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

[renalyne]

There is another way to boost sound in both Windows Vista & 7 by adjusting Speakers' properties

1. Click right at Speakers' icon at Windows' taskbar.
2. Select Playback Devices.
3. Select Speakers.
4. Click Properties -> Enhancements -> select "Loudness Equalization"
5. Click OK

I've done it in my Macbook Pro 13" 2009 with Windows 7.
It works for me hopefully, it'll work to you too.

 

[rgarjr]

There is another way to boost sound in both Windows Vista & 7 by adjusting Speakers' properties

1. Click right at Speakers' icon at Windows' taskbar.
2. Select Playback Devices.
3. Select Speakers.
4. Click Properties -> Enhancements -> select "Loudness Equalization"
5. Click OK

I've done it in my Macbook Pro 13" 2009 with Windows 7.
It works for me hopefully, it'll work to you too.

that actually made mine less louder here.

 

[mlaird]

Check your inbox, cheej.

 

[Deedle]

Thanks renalyne, that helped.

I just registered because I have the same low sound problem with my Macbook 13.3 Unibody. With that change I finally have my 64-bit Windows 7 RC at a usable level.

I just hope to see a bootcamp update for Windows 7 when it is officially released that fixes some of this. I agree; I bought this laptop with the understanding that Windows worked without problems. I would just install 64-bit Vista if I had the disc. Only got the 32.

 

[adida948]

Thank you very much

I recently bought a Macbook Pro 15.4 " with Snow Leopard. Since my school is part of the MSDAA , I was able to get the free copy of Windows 7 Professional. Immediately after downloading it, I installed it. Everything went fine. So me minor bugs with the graphics driver but nothing that couldn't be handled. Anyway, once the installation was done i decided to go to pandora. com, free streaming website. IT was here that i first noted that the volume of my macbook was too low. I tried tons of things to make it louder but did not have any luck. Ultimately, I started looking in google and stumbled upon this page. After downloading the realtek driver from the manufacturer's website and having no luck, I was about to give up. BUt this fix does work and it is awesome. Now i can play video games with sound!(I usually don't have headphones when i play games.)

 

[Ron867]

bad driver for cirrus audio card in windows XP

well i got the low volume problem fixed by this http://www.stuffedcow.net/macbook_audio, dut did any one find a solution for the robotic sound from the mic on windows?

 

[mightyengineer]

Question

I recently bought a Macbook Pro 15.4 " with Snow Leopard. Since my school is part of the MSDAA , I was able to get the free copy of Windows 7 Professional. Immediately after downloading it, I installed it. Everything went fine. So me minor bugs with the graphics driver but nothing that couldn't be handled. Anyway, once the installation was done i decided to go to pandora. com, free streaming website. IT was here that i first noted that the volume of my macbook was too low. I tried tons of things to make it louder but did not have any luck. Ultimately, I started looking in google and stumbled upon this page. After downloading the realtek driver from the manufacturer's website and having no luck, I was about to give up. BUt this fix does work and it is awesome. Now i can play video games with sound!(I usually don't have headphones when i play games.)

Hi Adida,

Could you please specify which way in this page you use to fix the problem? Thanks.

Or anyone could you please suggest which is the best way to fix my new Macbook Pro 15.4 " with Windows 7 installed (like adida948) Thank sooooo much.

Tom

 

[macfanboy]

well i got the low volume problem fixed by this http://www.stuffedcow.net/macbook_audio, dut did any one find a solution for the robotic sound from the mic on windows?

no, unfortunately.

all my games i play need mics D:

 

[Stridder44]

The red light is fine, that is simply the Digital (Optical) Audio Out.

Yeah, but it's not supposed to be lit up if nothing's plugged in.

 

[SpaceKitty]

Due to popular demand, I have created a variant of the modified XP driver that also turns off the optical S/PDIF output. It's available in the same place as before.

http://www.stuffedcow.net/macbook_audio

Thanks for this, it fixed my XP audio problem. Nice work!

 

[dissdnt]

Using Henry's suggestions, I made edits to the INF file that limit the volume on the headphone jack because it is too loud and remove the limit on the speakers. I also wrapped it all up in a 7Zip installer package for both the 32bit and 64bit flavors of Vista and Windows 7. The only downside is that the red light is always on but this is probably because the functionality to turn it off when there is nothing plugged into the headphone jack is added on later by Apple and not a standard feature of these drivers, we'll have to wait for Apple to fix their driver. Thanks again to Henry and ChristianZ!

