How to Disable All Sound on 9300

You are correct that it is AC97 integrated on the motherboard. You can't replace it but you can add an external sound card that will function instead of the internal one. There is no BIOS setting for it that I know of. The only way I know to disable it is to uninstall the Sigmatel audio driver. You can uninstall it from Add/Remove Programs, or go to the Sigmatel folder on the hard drive and delete it.

c:\Dell\Drivers\R.....

The Sigmatel folder will be the one that has a subfolder named "WDM".  If you have the current driver it is named R99254.  When you want to reinstall it download a new copy from the 9300 downloads page.

You might want to remove the modem from the computer (page 88 of the 9300 Owner's Manual) as part of your test. It is somewhat audio related.

Update. Thanks Jim.

First I looked in Device Manger and I have driver 5.10.0.4255 for Sigmatel. But I did not have a folder for R99254 under C:/drivers or anything else for Sigmatel. When I downloaded and installed the latest driver from Dell, it created that R99254 folder and installed the same driver I already had. So if had the proper driver but I did not have that folder, could that be possible cause of my problem described in original post? Thanks Meta1.

The R99254 contains the files for the Sigmatel driver, so I would have to think that either the folder was moved to a different location on the hard drive, was renamed, or that the Sigmatel driver was not working.

If it was not working due to missing files, but you heard audio anyway, then the Intel AC97 driver that is built into XP may have been operative. About your symptoms, they are not symptoms that are familiar to me as an audio problem.

About the Intel driver I mentioned, as far as I know XP does not automatically install it upon bootup when there is no other audio driver (although that is exactly what happens in Vista but with an Intel HD audio driver, not AC97) but I could be wrong about that. Here is the only way I know to install the Intel driver if you want to experiment with it. You should see some minor differences in its functionality compared to the Sigmatel.

> Go to Start/Control Panel/System/ Hardware tab, then click on Device Manager. Go down to  Sound, Video and Game controllers and right click on SigmaTel. Choose properties.

(Or instead right click on the speaker icon, click on Adjust Audio Properties, click on the hardware tab, select SigmaTel, and click Propertties.)

> Click on the Driver tab and click on Update Driver. The Hardware Update Wizard will open.

> Answer "No" to the Windows Update question.

> Choose "Install From List or specific location".  Ignore the 'Insert CD' instruction.

> Hit next and then choose "Don't Search, I will choose driver I want to install".

> You will get a list of SigmaTel drivers. Uncheck the box that says "show compatible hardware".

> Select Intel, and then select "Intel AC 97 Audio Controller". XP replaces the SigmaTel driver with the Intel AC97.

> To reinstall the original driver later just go back to Properties and select "Rollback Driver".

Thanks Jim, let me ask you one final question on this thread. So far with the sound card disabled I have not had my original shutdown problem. If I get through a full week I’ll assume I have a working motherboard with a defective onboard sound card. I could then play around with the drivers you described switching to Intel from Sigmatel to see if that helps. Another solution would be to put in a separate sound card (maybe in one of the slots). Is that possible on a 9300? Anything harder then replacing a hard drive or DVD player is beyond my skill level on a laptop. Thanks again, Meta1.

Beyond my skill level too.

You choices for an external sound card are either usb or pcmcia (goes in the PC Card slot). Google around about the pcmcia card. I don't think they are made anymore and you would probably have to buy used. An interesting thing about the Sound Blaster pcmcia card that used to be widely used was that you could play music from it through the laptop's internal speakers, but only if the Sigmatel audio was working. Of course most people bought it after the Sigmatel stopped working so they had to use external speakers.