Lenovo X1 Carbon Gen 12 speakers almost inaudible, headphone jack sound is fine

Before you think hardware failure, I can say the speakers work fine if I boot with Linux from a USB drive.

I got this laptop nearly 2 years ago. It came with Win 11 Pro installed. I used Zinstall to copy all my data and apps from an older Lenovo X1 laptop running Win 10.

From the start, my speakers were almost inaudible. I'll leave out the long story, but it includes two onsite tech visits and shipping the machine back to a Lenovo depot which supposedly fixed it. They also re-imaged the hard drive. In disgust, I didn't try it for 1 1/2 years, until two weeks ago. Again I used Zinstall and got everything working except still speakers were inaudible. Fine sound in wired headphones plugged into 3 pin socket. Also fine sound in my paired bluetooth speakers.

Today a Lenovo tech replaced the entire speaker system. When he booted with a Linux USB drive, the speakers sounded fine. But in Windows they were virtually inaudible. He tried all sorts of advanced Lenovo diagnostic tools but found no issues. He reinstalled Realtek drivers. No change. In his view, the only solution now is a complete reset of Windows.

I didn't want to reset Windows and lose all my apps and settings. So I tried a "repair install" of Win 11. Took hours with my relatively slow internet connection. I finally got back to Windows as it was before. That is, menus, screens, apps and settings working as before. Speakers still inaudible.

Zinstall claims it does to touch the OS or any drivers. It does seem like even if it did corrupt a sound driver, what the tech and I have done would have corrected any problem.

Anyone have an idea that does not involve a full reset of Windows?

RandySea said:

Anyone have an idea that does not involve a full reset of Windows?

Click to expand...

I don’t, sorry. But when you contemplate how much time you’ve spent on this and how much more time you may need to spend on this, you probably could have fresh installed Windows and reloaded your apps many times over.

Can I suggest making an image of your OS in case the fresh install makes no difference.

antspants, I agree with you as to the time I could have saved. However, I have programs on my machine that I paid for and/or registered but have lost the registration information for and have not been able to retrieve. These copied over with Zinstall and are working. I wouldn't necessarily mind paying again if I could simply buy licenses. But some only have subscriptions now, which I really resent.
There are a couple of programs that are out of date and won't install with Win 11. But they still work.

Ultimately, I may have to give in and do as you suggest. Right now, I'll keep trying to find a solution. For example, it just occurred to me that we never tried booting Windows in safe mode. In any case, I am not spending much time on it. I'm using my very dependable, old Win 10 Lenovo X1 for daily work.

Too bad the Lenovo-sent tech didn't try booting from his Linux USB stick after he reassembled my laptop. I mentioned in my OP that the speakers worked fine with the Linux USB bootup. But I just wonder if it's possible that the speakers are having a problem with the case fully assembled. The tech said it was highly unlikely and he was probably right.

RandySea said:

antspants, I agree with you as to the time I could have saved. However, I have programs on my machine that I paid for and/or registered but have lost the registration information for and have not been able to retrieve.

Click to expand...

Yes, that's certainly a problem.

Have you tried creating a new user account to see if it happens for that account also?



If no change:


Also if needed:

Links above edited.

Here is a little followup. I tried Safe Mode but sound doesn't work at all in Safe Mode.
Then I tried the Troubleshooter. It didn't find any sound problem but said I could try the new Troubleshooter. When I did that, it said "sound is muted" but gave no suggestions except to sign in to Microsoft support. I have never signed in to MS support on this machine, where I have only a local login so far. I'm not going to try that yet.

antspants said:

Yes, that's certainly a problem.

Have you tried creating a new user account to see if it happens for that account also?

Click to expand...

I created a new user account with admin rights for the Lenovo-sent tech. No difference for him.

The Windows sound icon says 100%.

Running an advance media player troubleshooter says "Media library is corrupted". I have found online suggestions as to how to rebuild the media library. But I don't think this is my problem. I have the same muted sound when I look at youtube or dailymotion videos that I have not looked at before. They won't be in my media library, I think.

There's some recent drivers released in December 2024: https://pcsupport.lenovo.com/us/en/...Audio&id=3AA7F1C4-5B2A-453C-9CE2-B8FCDA8B69BA (labeled as Critical - so there's a known issue with previous drivers). Do you have this version installed? Also, what app does it come with - for Sound Control (beyond the one integrated in Windows)?

