SOLVED Mic Stops working randomly while using Windows 10

[Forteh]

It all started when I installed Windows 10 on release day. (I was using windows 7 before). I downloaded mumble and then all my games and started playing with friends. After a while I noticed that my friends weren't responding to me I alt tabbed and realized my push to talk wasn't working (this goes for every voice program, the same thing happens the push to talk key stops working). In my Recording options the mic isn't disabled.

When I go into recording devices after it stops working when I speak I do not see any green bars, when I go to steams voice test and nada, no green bars. To fix it I either go into Mumble settings and just hit 'apply' or I open up the mumble audio wizard and close it right away and my mic will work again along with push to talk. For some reason this makes my mic work again.

I've tried a fresh install of windows 10, I've tried different mics, different sound cards and the same thing keeps happening. Before I reformatted it got so bad it was happening every 2 minutes. Now it happens every couple of hours and progressively happening more often.

To me it seems something is disabling my mic and doesn't re-enable it. EventViewer isn't helpful there is no entry for when it happens. It happens when I'm gaming, or even when I'm not even on my pc doing anything.

I feel like I tried everything. I've been googling fixes and working fixing this for two weeks with no luck. Any help would be appreciated.

 

[Trouble]

Hello Forteh and welcome to the forum.
You are likely going to discover that it is power saving setting somewhere that your are going to have to find and fix.
You don't mention what mic you are using nor how it is attached to your computer so it's difficult to be specific
Start by checking device manager, if it is a USB device then check each of your USB hubs and in the properties dialog box be sure to uncheck "Allow computer to turn off this device to save........."
Like wise Control Panel\All Control Panel Items\Power Options\Edit Plan Settings\Change advanced power settings
Look at USB settings\USB selective suspend setting Change it to Disabled
Look at PCI Express\Link State Power Management Change it to Off
See if any of that might help with your issue.

 

[Forteh]

Thank you, I'll try this and get back to you in a day or so.

The mic is just a regular desktop mic attached through the mic port on my sound card (SOUND BLASTER OMNI 5.1 USB Sound Card) or in my REALTEK Onboard port.

 

[Forteh]

Well after following your steps it is still happening.

 

[Trouble]

the push to talk key stops working

I'm wondering if you are missing a driver for the component that supports the "push to talk" function.
Have you looked for a possible driver update specific for that particular device.

 

[Forteh]

Everything is up to date and everything that needs drivers has them. After further testing (I'll need to do more) it seems my USB sound card (Sound blaster OMNI 5.1) drivers are screwing up or something because I uninstalled them and then just used my onboard sound card and I haven't ran into the problem. However I don't like using onboard as It picks up coil whine from my GPU and I can hear it through my headphones. Is there a way to see if a driver is screwing up?

 

[Trouble]

You might try reversing the procedure.
See if there is an option in the System Setup Utility (BIOS) to disable the onboard integrated sound card and then install the appropriate driver package for you USB sound card and see if the problem is or was as you suspected that they were contesting with one another.

 

[Forteh]

Oh there is, I always had my onboard sound card disabled in bios. I only enabled it again so I could try and find the reason for this happening.

 

[Trouble]

And even with only the addon sound card and driver package installed you still have the problem?
Have you made an effort to remove any Realtek software and associated drivers.
Device Manager -> Menu Bar -> Show hidden devices -> See if there is any remaining reference to the Realtek Card and if so uninstall it and tick the box to remove drivers.
Additionally you may want to run msinfo32, expand Software Environment and have a look at System Drivers just to see if there might be any reference to the Realtek Sound Card driver listed as "Running" = "Yes"
Simply right click the start button and choose run and type
msinfo32

 

[Forteh]

Yeah, found nothing in msinfo.

 

[mandaleeee]

I'm having the same issue with the same soundcard. My mic just stops working randomly while I'm using it.