Speaker compatibility with Windows 10

[peterracine]

I have found that Windows 10 has compatibility issues with Bowers and Wilkins MM-1 speakers. Most of the issues are poor sound quality. Could it be an issue with the device driver? any thoughts would be greatly appreciated

 

[nukemaster]

I have not used USB Audio(I would guess you are using the speakers DAC?) on windows 10.

Can you check to ensure you do not have any enhancements turned on and that the sample rate matches what you had on your old operating system.

Does using your sound card sound any better(3.5mm in on the speakers).

 

[peterracine]

I have not used USB Audio(I would guess you are using the speakers DAC?) on windows 10.

Can you check to ensure you do not have any enhancements turned on and that the sample rate matches what you had on your old operating system.

Does using your sound card sound any better(3.5mm in on the speakers).

Hello nukemaster,
Yes the MM-1 speakers use their own dac and I have not tried to plug into sound card. Will give it a try. I also would like to stress that this issue is appearing with many computers and many different speakers as it is not an isolated incident.
Thank you for the quick response!

 

[nukemaster]

I wonder if MS changed the audio setup in 10 enough to cause issues.

Vista was a big change that caused some interesting driver requirements.

Can you explain the sound difference?

Unfortunately or fortunately depending on how you look at it, I listen to music with a plugin that bypasses the Windows mixer(Using hardware OpenAL[works on some old hardware based creative cards]) and talks directly to my sound card(X-fi). This means Windows has no effect on that part of my sound.

 

[peterracine]

I wonder if MS changed the audio setup in 10 enough to cause issues.

Vista was a big change that caused some interesting driver requirements.

Can you explain the sound difference?

Unfortunately or fortunately depending on how you look at it, I listen to music with a plugin that bypasses the Windows mixer(Using hardware OpenAL[works on some old hardware based creative cards]) and talks directly to my sound card(X-fi). This means Windows has no effect on that part of my sound.

Hello nukemaster,
The MM-1 have a great sound on Win7 and on Win 10 the sound is terrible and it seems that only tweeters and no bass or mid range are used. I have not tried them via 3.5 cable I will have to pick one up tonight.
Thank you for the response.

 

[nukemaster]

The more I think digital is digital, the more it turns out to be wrong.

I would have always figured that the audio stream is simply sent to the card(usb/pci/pci-e/ect) and it does the digital to analog and the quality of the dac would be the only limiting factor.

It is like nothing can leave the audio alone without changing it.