Surface Sound Settings Unresponsive After USB Soundbar Plugged In

[clatham78]

I'm having an issue with an AC511 soundbar on Windows 10 21H2 on a SPro7. We have tried different soundbars (both AC511), docking stations (MS Dock for Business 2,) monitors (with data cable going to docking station,) docked/undocked, and plugging directly into the Surface (both charging and not.) In every instance, the sound settings become unresponsive, YouTube starts buffering (stops immediately after unplugging soundbar) and Teams all but freezes when using the meeting function. Everything that relies on sound goes haywire or locks up immediately upon plugging in the soundbar and stops as soon as it is removed.


All drivers and firmware/BIOS have been updated. Event viewer is barren except for a few power settings changes and NHI entries about driver entering or exiting RTD3. No errors, only informational. I've also tried suspending selective suspend in the registry but that did nothing. I can't find anything about this on Google despite searching for quite a while. Any ideas?

Thanks,
Cory

 

[sharpuser]

Cory,

The problem may indeed be by design of the SP7, but this would be a very common complaint, if so. It sounds like your particular SP7 has the issue. Of course, at this point it cannot be determined whether the issue is hardware, firmware, or software. Do you have any friends with an SP7 who would let you plug in a soundbar for a very short test?

 

[clatham78]

Cory,

The problem may indeed be by design of the SP7, but this would be a very common complaint, if so. It sounds like your particular SP7 has the issue. Of course, at this point it cannot be determined whether the issue is hardware, firmware, or software. Do you have any friends with an SP7 who would let you plug in a soundbar for a very short test?

The user moved from a SP6 about a month ago and never had this issue. It was also on 21H2 and current on all drivers and firmware. We don't have any other Surfaces to test with.