In order to use these, just install them! No need to edit the INF file! If you were using the previous INF edits, just install this on top, these are much better because the headphone jack has normal volume.

32 Bit (Untested but should work:
http://rapidshare.com/files/265858428/FixCirrusAudioVista32.exe

64 Bit (Tested and working on mine!):
http://rapidshare.com/files/265858429/FixCirrusAudioVista64.exe

64bit version works great in win7 thanks!

 

[memo90061]

I'm having the same problem but I have an iMac. How can I fix this?

 

[f-junkie]

solution: low audio whilst running Windows XP Professional SP2

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?

http://www.stuffedcow.net/macbook_audio
manually install the drivers following the instructions. problem fixed!

 

[clientsiman]

Using Henry's suggestions, I made edits to the INF file that limit the volume on the headphone jack because it is too loud and remove the limit on the speakers. I also wrapped it all up in a 7Zip installer package for both the 32bit and 64bit flavors of Vista and Windows 7. The only downside is that the red light is always on but this is probably because the functionality to turn it off when there is nothing plugged into the headphone jack is added on later by Apple and not a standard feature of these drivers, we'll have to wait for Apple to fix their driver. Thanks again to Henry and ChristianZ!

In order to use these, just install them! No need to edit the INF file! If you were using the previous INF edits, just install this on top, these are much better because the headphone jack has normal volume.

32 Bit (Untested but should work:
http://rapidshare.com/files/265858428/FixCirrusAudioVista32.exe

64 Bit (Tested and working on mine!):
http://rapidshare.com/files/265858429/FixCirrusAudioVista64.exe

Thanks.Working fine on mine too . Windows 7 - macbook pro 13

 

[Rotator]

There is another way to boost sound in both Windows Vista & 7 by adjusting Speakers' properties

1. Click right at Speakers' icon at Windows' taskbar.
2. Select Playback Devices.
3. Select Speakers.
4. Click Properties -> Enhancements -> select "Loudness Equalization"
5. Click OK

I've done it in my Macbook Pro 13" 2009 with Windows 7.
It works for me hopefully, it'll work to you too.

That's simply adjusting the EQ though. And it's probably gonna cause music to sound terrible as well.. :/

 

[jebus197]

Thanks for the easily installed fix. It's sad that:

a. The sound quality is still awful.

I can confirm this too. The modified drivers work for windows 7 32Bit, but the sound quality is awful.


I think it's safe to say that the bootcamp audio drivers on MBP 13" are well and truly borked.

Being somewhat new to Apple, the question this raises in my mind is, don't Apple bother testing their stuff before they release it? Why would they ship a product with borked drivers?

I'm using the latest bootcamp drivers from my Snow Leopadrd DVD.

Also I can report using the hacked drivers that the left speaker is much louder than the right and there is no centre speaker sound (does the 13" even have one though?).

Given Apple's past record in addressing these issues, it looks like we may have to wait a very long time for any kind of a fix.

 

[Mackan]

Being somewhat new to Apple, the question this raises in my mind is, don't Apple bother testing their stuff before they release it? Why would they ship a product with borked drivers?

Because Apple deliberately provide bad support and drivers for Windows. They will never make Windows give a good user experience on their hardware.

I think Apple's behaviour is terrible.

 

[macfap75]

Thanks ChrisitanZ

I just registered on the forum to say thanks to ChristianZ for the fix. I have fully working audio with the same volume levels as Mac OS X. Still have the light from the headphone jack etc etc, but this is a great fix for the volume until new drivers are released. Thanks again.

Windows 7 (64bit Ultimate RTM 7600), 2.66GHz, 4GB ram, Macbook Pro (2009 version)

Hi all,
I am running Windows 7 Build 7100 64bit and none of the descibed solutions did help so far. The Realtek drivers install but do not produce sound anyway.

Here is my solution to get a higher output on the MacBookPro 13" Unibody.

You have to use the Bootcamp Drivers for the Cirrus Logic device.
..\Boot Camp\Drivers\Cirrus\ unpack the CirrusAudioVista64.exe or 32bit version to a seperate folder.

inside the folder there is the file "cs420x.inf".
Inside this file there are amplifier capability overrides defined, like max. +0db Output...

You can edit these settings with a simple text editor, and finally reinstall the driver.

I will include my modified inf file for 64bit windows.
Please try to modifie the 32bit version on your own - I just copied existing lines from different places within the inf file - so I did not have to bother with the dword values in deep - but I think one can even better modifiy them with knowing what they mean !!

