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acex5 Author

Level 1

34 points

Fix for No Sound in iTunes on Windows 10

Guys this is just more something I wanted to share. I was searching forums back late last year when I noticed an issue where iTunes would just not play sound anymore. It was working fine after my Windows 10 upgrade and then just out of nowhere I could not get sound to play in iTunes. Checked and made sure all volume sliders were up and ran through my playback devices in sound to make sure it was not playing on the wrong device. Sound was working fine on everything else except iTunes. I uninstalled and re-installed iTunes 1 or 2 times as new versions came out in case it was some kind of Windows 10 issue with iTunes but it never fixed it. Finally today while I was going through a forum I noticed someone post about disabling the Sound Enhancer but it was already disabled. But I noticed another setting on the same page. The Play Audio Using: Section was set to Windows Audio Session. I changed it to Direct Sound and tada I can hear sound in iTunes again. This may work on older operating system versions to. Windows 10 was just what I was using.

Heres the process

1. Open iTunes and go into Edit and then preferences

2. Click Playback on the preferences screen.

3. At the bottom you will use Play Audio Using:

4. Change from Windows Audio Session to Direct Sound.

5. It will ask you to close iTunes and re-open and then you should have sound again.

You might be experiencing a different issue but if this can help one other person its worth it to post especially being a simple thing to check. Thanks!

null-OTHER, Windows 10

Posted on Mar 11, 2017 5:01 PM

Best reply

Suggzy79

Level 1

4 points

Posted on Jul 6, 2018 3:59 PM

Hi all,

This is the only thing that worked for me, using windows 10.

1. Open

Settings, and click/tap on the System icon.

2. Click/tap on

Sound on the left side, and click/tap on App volume and device preferences under Other sound options on the right side.

3. You should see the ITunes app/icon to the right of that, there s a drop down box labelled Output which I think lists the different sound cards installed in your conputer, I selected default and the sound came through straight away loud and clear as before.

NB I m not sure why the iTunes app wasn’t set to default in the first place, despite researching relentlessly and tweaking settings over the last few days to solve this issue, switching to direct sound in ITunes had no effect. Hope this helps.

View in context

235 replies

May 19, 2020 10:39 AM in response to acex5

On the lower right of the Video playback screen, is a text blurb icon to depict Audio. I clicked there and found that turning off "Prefer AC3 Passthrough" did the trick for me. Honestly, have no clue when that was turned on or why. Good luck all.

Jul 28, 2020 7:07 AM in response to acex5

Thank you. This happened to me too, after installing new drivers. Followed the steps and got sound on iTunes. Then the sound was kind of distorted with some extra notes so disabled Sound Enhancer. Now all is fine.

Aug 19, 2020 6:34 PM in response to acex5

I am having this issue as well, however it is not resolved by the method above. I can play music and hear sound via iTunes (Windows 10) however I cannot hear sound from movies. My output device is Arctis 7 and I have triple checked that all drivers are updated and that Windows is updated. I even tried removing and reinstalling iTunes as well as removing the headphones via device manager. Have also switched between sound outputs (making sure to use correct device as default), have double checked the sound level. I'm out of ideas and believe this is an issue on Apple's end. Dear Apple, stop neglecting Windows devices. Where is the updated TV app that is available on Macs?

JimMAsh

Level 1

8 points

Oct 10, 2020 6:36 PM in response to acex5

This just worked for me as well after the last 12.10.9.3 ITunes release. However I noticed that after you toggle to "Direct Sound" you can then toggle back after a iTunes exit back to "Windows Audio Session" and it remains working. - Jim

Oct 15, 2020 8:41 PM in response to acex5

Here I am, October, 2020, and had the exact same issue, Googled the problem, found this, and IT WORKED!

Getting computers to work together is like getting the UN to agree on something, but this worked!

Jan 29, 2021 10:39 PM in response to acex5

You are huge for this. This started a couple days ago and it would play sound through my gaming headset but not the speakers most of the time. It was hard to search for a fix since it was so specific but yea if you check this you are the goat

UCKimi

Level 1

4 points

Feb 8, 2021 10:44 AM in response to acex5

Hi Everyone, I just wanted to add what worked for me. As well, this is for Windows 10 with the most current iTunes software. I had just rebuilt my PC and couldn't figure out why iTunes had no volume.

I went to my volume icon in the lower right corner, right clicked it and chose "open sound settings." From there, I scrolled down to "advanced sound options" and clicked "app volume and device preferences." Once there, I scrolled down to iTunes and noticed my volume was set at 0. I slid it to 100, and I have volume again. Hope this helps!!

juzzle

Level 1

13 points

Apr 1, 2021 11:00 PM in response to acex5

Contrary to what people are saying here, my experience is that this only works once, then you need to toggle from Direct Sound to Windows Audio and back again to Direct Sound in order to this to work each time (that's Start, Restart & Restart again). This is infuriating!

Jul 17, 2021 3:03 PM in response to acex5

I just experienced this only yesterday and it happened while playing between songs. I though my audio jack had begun to be defective. But then this morning I tried playing movie and the audio works perfectly fine on my earphones. Then I search for answers. Thank you very much!!! I was just wondering, what have I done to cause this switch. Again the problem occurred between songs, there were no windows update that I was aware of. So any other info (aside from windows update) how this (Play Audio Setting) occurred. Thanks again, this information is so very helpful.

Jcbrap

Level 1

8 points

Nov 12, 2021 1:58 PM in response to acex5

This fix works, TY so much! Btw, somehow this config "switch" gets set incorrectly on major updates so keep this fix in mind going forward (e.g., I just upgraded to Win 11 and when I tried iTunes, no sound, this fixed it)

Apr 26, 2017 4:40 PM in response to acex5

I could kiss you... I've been struggling with this for two days now, and you just fixed it. THANK YOU

turingtest2

Level 10

272,937 points

Sep 25, 2020 8:38 AM in response to Calvy1990

If iTunes cannot see any AirPlay compatible speakers on the network it may not show the icon. See Recommended settings for Wi-Fi routers and access points - Apple Support.

tt2

Jun 18, 2017 10:21 AM in response to acex5

Thank you!!

eci1

Level 1

4 points

Sep 6, 2017 12:11 AM in response to acex5

You, good sir or ma'am, deserve a cookie. Thank you for taking the time to post this fix for no reason other than to alleviate the frustration of those whom you have never met.

Enjoy your cookie!

dbw100

Level 1

4 points

Oct 13, 2017 12:05 PM in response to acex5

Howdy!

Just re-installed itunes after long time away - and had no sound on playback - but your fix worked!!

Thanks for taking the time to post...

Fix for No Sound in iTunes on Windows 10