Finally Fixed? Realtek Audio Stops Working After Standby

Ok, so my blog doesn't normally include technical items, but I haven't found this solution out there anywhere, so I wanted to post it SOMEWHERE on the off-chance that somebody else may find it and be helped by it.

Problem: After my recent computer upgrade, my Realtek HD Audio occasionally died, and I had to reboot the computer to fix it. I finally figured out that the problem related to returning from standby, and that I could force the failure by going to S3 standby while watching a video on Hulu.

Solution: I saw some other people in several old threads I found through my Google searching, who said that if they remove their wireless PCI card. WHAT!?!?! The wireless card makes the audio die? Anyway, I decided to upgrade my drivers and see what happened. My network card is a cheap AirLink101 board, and their latest driver is from 2006--so of course I already had the latest version.

Wait!!!

I looked in the device manager and decided to Google the PCI Vendor and Device IDs and found a long list of matching hardware. As it turned out, the AirLink101 uses a Ralink chipset, and different manufacturer's products are differentiated only by the subsystem ID.

On Ralinks website, I downloaded all of their PCI drivers, and then sifted through the INF files until I found the one which supported device ID 0302, which turned out to be the RT256x Driver. Wow, a 2009 date! Wouldn't it be nice if all the OEMs like AirLink101 would at least rerelease the reference drivers once every couple years? I downloaded this and did a driver-only install on my system.

Next hurdle...I try to update the driver in the Device Manager, and it says that there are no other drivers on the system. No problem, we just have to force it to use the right one. Examining the new INF file showed that Ralink includes a bunch of vendor's subsystem IDs in their file, but not the one for my AirLink101 board. I decided just to force the driver install and see what happened. From the INF, I learn that device 0302 is called the Ralink Wireless LAN Card V2. By choosing to select the driver from a list and browsing to this driver, I was able to force the installation--ignoring all the complaints that the world might end if my driver mismatches.

A few seconds later my computer reconnected to my wireless network, and I have since suspended and resumed repeatedly in the middle of Hulu videos with no problems whatsoever, hopefully this fix is permanent. Thanks Ralink!