No DVD Soud on ND-3550A

CD, DVD and (Ultra HD) Blu-ray Writers NEC / Optiarc Writer
#1

I have an NEC ND-3550A DVD burner. The problem I am having is when I play a commercial movie DVD I get a picture but no sound. If I play a music CD on that same burner I get sound as normal so I know that the cables are connected correctly. Does anyone have any thoughts to what I could to to enable sound when playing DVD movies?

Note: This is a new system that I built. It is an Intel E8400 CPU on an Asus P5K-E motherboard. The OS is Vista Home Premium 64 bit. All seems to be working well on this system except for the problem that I just described.

#2

Welcome to the forum.
You require a codec for DVD sound. This is usually installed with DVD playback software such as, Power DVD.

#3

Thank you for the suggestion, and you are probably right. I downloaded and installed a couple of free codecs but was still not able to get any sound. I did some reading on the Vista help files and it seems that I need a 64 bit codec. The codecs that I downloaded were most likely 32 bit, thus the reason it did not help. I think finding a 64 bit codec will be a challenge. Maybe one will be included with Vista’s SP1.

#4

You could install AC3filter.

#5

I downloaded the 64 bit version of Media Player Classic HomeCinema from this site:
http://www.start64.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1376&Itemid=72

With MPCHC I was able to play DVD’s with sound. Now, in order to get Windows Media Center to play DVD sound, I need to find out what is different between Widows Media Center and MPCHC.

#6

I have fixed this issue and thought I would pass this on so that it may be of help to others with the same issue.

This fix only applies to systems where you have an HDMI connection directly from your computer to your TV. I happen to be running Vista Home Premium 64 bit, but I think this would apply to 32 bit as well.

  1. Open Control Panel.
  2. Click on Hardware and sound.
  3. Click on Sound.
  4. Click to highlight Digital Output Device (SPDIF).
  5. Click on Properties.
  6. Select the “Supported Formats” tab.
  7. Under “Encoded Formats” you will see three items with tick boxes. These items are DTS Audio, Dolby Digital, and Microsoft WMA Pro Audio. All three of these boxes must be NOT TICKED. That is the key. Make sure all of these boxes are not ticked. I believe one or more of these tick boxes are used when your SPDIF signal goes from your computer to an audio amplifier, but if you are set up like I am where your SPDIF signal is incorporated into the HDMI cable and the HDMI cable runs directly from your computer to your TV, then these tick boxes must be not ticked.