Reason for their being no sound playing through your laptops speakers or your desktop computers audio output(s) could be from the following:
- You either purchased a used computer with drivers that are incompatible with the current operating system.
- Failing or damaged sound card (no longer working)
- Speakers or Headphones are not working.
If your sound card is not working than an easy solution to that is to purchase a new sound card. As for headphones and speakers, you want to test them out on other devices like your cell phone, MP3 player, etc. to see if you are receiving sound through them. If they work then it is most likely incompatibility with your drivers.
Diagnosing the Problem:
Goto Control Panel, click on Sound, then click on the Playback Tab. Locate your audio device there, you should also see an option called Speakers. Click on Properties, in the Levels tab, you should see a slider on either Speakers, or Front/Back Input. If the sliders are move-able and not grayed out, position the volume all the way up. Also by clicking on the Advanced tab, you can click on the Test button to see if you have sound.
If that doesn’t work then head over to your manufacturers website, locate the driver section and search for your computer (make/model), find the name of the sound card, and see if you can locate the correct version of your driver. You want to check which version your computer is when you are looking for a compatible driver, either 32-bit or a 64-bit. If the manufacturers website doesn’t provide you with the correct driver than alternatively you can type it in google and do a search. If the search results come up empty or redundant then we recommend using a software called Driver Detective, this program finds every driver 95% of the time
Once you have found and installed the correct driver, restart your computer. You then should see a small speaker icon on the bottom right corner of your screen (on the taskbar). Test out your headphones or speakers for sound.
Alternate Solution:
If all still fails, here are three options to choose from:
a) Upgrade/downgrade to an operating system that is compatible with your existing sound card
b) Purchase a brand new desktop or laptop computer
c) Buy an external usb sound card
Hope that helps.