Oblivion - My sound cuts out. Please help.

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I'm having the same problem with an 1820. I can't for the life of me figure it out, not even what seems to be the catalyst in game for the cut out.

I'm no expert in soundcard technology, but it might be a problem with the game utilising the channels on the sound card. I guess the developers concentrated on Creative-type cards and ignored the others...

Have you tried reducing the number of channels in the game's sound options? That should reduce the number of sounds the game tries to play, and so ensure that the key ones get played.

Weird indeed. Seeing option 3 and 4, I do not think your hardware is at fault. It's either an Oblivion bug, or a combination of an Oblivion bug + the OS.

I did not see you try yet to turn off any audio hardware accelleration, I'd definitely recommend doing that.

Is you audio card supporting EAX in some way? and your onboard audio? I ask because of the effects you listed. I can't see it as an option in the audio menu, but it may be there in some .ini file (although I cant see it there either).

Weird indeed. Seeing option 3 and 4, I do not think your hardware is at fault. It's either an Oblivion bug, or a combination of an Oblivion bug + the OS.

I did not see you try yet to turn off any audio hardware accelleration, I'd definitely recommend doing that.

Is you audio card supporting EAX in some way? and your onboard audio? I ask because of the effects you listed. I can't see it as an option in the audio menu, but it may be there in some .ini file (although I cant see it there either).

Yah I have an EMU 1212m, which is a creative product. I can play Call of Duty with EAX enabled and Battlefield 2 without any issues. I will have try try audio acceleration and lowering the number of sounds played per channel (which sucks because I don't want to lower performance)

Oh as an update I just received my 7800GS and it has brought new life to my computer!!!! I can play Oblivion @ 1024x768 with absolutely every option to the max (except the obvious HDR lighting and AA, I chose to have the HDR lighting enabled as it looks better imo) I can also play battlefield 2 with every option to the max. I LOVE THIS NEW CARD!!

I have the same problem, although more extreme:

I have to completely turn off all audio acceleration to keep the game from crashing. I not only lose sound, but my sound will degenerate into loud static and the game will eventually lock.

With all audio acceleration turned off (from my Windows XP control panel) I can get the game to play, but my background music turns to garbage. Then I have to turn off my background music from the Oblivion audio settings and I'm good. The game feels a little stark without music though.

I occasionally lose audio during gameplay too, but it usually comes back after a few moments.

My soundcard is an ECHOAudio Gina -- which is a serious audio production card, but admittedly hardly standard, but its never been a problem in any other game. I'm guessing Bethsoft used a whole bunch of Creative Labs specific features and left the "compatibles" out to dry....



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2 x AMD Opteron 270 Dual Core
4 Gigs RAM
nVidia Quadro 256M (Yes... I know)
Windows XP

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I just got off the phone with technical support, as I am having the same problem. I have the latest drivers for my sound card and other hardware, latest patch for Oblivion, etc. And I still have the error.

I can hear my weapon sheath, footsteps, music, and possibly 1 or 2 other audio channels. But when it comes to hearing a conversation between people, casting magic, or just hearing rain, I cannot hear any of it.

I have the following:
Intel P4 2.8Ghz Hyperthreading
1Gig RAM PC3200
ATI Radeon X800 256MB GDDR3 card
Creative/Soundblaster Audigy 2

Could someone possibly help out and tell me how to fix this problem?

What I have done so far to fix it:
1) Updated EVERYTHING
2) Messed with audio acceleration settings
3) Called Tech support
4) Disabled all background programs

Thanks in advance to anyone who can help me.

Although I can't propose a solution to your problem, I can offer an experience I had with the same problem. My cousin ran Oblivion on an Athlon 64 rig and he too experienced the same problem: certain sounds effects were omitted while he played the game. He upgraded his power supply and video card (from an ATI x1300 series to an x1900 series card), he also changed his motherboard from a budget ECS motherboard to a decent Gigabyte motherboard (he used onboard sound for both configurations). After his upgrades he had no sound issues in Oblivion. Other than installing the drivers for his new motherboard and video card, he did not change any of the software on his rig. He didn't even attempt to reinstall or repair windows.

