If you install an NVS300 supplied by HP it’ll disable the onboard SoundMAX hardware because there’s a sound device built into the video card.
I tried a lot of things, including nVidia’s downloadable drivers, HP’s drivers and a few other options but eventually found it was a BIOS setting issue.
- Go into the BIOS (F10 on startup)
- Scroll across to
Advanced - Select
PCI Devices - Once you’re in there, you’ll see the following:
The trick is to press the Page Down key and you’ll get to see the second set of PCI Devices:
Scroll down to
nVidia HD Audio deviceand hit one of the arrow keys until it saysDisable
F10 to accept, scroll across to File and save/accept settings.
Boot back up and you’ll have your default sound device back!