Article ID: 332020 - Last Review: December 3, 2007 - Revision: 8.6

No Audio After You Install Windows Server 2003

View products that this article applies to.

This article was previously published under Q332020

SYMPTOMS

After you upgrade to Windows Server 2003, you may find that your computer has no sound. As a result, some Accessibility software features may not work correctly.

Back to the top

CAUSE

This issue may be caused by either of the following:

A sound driver may not be installed. Windows Server 2003 includes a limited list of sound drivers.
Sounds may be disabled. By default, Windows Server 2003 disables sounds for stability and security.

Back to the top

RESOLUTION

To resolve this issue, follow these steps:

Use Device Manager to verify that your sound device has a driver installed. To do so, follow these steps:
1. Click Start, right-click My Computer, and then click Properties.
2. Click the Hardware tab, and then click Device Manager.
3. Expand Sound, video and game controllers, and then verify that your sound device is listed.
If no sound device driver is installed, use Microsoft Windows Update to see if a driver is available.

Note Windows Server 2003 may disable the Microsoft Dynamic Update Service. To manually see if Microsoft Windows updates are available, visit the following Microsoft Web site: http://windowsupdate.microsoft.com/ (http://windowsupdate.microsoft.com/)
After you verify that you have the correct sound driver installed, you may have to enable the Windows Audio service. To do so, follow these steps:
1. Click Start, click Run, type services.msc in the Open box, and then click OK.
2. In the Services Management Console, double-click Windows Audio service.
3. In the Startup type list, select Automatic, click Start, and then click OK.
Note By default, this step applies to all versions except Windows Server 2003, Standard Edition.