The growling beast syndrome for dell pc owners

In recent months there has been a flurry of incidents which I commonly call the “growling beast syndrome.” After assisting many users with this problem I have found one recurring factor that ties them all together. These people all are using a Dell PC and it has an “integrated” sound card.

I have helped several friends and neighbors with this problem as well and I will say this – Its a Dell PC and most of them sold here in the US come with a full 3-year warranty and most even include free in-home technical repair if necessary. Dell has become irritated by the number of people who have called to complain about this issue and have now become reluctant to deal with the problem, but persistence does pay off.

Dell will first try to tell you that there is nothing wrong with your sound card. This in fact is true. The sound card is not faulty or bad. If you listen to a music file on your PC it will ‘sound’ fine. If you visit websites or use programs that have sound effects these also will be ‘heard.’ In fact, even while in a Yahoo! or MSN chat room you will ‘hear’ others fine. However, every time you try to use your microphone to speak back to the room or play music, etc., all anybody else will hear is a slow, deep growling sound (aliens, beasts, its been called many things).

OK, now I just said there was nothing wrong with the sound card so why is it the problem you ask? It is the type of sound card these PC’s have that is the problem. The integrated sound cards ARE NOT compatible with either MSN or Yahoo’s voice servers. Therefore, every time you log into a chat room, your voice will suddenly become that of the “hideous beast” that has plagued the Yahoo chat rooms this past year and there is only one solution – use a non-integrated sound card.

Dell will swap sound cards out with you if you are persuasive with them. Simply explain to them that while the sound card is not ‘bad’ it still is not compatible with your favorite or most used programs and that if they really stand by their pledge of Quality Customer Service then they will swap cards. I personally have dealt with them on this matter and they will do it, but be polite. (Keep in mind that when dealing with “tech support” people, really all we are dealing with is a telemarketer who has been transformed to avoid becoming obselete – no offense – and that these tech’s make around $8.00/hr to read back info that is pulled up on their monitor to you…much the same way as Yahoo’s help pages…and we all know how helpful that info is..:()

There is another option as well. You could go buy a sound card out of your own pocket and install it…not very difficult but its not right that you should have to pay for it. I know even Wal-Mart carries sound cards like “Sound Blaster” that ARE compatible with the voice servers and cost approximately $5-15.00 depending on what you buy. Either way is up to you but I personally guarantee you that when you find that you do in fact have an integrated sound card that this is the proper solution.

P.S. There is another similar voice problem that I have come across in the past by non-Dell owners w/o integrated sound cards and the solution was this..there was a voice modifying program installed on the system. To correct the problem you simply have to uninstall the program and it helps to run the voice setup wizard again to re-configure your settings.