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Originally Posted by icculus203
Has anyone found a solution to this? I've spent a lot of time trying to figure it out and I can't get sound working on my 7700/Vista x86. I see a large number of "Unknown device" listed in the Other devices section of device manager. I've tried the 1.60 drivers and the XP drivers with no luck. The driver setup program seems to work/install but do not actually work.
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I'm sure this comes too late for you, but maybe someone else will benefit from this information. If you're on a Clevo D900T, which in my case is an Alienware Area51m 7700, but could also be a Sager 9860, and perhaps other makes/models -- then the culprit is indeed the SmartLink modem. What follows are the steps I took to fix mine. I'm listening to an MP3 as I type this, for the first time in months. I'm not advocating the same steps for anyone else, and will assume no responsibility for any who follow in them, but offer them for the sake of pointing people in a useful direction (something I couldn't find myself anywhere on the net, or from Alienware, or from Microsoft (although they tried harder and longer to help me than ANYONE else, to their good credit), or from Clevo, or from Smart Link, or from Conexant, the POS company that acquired Smart Link's pc chip modem line back in 2005, and then dismissed the needs of the built-in customer base that came with it by not releasing Vista compatible drivers. But I digress. This took no more than a philips screwdriver and about 20 minutes. I broke the laptop completely down. You have to get the keyboard, metal rest underneath it, and the monitor off in order to expose the part of the motherboard you need to get to. That means taking the battery and other panels off of the back, and unscrewing the dozen or so little black screws holding the top of the case on. Don't miss the long pesky silver one nested under one of the panels that holds the middle down, I think it was in the same recess as the hard drives, but I won't swear to it. I removed a number of silver screws across the back of the machine, you can see that the split between top and bottom runs right through the middle of the ports on the back of the machine, so any screws above that have to come out. The keyboard pops out by clicking back the four little clasps holding it in along the top edge, then the disconnection of the data cable. I think the aluminum tray beneath that is held down by 4-5 more screws, they come out, it comes up. Then the black plastic strip that surrounds the power button above your F keys comes up, with at least one wire disconnection. Once that's up, you can easily remove the monitor by disconnecting the three cables, and lifting it straight up out of the two slots its pegs are in -- but this may not be necessary. In any event, you should now be able to eyeball where the phone jack in the back of the machine is for the modem. Just inside the machine, on the top surface of the motherboard, there are two wires (white and black, in my case) plugged into a port, that lead deeper towards the center of the board about 2 inches to a small card (about the size of a postage stamp) which is seated on the mother. I removed the wire from both connections. I then lifted the small card off the board, and set it aside. In my case, it was sandwiched by black card stock, and bore a white sticker with the following info: Model: MDCAZS P/N: 88-D90T1-391 That's the problem causer. With it removed, I reversed my tracks, reassembling the machine. Upon completion, I booted up, and went straight to this page:
http://www.realtek.com.tw/downloads/...&GetDown=false From there, I downloaded the most recent version of their HD Audio driver (in my case R1.66), and installed it. After a prompted reboot, I had audio. No more modem, but it wasn't working anyway, Conexant has no intentions to produce new drivers or support the Smart Link products they acquired. No more 39 unknown devices in the manager. All relatively easy. Wish I had gone poking around in there months ago, maybe I wouldn't have been living in silence this long.
I hope this helps someone out there. There's virtually no worthwhile information about this problem on the net. Just lots of people complaining about it going back to the early Vista builds, and then the discontent tapering off over time as people either (like me) sort of gave up, maybe now and then trying a new Realtek driver without luck, or just downgraded back to XP. These Clevo D900T's are still great boxes, although mine has also been suffering power issues related to a loose connection between the power in jack and the motherboard (it's encased in a little silver box, so I can't see beneath it to tell if it's something maybe I could just solder -- anyone have any tips here?) -- anyway, the point is that they're worth the effort to get the sound working. I am not a particularly proficient tech type, which should be reassuring to anyone who wants to try the same solution on their own machine. If you have questions, I can be reached by way of clarity at buckeyeplanet dot com.