Have luck with that one.

Once again, if you modify the value, you have to uninstall previous devices within the device manager including deleting the older files in the system directories. Finally you have to point the driver installation to the exact point of the inf file.

Please change the ending of the file from .inf.txt back to .inf only

 

[Stridder44]

I can confirm this too. The modified drivers work for windows 7 32Bit, but the sound quality is awful.

I always enable Virtual Surround and set the equalizer to Rock. Both of these can be done by right-clicking the speaker icon next to the clock--> select playback devices --> Speakers --> Properties --> Enhancements. It's not perfect, but it sounds WAY better than the default setup.

 

[simflight01]

Thanks a lot for your support

Thanks for the easily installed fix. It's sad that:

a. The sound quality is still awful.
b. Apple haven't fixed this yet. Hopefully they will eventually...

just I installed on my new macbook pro 13.3 boot camp and W7 and the sound was very poor, now I am happy because the volume increase at least 80%...excelent.....the mic doesn't work yet.... will be waiting for apple give us a solution in short time, thanks again.

 

[scaz182]

Does that modified INF actually fix the issue or just suppress it, i.e. does it sort out the current confusion over the left, right and middle speaker or does it simply raise the volume of them all, if it’s the latter I’d be a little worried that a) the sound quality is going to be a bit rubbish and b) it could ruin the speakers?

Can't believe this has been going on since June, it’s actually mental!

I spoke to a mong from Applecare yesterday who after stating it isn’t a known issue took me through the monkey boy steps of...turning the computer on and off and reinstalling the drivers which clearly, was never going to bring any joy!

I thought Apple were all about customer service! It was *****, wish I hadn’t bought the extended warranty now...or a Macbook!

 

[Quad5Ny]

Has anyone looked into the 13" Macbook Unibody (NON-Pro's) speaker problems?
The non-pro Unibodys have realtek chipsets, so this fix wont work for them.

Dammit, so many stupid problem's with bootcamp.

Heres hoping someone knows something I don't. =P

 

[bmzero]

Using Henry's suggestions, I made edits to the INF file that limit the volume on the headphone jack because it is too loud and remove the limit on the speakers. I also wrapped it all up in a 7Zip installer package for both the 32bit and 64bit flavors of Vista and Windows 7. The only downside is that the red light is always on but this is probably because the functionality to turn it off when there is nothing plugged into the headphone jack is added on later by Apple and not a standard feature of these drivers, we'll have to wait for Apple to fix their driver. Thanks again to Henry and ChristianZ!

In order to use these, just install them! No need to edit the INF file! If you were using the previous INF edits, just install this on top, these are much better because the headphone jack has normal volume.

32 Bit (Untested but should work:
http://rapidshare.com/files/265858428/FixCirrusAudioVista32.exe

64 Bit (Tested and working on mine!):
http://rapidshare.com/files/265858429/FixCirrusAudioVista64.exe

This works on my new (~3 months old) 15" MacBook Pro, Win7 64-bit. Big thanks!

 

[lawscientist]

I need the cirrus fix for win 7 please

Check your inbox, cheej.

Mlaird or Cheej, can you email it to throwaway69696969 at yahoo dot com please! I will really appreciate your help.

peace!

 

[magicrich]

Well i just could not resist on joining!

I am visiting canada to see my brother, whilst on my visit i went into a "Future" shop and saw a brand new 15" Unibody 2009 (No Battery Compartment Model) for sale at a cheaper price to england!!

Well again, i couldnt resist so i bought one from them about 3 days ago now!

Sound and everything was working fine in Mac Mode

After playing around i installed bootcamp V 3.0 That came shipped with the new mac i bought) I then put windows 7 Ultimate which i purchased same day on the system!

In Windows 7 the audio was shocking low and headphones were really high!

I googled the problem and came here, i followed the clyd fix and i have to say it worked! Only thing is i have a red light on my optical drive hole (Next to headphone jack) but i spoke with apple and they said that there latest driver they released (3.0) had a fix to switch this off, but if you roll back the light comes back on (Using Clyd). This is not an issue! Red lights are perfectly fine!!

This is the fix i used (Found on this forum)
https://forums.macrumors.com/posts/8238276/

My headphone volume is now at a decent volume!

So i can say, that Apple have not yet shipped or changed there disks! So the only way i found to fix the volume was to use the fix a few posts up!!

Thanks ever so much for putting it up!!!

Rich