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13-inch MacBook Pro: Low audio volume under Boot Camp?

dennya

dennya

macrumors regular
Original poster
Jun 15, 2009
105
1
Seattle-ish
I just set up my new MacBook Pro 13-inch with Boot Camp. Initially I put Windows 7 RC on it, but I couldn't get the audio control function keys to work. Figuring Win 7 is probably quirky, I figured I'd drop back to Vista for now until 7 is officially supported. (Interesting how easy Apple makes it to annihilate a Boot Camp partition. :)

So now I have Windows Vista Ultimate SP2 running with no issues. All the Boot Camp drives and utilities seem to be working.

However, with all the sounds cranked to max in Windows, and using the F12 key, the volume is very quiet. Probably less than half of what I can get in OS X.

Anyone seen this issue? Any hints?
 
Maybe the system volume is low?
If the function keys aren't hooked up to the system volume, no matter how high you crank it, if the system volume remains low the total volume will remain low.
(Think of the system volume as a cap, a maximum possible volume.)
 
Nope, I've maximized the volume everywhere I can think of... The Windows volume control (and checked the mixer to make sure system sound and individual apps are maximized), and using the F12 key to make sure the system volume reads fully maximized.

I actually saw low volume under Win 7 as well. That's how I discovered the inabiltiy to use the Fkeys under Win 7; I was trying to raise the volume and I discovered they didn't work. So I wiped it and installed Vista, where the F keys do raise/lower the volume as intended, but the max volume is really quiet.
 
Same Problem

New 13" MBP
Windows 7 RC1 64 bit

I have audio, but as you describe, nothing will get it to go above about half the normal max volume. It's so low that it's annoying to watch TV.

I haven't had time to look more deeply, but Windows says my audio device is a Cirrus Logic CS4206A, while the OSX side says Intel HD Audio. My guess is that it's still a driver issue?
 
Thanks for the confirmation, folks.

The thing is, the half-volume audio is an issue in Vista as well, which is supposed to be supported by Boot Camp.

I can't go all the way back to XP as some of the resources on my office network require Vista to access properly.

Does it help to report this kind of thing to Apple support?
 
dennya said:
Thanks for the confirmation, folks.

The thing is, the half-volume audio is an issue in Vista as well, which is supposed to be supported by Boot Camp.

I can't go all the way back to XP as some of the resources on my office network require Vista to access properly.

Does it help to report this kind of thing to Apple support?
Click to expand...

I tried making a thread about this earlier and didn't get any replies. It's definitely a real issue, and many people seem to be downgrading to XP for gaming/anything that uses audio.

I tried reinstalling the latest realtek hd drivers to no avail. Never tried to find cirrus logic drivers though. Hopefully a fix will be figured out eventually - Windows 7 is free for me, it would suck to have to put down money for XP!
 
Just experience this problem myself, 13" MBP using internal speakers.

Digging into the mixer it appears the that audio on the right speaker is too low.

If you go to the Speaker Properties -> Advanced and select Test you will hear the left speaker really loudly and the Right speaker quietly (like half the volume). This is despite the Levels -> Balance showing both L, R, C & sub at full.
 
Hi guys,

I'm also experiencing this issue. What's worse, however, is that the audio out port on my MBP 13 does not work in Vista. This renders the MBP 13 virtually useless for gaming. Also, a red light is emitted from the audio-out port.
 
I am suffering the same problem with a 15 inch 2.8GHz MBP. Volume through the speakers in Windows XP is very low, but it is ear-splittingly loud through headphones. As a previous poster suggests this really affects the MBP's ability to play games.

Interestingly videos played through YouTube don't seem to be so quiet, only games. Maybe the issue only occurs when a game tries to make use of some hardware audio feature?
 
tarasis said:
The red light is fine, that is simply the Digital (Optical) Audio Out.
Click to expand...

The problem with the red light is that it is on even when i plug in my 3.5 mm cable from my speakers into the port, rendering them useless. I upgraded to this MBP 13 from my unibody MB and I am quite disappointed.