I will try to find out the model numbers of his motherboards and the drivers he used. I don't know exactly how or why his audio problem was solved (I though it may have been from better onboard sound/better drivers). I don't know much about resolving sound problems, but let me know what information about his system I could check that could help.

I get this exact same thing, despite the game crashing constantly, that isn't a problem for me, I'm sure everyone else gets it, my friends do anyway, but if I'm in area with alot of sounds, like trees, in a battle, ect, I can only hear very main sounds i.e. screaming and enemy casting spells (Only Sometimes) most of the time if I pull out my sword and hit a wall all I hear is the sound of somthing hitting the wall, not the sword itself i.e. clanking sounds. When I'm in big areas like I said, I cant' hear footsteps either, and sometimes NPC's will be talking and words will show up but they're just lipsyncing to them. I don't know what's wrong with it, I have an idea though, I have a codecpack named FFDShow if you have it, try disabling it, because from what I see, it uses Oblivion's sounds with it's software, and could not being going fast enough to filter all the sounds so it gets messed up completely in the process. Also, in addition to what I said about large sound areas, when I'm in my house, I can hear everything just fine because there isn't anything else that's there that's making any sounds. If my idea works, which I hope it does, get back to me. Thanks for reading.

I have the 1212 and experiencing the same kind of problems...
No sound in Test Drive Unlimited , partial sound in RS Vegas.
Also no sound in GTA SA untill I had Winamp opened one time and started the game...So I figured out that if I had Winamp opened with a song on pause in it I had sound ingame...
So I think it's not the hardware but a filter or a overlaymixer setting that is causing the problem , still haven't pinpointed it...some help please

if it hasn't been suggested already try rolling the drivers back as the newer drivers might be creating incompatibility issues.

Hey guys...
I got myself Oblivion.. im getting similar problems as well except perhaps a little more serious... my game play goes normally with a little bit of lag... played in 800x600 medium detail... (this is not the problem but i do query it)
It plays normally for up to 20 minutes or so to which slowly i start to get a faint crackling static noise start to build in behind the sound of the game... it starts in effects (swords, crashing etc) and then starts in voices to the point where i have to turn off all the sound intirely to keep it running longer... it doesnt stop there though eventually (happens quicker if i leave the sound crackling) after a while it just gives up and i get a BAD_POOL_HEADER blue screen of death... i havnt tryed to much.. ive updated the graphics drivers and have updated the sound drivers still no real change ive tryed turning the sound acceleration down..
I had the very same problem with the game FEAR as well... it happened alot quicker though..

My stats are:

-Windows XP home edition
-Intel Pentium 4 processor 3.0 ghz
-C media AC97 audio (intergrated)
-1.5gb ddr400 ram
-GT 7600 256mb (geforce) graphics card (AGP slot)

-There is a tiny problem, my PSU is a 300v ... i intend to asap upgrade to a 400v+.. it terms to heat up some what ive countered this by taking off the side piece of the case to which it happily runs normally (im expecting this is holding back the graphics cards preformance abit) not sure.. i read on the Nvidia forum my card requires a minimum of a 350v PSU

But yeah some help on this would be great please.. Any useful URL links to useful tools or anything that might help would be much appresiated.

All other games i have a few quake 4, doom 3, Age of Empires 3, Half Life 2, work fine with no problems..

Thanx for any help !!!

Had this problem, solved it by going into my control panel > sounds, speech and audio devices > change speaker settings > speaker settings advanced ( bottom one ) > Performance tab > changing the hardware acceleration to Basic acceleration, the next click over from turning it off. I have not gotten any static background music as I have with turning it off and no more random high static bursts of sound from sounds swinging, fists hitting, jumping up and down, etc...

I had the exact same problem and what I did was disable the 5.1 Surround (on my integrated card) and it went away. I am using realtek HD Audio. If anyone else is having this problem this might be the solution. If your not using Realtek, something similar to this might help.

Oh thank god I found this thread/forum! I just disabled my surround sound, plugged in headphones and tried it and I can at last her the npc's voices. What a pleasure. Thanks for the help! I hope this doesnt happen in skyrim.

tags so people can find this:

Oblivion sound problem Oblivion npc sound Oblivion npc talking no sound Oblivion no sound for talking npcs

This topic has been closed by Mousemonkey