Question Using custom sounds on Windows 11 24H2 ?

[NayWard]

Hello. First post here. Can't seem to solve this one. Looking at Windows 11, given Windows 10's demise is on the horizon.
For familiarity/recognition, enhanced user experience and a smaller learning curve for people I'm updating PCs for I would like to use the sounds from Windows 7 for several of the Windows sound events.
I've been doing this on Windows 10 for years and it works fine, but on Windows 11 it just ignores the custom sounds and plays the default ones.

I've tried this through the sounds GUI and also editing the registry directly. I've tried with the sounds in %userprofile%\Media (for no particular reason just to place them somewhere outside the windows folder), and in %windir%\Media. Nothing seems to work.

I've been through many websites about this, many of which are just plain junk, and seen several tutorials, none of which work.

The sounds are device connect, fail and disconnect, Windows startup sound, Windows notify and exclamation.

Here's an example of the registry tweaks;
(This is for %userporofile% but %windir% yields the same outcomes).

REG ADD "HKCU\AppEvents\Schemes\Apps\.Default\DeviceFail\.Current" /ve /d "%USERPROFILE%\Media\Windows Hardware Fail.wav" /t REG_EXPAND_SZ /f
REG ADD "HKCU\AppEvents\Schemes\Apps\.Default\DeviceFail\.Modified" /ve /d "%USERPROFILE%\Media\Windows Hardware Fail.wav" /t REG_EXPAND_SZ /f
REG ADD "HKCU\AppEvents\Schemes\Apps\.Default\DeviceConnect\.Current" /ve /d "%USERPROFILE%\Media\Windows Hardware Insert.wav" /t REG_EXPAND_SZ /f
REG ADD "HKCU\AppEvents\Schemes\Apps\.Default\DeviceConnect\.Modified" /ve /d "%USERPROFILE%\Media\Windows Hardware Insert.wav" /t REG_EXPAND_SZ /f
REG ADD "HKCU\AppEvents\Schemes\Apps\.Default\DeviceDisconnect\.Current" /ve /d "%USERPROFILE%\Media\Windows Hardware Remove.wav" /t REG_EXPAND_SZ /f
REG ADD "HKCU\AppEvents\Schemes\Apps\.Default\DeviceDisconnect\.Modified" /ve /d "%USERPROFILE%\Media\Windows Hardware Remove.wav" /t REG_EXPAND_SZ /f
REG ADD "HKCU\AppEvents\Schemes\Apps\.Default\Notification.Default\.Current" /ve /d "%USERPROFILE%\Media\Windows Notify.wav" /t REG_EXPAND_SZ /f
REG ADD "HKCU\AppEvents\Schemes\Apps\.Default\Notification.Default\.Modified" /ve /d "%USERPROFILE%\Media\Windows Notify.wav" /t REG_EXPAND_SZ /f

I've tried with the user name (eg. C:\Users\test\), rather than a variable, and with REG_SZ instead of REG_EXPAND_SZ.

Why can't I get this to work?

WIndows 11 26100.3323 24H2 on I5-14600KF/MSI Z790 Tomahawk mobo.

thank you.

 

[Lutfij]

Welcome to the forums, newcomer!

Out of curiosity, did you migrate to Windows 11 using the internal upgrade path from Windows 10? If so, then you should consider recreating your bootable USB installer for Windows 11, formatting the drive with all other drives except the one you wish to install the OS onto disconnected and reinstalling Windows 11.

I've also learned that like Windows 10, if you tinker with the registry, chances are that the OS goes belly up. As it stands much of the updates released by Microsoft have been half baked, with 24H2 being buggy for a lot of users, me included.

 

[NayWard]

Thank you for the warm welcome.

I always install from scratch. Create a fresh boot drive and install on a formatted system as you suggest.

I've found W11 to be significantly slower than W10 on the same hardware.

I feel quite confortable with the registry having been working with it for quite a long time. Of course, I've bungled things once or twice, but hey, what better way to learn

I agree with the sentiment about updates. I can't even remember the last time Microsoft released an update that didn't cause problems.
Automatic updates (on anything, not just Windows), make it impossible to get a stable environment in which to do testing.

I have a spare PC so I do all my testing on that. At this stage I couldn't imagine running W11 on production machines.

But as to the sounds, working through the control panel/settings gui doesn't work either.