised to find that the sound was still distorted. In fact, when i turned the volume down, the distortion noise overrode the actual music. My computer has a front and rear output, and both are distorted.

does anyone know why this would come up out of the blue? it's a new computer, and while it's still under warrenty, i'd prefer and easier solution. Thank you!!!
Bob:

my soundcard also has environment control. This was my initial thought, but it was set to normal, and all my vol. Levels are at or below average, which worries me because this computer's being a butt. But you're not, so thank you. =D
interested dude:

i just checked and it was set for analog output. However, i noticed something interesting that i hadn't been able to tell before without headphones:

only the left channel is distorted. The right plays normally.

who knows

Answer

Submitted by: Interested Dude

You might want to check if the output somehow got set to digital output only. I have seen this and it sounds horrible with standard speakers