If some pompous app - might come with a volume nominalizer - and maybe it's set to Headphones too (instead of Speakers - some don't switch automatically - as they should). Linux can't use this apps - so it uses its own integrated/generic Sound Manager. You could try the generic one made by Realtek instead: Realtek Audio Control - Free download and install on Windows | Microsoft Store (rather basic - but it covers the core needs).

Thanks for the suggestions, neves. On a quick check, I see that my Realtek driver is dated 3/28/23. If that new driver applies to my machine, then the Lenovo-sent tech missed it. He said he installed the latest Realtek drivers when he was here yesterday. On the other hand, when I look for an update on the laptop, it says I'm up to date.

It's past midnight here so I'll take a closer look tomorrow before I do anything rash. We're predicted to be in the minus teens, so I won't be going out early.

neves said:

There's some recent drivers released in December 2024: https://pcsupport.lenovo.com/us/en/...Audio&id=3AA7F1C4-5B2A-453C-9CE2-B8FCDA8B69BA (labeled as Critical - so there's a known issue with previous drivers). Do you have this version installed? Also, what app does it come with - for Sound Control (beyond the one integrated in Windows)?

If some pompous app - might come with a volume nominalizer - and maybe it's set to Headphones too (instead of Speakers - some don't switch automatically - as they should). Linux can't use this apps - so it uses its own integrated/generic Sound Manager. You could try the generic one made by Realtek instead: Realtek Audio Control - Free download and install on Windows | Microsoft Store (rather basic - but it covers the core needs).

Click to expand...

Just spent some time with two Lenovo advanced support techs. They uninstalled everything related to sound, both Realtek and Intel. The let Windows reinstall the devices and drivers. No improvement.

The Lenovo tech also said they do not show that updated Realtek driver as being for my laptop model so I should stick with the 2023 driver.

One tech suggested reimaging the drive. I don't want to do that for the reasons I stated earlier in this thread. r

My last hope is to go through the tedious process of stopping blocks of programs (not Microsoft processes) from running at startup. I think I do this through Task Manager. If I find one trial leaves speakers working correctly then I narrow the list down until I find the offender.

Two additional notes:

My X1 with Win 11 is a virtual duplicate setup of my older X1 running Win 10. This is because I used Zinstall to copy all programs, settings, and data from the older machine to the newer one. As far as I can tell, everything is running as it should on the Win 11 machine. This includes Thunderbird and Picasa, which are normally problematic to move to a new PC. It also sets up a duplicate desktop.

Second, my speakers are almost inaudible but not muted. If I mute the speakers, they have no sound at all. Also, sound is fine through headphones or bluetooth.

RandySea said:

The Lenovo tech also said they do not show that updated Realtek driver as being for my laptop model so I should stick with the 2023 driver.

Click to expand...

If that's what Lenovo Bridge says (the soft detecting your hardware components) - that's probably right - about the Driver.

But Realtek Audio Control is simply a generic sound manager (works with most Realtek drivers). In case the fancy Sound App provided by the OEM - is the one causing the issues. Another thing you could try:

Press Windows Key + R type mmsys.cpl and press enter.

Check if you have the correct device selected, as in:



Next, right click on it (or simply select it) and click on Proprieties and disable Audion Enhancements - by unpicking it, as in:



Check and see/hear if this helps in any way.

Neves, I just looked a little more closely at the link you gave me to updated Realtek. It appears that the newer drivers are for a slightly newer version (same 12th generation) of my laptop. I do have the latest drivers.

I've continued spending time with Lenovo support. They are just saying I have to reimage the drive because they can't find what program or service or driver is causing my speakers to be almost inaudible while the headphone jack and bluetooth both give excellent, full volume audio.

Spent 2 hours with Lenovo Premier Support today. Removing and reinstalling drivers, checking settings, etc. We just could not find the source of very weak sound in the internal speakers.

Since there is full speaker sound when booting from a Linux USB, Lenovo says it's a Windows problem, not hardware. So I'm back to reimaging the SSD drive and painstakingly reinstalling all data, apps, and settings from scratch. I had avoided that by using Zinstall, which worked perfectly to copy from my old Win 20 machine to my similar, new Win 11 machine. All of my old apps work perfectly on my new machine. Just somehow the sound had gotten corrupted. The Zinstall company has stonewalled me.

If you end up having to do a clean install, you can save your current install as a VM (vhdx) and run that inside your new install to access non-transferable apps, and recover things as you need them. I often take that approach when transitioning from an older installation to a newer one.
HTH,
--Ed--