Anyone have any suggestions on how to enable analog audio out on Vista?
 
sux

i'm having issues with this too. I just bought this 13" MBP and boot camped Vista Enterprise. I upgraded from 13" MB and the audio worked fine with Vista Enterprise. I, too, am seeing the red light (optical) through the audio port. When i go back to OSX, everything is perfect, no red light, no low volume. I'm thinking it has got to be from the drivers included for Boot Camp that needs to be installed once Vista is in. Anyone open a ticket with Apple support yet?

EDIT: I should also add that the headphones does not work under Windows...
 
same here and I don't think my internal mic is working either, the sound for the speaker is really low.


Windows 7 RC on MBP 990 2.26GHZ
 
I'm having the audio problem too with my new macbook pro running Win 7 x64. Sounds like the audio is only coming out of the left speaker.

Also when I plug in analog speakers the audio mixer icon in Windows 7 says that I have plugged in headphones.
 
When Apple updates bootcamp drivers do they usually do releases for individual devices or as a whole package of new updates?

How long should we expect to wait for them to provide a fix for this is what I'm asking? Weeks? Months? A year? And any chance of a 3rd party providing a driver update themselves?
 
win xp has same problem

just so you all know, win xp sp2 has the exact same problem where the low volume is driving me nuts... is pent an hour or two looking for softwares that can boost the volume, but found nothing....if anyone finds a solution to this, please share:D
 
Macbook Pro 15": low internal speaker volume in Windows

I returned my Macbook today and sent this bug report to Apple:

The MacBook Pro 15" 2.53GHz(2009) internal speaker output is very low in Windows Vista (sp2,32bit) and Windows XP (sp3,32bit) when playing any audio source even with the latest Boot Camp 2.1 Cirrus Audio driver, firmware update (MBP53.00AC.B03 EFI 1.7) and all volume controls maxed.
 
A possible solution

I've found a solution for the problem I think. I'm running Vista SP2 on an Intel iMac. All I did was download the Realtek High Definition Audio Codecs from here:

http://www.realtek.com/downloads/do...=3&GetDown=false#High Definition Audio Codecs

Then, I ran it to uninstall the codecs that came with the installation disk and restarted. Then, I reinstalled it again and restarted again. Now, my audio words fine :D

I've only tried it with my iMac, so I don't know if it will work for most of you guys with macbooks
 
Also got low audio whilst running Windows XP Professional SP2 on my MacBook Pro 13" 2.26GHz :(

By the way - I looked at system info in Windows and it says I have 2.7GB RAM. I actually have 4GB. Is this a known issue to display the wrong RAM info?
 
wdmeuk said:
Also got low audio whilst running Windows XP Professional SP2 on my MacBook Pro 13" 2.26GHz :(

By the way - I looked at system info in Windows and it says I have 2.7GB RAM. I actually have 4GB. Is this a known issue to display the wrong RAM info?
Click to expand...

You're probably running a 32 bit version of windows. 32 bit operating systems can only use 3 gigs of memory max.

When I'm at my computer again I'll retry installing the realtek drivers, but I tried that before and it didn't fix the issue. I'm running win 7 though, not vista.
 
mrsun613 said:
I've found a solution for the problem I think. I'm running Vista SP2 on an Intel iMac. All I did was download the Realtek High Definition Audio Codecs from here:

http://www.realtek.com/downloads/do...=3&GetDown=false#High Definition Audio Codecs

Then, I ran it to uninstall the codecs that came with the installation disk and restarted. Then, I reinstalled it again and restarted again. Now, my audio words fine :D

I've only tried it with my iMac, so I don't know if it will work for most of you guys with macbooks
Click to expand...

About to try this now, just waiting on some other updates to finish first before I reboot. Trying these drivers on Windows XP (though the HW list mentions Cirrus Logic HD codecs, not Realtek)
 
Installed the realtek drivers in xp and windows 7. They changed nothing, as I expected. I am extremely angry how Apple doesn't test their newest hardware with all bootcamp. I'm considering returning my computer until they get all these issues sorted out.
 
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