Sound card issue - need technical help

[cj_91]

Hi, for anyone who may be knowledgeable on the subject of soundcards and more specifically uncommon problems resulting from defect/damage may be able to help me!

Last year I bought an asus xonar essence STX, about a month ago it developed a problem whereby the sound level coming from one channel (right, from memory) is very low, and increasing the volume via the sound card itself, the system, or the headphones (sennheiser pc360's) resulted in ONLY the already loud channel increasing in volume. With the headset's volume control slider on 100% I have to manually adjust sound output balance level on the soundcard to reduce the loud channel down to aprox 50% so that the sound is even.

However with the headphones volume slider on 0% (which is far from muted on these particular headphones) the sound balance is quite even and so I can leave the levels even on the soundcard itself.

The ONLY way to get the sound loud, and balanced, is to manually boost the dB output of the soundcard as if I was using high impedance headphones, but even then any adjustments made to the volume on the headset or even windows volume needs to be corrected on the soundcards' stereo balance to make it even in each ear.

The only thing I can suggest that may have caused damage to the soundcard was that it sat awfully close to a very hot HD6970 for the best part of 6 months and I am thinking that maybe there could be heat damage.. the PCB can reach temps of 60+ degrees C and can move that heat through the PCI slots as well as through convection and radiation.

Any help on how to further troubleshoot or diagnose the issue would be much appreciated!

Things I have tried: different headphones, using stereo speakers, moving the card to a different PCI-E slot, trying a different computer with fresh drivers altogether, reinstalling the drivers, reinstalling previous drivers, swapping the OP AMPS, googling every which way I could my problem.. so far no luck - I am convinced that it is a problem with the card itself! Maybe capacitor damage?

edit: To simplify. the left channel sound is permanently stuck low. we will give it an abstract value of 10. 10 is the lowest level the sound can go without being entirely muted. Raising the volume on the headset increases the right channel from 10 (0% volume) to 20 (100% volume) however the left channel stays fixed at 10. With the dB boost we can call our new abstract value 20. Now the volume on the right channel goes from 20-30 but the left stays fixed once again at 20. With a pair of earphones that do no have a volume slider it is essentially the same as if it were set at 100% volume and ratio of sound is 2:1, so there is a major issue at the heart of the soundcard i think..

 

[Dakyris]

You say you tried different headphones, different computers, etc. Were the results exactly the same (unbalanced sound, same level of difference between the channels, etc.)?

EDIT : Did you try the same headphones on another source (another computer, cellphone, mp3 player, whatever) to see if it has the same issue there?

EDIT2 : Did you try switching to the onboard sound on the same computer? That way the only big difference is the card and its drivers, the other softwares are unaffected and the headphones are the same (except they are connected to the onboard, of course).

Did you try the analog speaker outputs? (The 2 RCA connectors, you'll need powered speakers for that and I hope you didn't connect powered speakers to the headphone output, that's a terribly bad idea).

I have the exact same setup (STX, PC360, sitting right next to my 2nd GTX670) but I haven't had that issue.

My best guess right now would be that something in the analog amplifier circuit was damaged for one channel. I doubt it's software.

If you could get a really good photo (high resolution if possible) of the PCB (both sides so you'll have to temporarily remove the heatsink/shield), we may be able to identify some hardware damage.

 

[cj_91]

Thankyou for the reply!

I tried my headphones with onboard and that worked fine, onboard is fine all round, no issues, it is only when I swap to the soundcard that the problem is there. Be it on my computer, a different computer, regardless of what headphones I run through the output the problem is still there and doesn't change at all. Last night I also noticed that when in dolby surround sound there sound criss-crosses rapidly making it unbearable to listen to. I think that is more to do with the software relying on an even balance of the sound though so I am sure that is a result of the underlying problem..

I can take a detailed shot of the soundcard, but more importantly you mentioned that connecting speakers to the soundcard is a bad idea. I remember someone saying that to me but I never had a set of speakers so I didn't take notice to remember that! On a couple of occasions my friend would have brought over his 2.1 speakers for house parties and hooked it up to my computer, I'm guessing that we put it through the headphone out... Could this be the cause of the problem? If so is it bricked for good do you think?

 

[Dakyris]

About the tests, good that covers the basic troubleshooting, it does narrow it down to the soundcard. Being able to ignore the headphones and the softwares as a source of problems is great.

About bricking the card, it's a bit hard to tell like that. But the whole "don't connect speakers to the soundcard" is also because your typical sound card only sends a signal with a bare minimum amount of power, your typical powered speakers then amplify it. The STX (and other headphone centric soundcards) can push a lot of power compared to... let's say... your onboard soundcard. Connecting that powerful signal to speaker could've damaged them. So while it may have damaged the soundcard, I'd be more worried about the speakers (at least, with the PC360, I would expect you to stick to the normal gain mode so it's not as bad as the high gain mode).

Take good pictures and we'll do a visual inspection of the circuits, maybe we can spot something easy to fix like a blown capacitor. I can't guarantee we'll be able to fix everything but it's a start.

Oh and by the way, how's your warranty status? I know mine is supposed to have a 3 years warranty so that might be the easiest option if you really bought it last year.

 

[cj_91]

Uploading the images I took of the soundcard to photobucket now (will put a link in the thread as soon as they have finished), hopefully that is enough to see something. I took the card to my local electronics repair shop this morning and my man said that he can have a look at it but the odds of finding the problem and repairing it probably isn't worth the cost - he couldn't see any physical fault with a quick glance.

Once he said that though I straight away ordered a Xonar DX because my online store had a discount on them so I got it for $55.. Would still like to see if we can find the problem with the STX though!

If I remember correctly the soundcard started playing up after it had been used with the speakers - but I may be remembering it incorrectly.

As for the warranty, I did indeed buy the card last year in mid July, but as far as I can tell from my online store and from the manual the warranty is only 1 year thereby making it expired

Here is the link:

http://s1232.beta.photobucket.com/user/battlefever101/library/soundcard

 

[Dakyris]

According to Asus, the warranty should be 3 years.

http://support.asus.com/warranty.as...m=Xonar Essence STX&hashedid=zCDHPnfR1jymHK2f

Certainly worth trying to contact them.

As for the electronics, it was a long shot at best. Sometimes it's easy to fix but most of the time it isn't. If your local tech couldn't see anything at first glance I doubt I'd be able to do better.

 

[cj_91]

Yeah I had a feeling it wasn't going to be any good once the guy said that it wouldn't be worth the cost to try to repair it.

I did however just send an email regarding the warranty on the ASUS website to my online store, seeing as how I am in Australia that last consumer notice may have come into effect for products purchased prior to the extended warranty being a legal requirement as of January 2012 (in Australia).

Hopefully they can still accept it and it can be fixed or RMA'd!

Thanks a lot for the help, I know you weren't able to do a whole lot but it looks like that extended warranty might be the saving grace! Fingers crossed aye

 

[Dakyris]

Oh and your local tech may not have been aware of the cost of the card.

I know over here it's about $200 so repairs could've been cheaper than replacing it

EDIT : I took a look at the photos. Card seems in pristine condition, I don't see any visible damage. Your best bet is the warranty.