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I've almost got my home theatre PC back up & running after some major problems developed in the last week. Like it wouldn't start up. And it wouldn't play any media files. Which would be important for a multimedia PC.

So without going into details, lets just say I spent much time repairing XP & reinstalling drivers & software. Very dull, very frustrating. But now it all works. And it works well. I can't get the thing to crash, no matter how nasty I am to it. The picture from DVDs is great, all my music from iTunes is available in a slick interface, & all my TV shows play beautifully.

Now the sound has started to drop out occaisionally. Oh God. Its random. I check & recheck all the settings & driver versions I can. I observe & record CPU & RAM load to try and spot changes with the drops. I check XP's automated stuff. I defrag (because I can't think of anything else). I give up. Time for a coffee.

When I return to the room & switch the light on, Norah Jones' Come Away With Me loses sound for a beat. You know what? Whenever I switch a light on the sound drops out. Oh crap. This is just the atypical bloody thing that happens when building PCs. Bizarrely, the increased load (on a separate ring!) when switching a light on affects the sound output of my PC.

Why do I put myself through this?

By Sam on January 28, 2006 11:38 PM | 1 Comment