Windows XP SP3 on Qosmio X505 Q880, Conexant Sound [WORKS!]

Question

I've gotten everything but sound to work. The problem seems to be that it doesn't show up AT ALL. Meaning if there was some "unknown device" to force a driver through, it would work! So I'm wondering if there is something obsolete about UAA 1.0a conpared to Windows 7's UAA. Or maybe its outside of 32bit address space?
Its frustrating, because everything else works PERFECTLY! (after a lot of trial and error)
I'll share what I've done so far, and I'll be working tirelessly to get the sound working for the forseeable future, since I've spent so much time on it already. This should be the exact same for any X505 series, since the chipsets are all the same.
*You need free space on your drive for a new partition. Many options here...partition magic, etc. Personally, the tiny SDD got annoying fast, so I threw it out replaced it with a 640GB. Ahh, 10 times the space. Sweet relief.
*You need the WinXP OEM/Retail XP disk files. An unzipped or mounted ISO will do. (You will also need a blank CD-R for the finished product)
*Download nLite, http://www.nliteos.com/download.html. Feed it where your windows files are.
*Since Win XP install crashes due to missing SATA drivers so we use nLite to "slipstream" them in:
Windows Installer text mode SATA drivers: (I had nLite put in every line item from this pkg)   http://downloadcenter.intel.com/Detail_Desc.aspx?agr=Y&DwnldID=18860&lang=eng
Regular Windows SATA drivers, so it actually boots once installed: http://downloadcenter.intel.com/Detail_Desc.aspx?agr=Y&DwnldID=18180
Oh, if you want network access (YES YOU DO!)...slip in the wireless drivers: http://wikidrivers.com/wiki/Realtek_RTL8191SE/RTL8192SE
Be careful with the rest of the nLite settings, removing features might save a little space, but break stuff. Although the sizable language packs are a huge sitting duck, worth removing
*Install. When you format, do quick mode. The text mode drivers are SLOWWW and it will take an hour to finish.
*Open IE, go to nvidia.com, download drivers (yes the screen difficult to navigate because nVidia fails at life), 300*M* Series chip set, 360M   (MAKE SURE THE M's are there!).
*Run windows update from IE. Select custom, and select all the hardware updates. You'll now have everything but bluetooth, touchpad scrolling, and sound.
*If you want bluetooth, download the "Bluetooth Stack" from Toshiba Support Downloads.
*If you want touchpad scrolling/gestures, temporarily unplug any USB mice, and install this:
http://drivers.synaptics.com/Synaptics_v14_0_3_C_XP32_Vista32_Win7-32_Signed_default.exe
*LAST FREAKING STEP...Installing sound:.....not there yet.....hlep!
Solved!
Go to Solution.

Answer 1

YES!! It works!! Countless hours of pounding has paid off!
(The attachment says SOUND.TXT ....but if you rename it to SOUND.ZIP, things will make much more sense
Two major steps...the first one is the same no matter what your sound chip is, conexant, realtek, etc. The second one gets more specific.
Step 1: Patch Unified Audio Architecture (UAA), so it recognises sound card
Step 2: Install Driver for card
Sounds easy? Eh...kinda long and frought with problems, but persistance pays off.
The only problem is that you won't have sound until after you log in.
Use the files I attached and this should work straight off.
0. Make sure all your hardware updates are run, because all that crap gets in the way, especially the NVIDIA HDMI sound devices, which can cause confusion.
1. Download my attachment. (Just google for the files if it is gone)
EDIT: attachment didn't work...see my 3rd post below to recreate the files
Assuming you have XP SP3....we need to fake the Windows version so that it looks like SP2, so the new UAA wil install.
2. Open and install SP2.reg. ALTERNATIVELY: If you don't like opening reg files, use regedit to change
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Windows  -> CSDVersion to "200" (hexadecimal)
3. Run the UAA update, usually kb888111.exe
http://cid-3f10d7c1771f7efe.skydrive.live.com/self.aspx/Public/MS-UAA%20for%20XP.zip
4. Now we restore it back to SP3. Run XP3.reg, or regedit CSDVersion back to 300 hex.
5. Reboot.
At this point there should be some new high def audio device begging for drivers. But,just our luck, there isn't. For some reason UAA will crash at boot, and its pretty good at that. So, we need to restart UAA.
6. Get devcon and copy it into your root directory C:\ . (its from MS, resembles linux's lspci command).
This will do the legwork of starting UAA.
7. Run UAAstart.bat. UAA should work now, and it should find your sound and ask for a driver. If not, edit the bat file, and correct the DEV_ number. You can get this number from Control Panel -> System -> Hardware (tab) -> Device Manager -> System devices -> "Microsoft UAA Bus Driver for High Definition Audio" (there should be two of them, pick the bottom one) -> Details (Tab) -> Device Instance Id
(If you can't get the attachment, "devcon restart ..." where ... is the device ID)
EDIT: go down to my 3rd post for a more thorough treatment of devcon
9. It should NOW be asking you a driver. (YES!)
This is where it gets more specific. The drivers here will work for X505 and several other models.
 http://cid-10d0e6e125be32c7.skydrive.live.com/self.aspx/.Public/6ha113ww%5E_mod.zip
You will need to edit the INF file to change it to have the same DEV_ and SUBSYS_ numbers as your "Unknown Device", get these from Device Manager -> Unknown High Definition Audio Device ->Details -> Device Instance Id. If the DEV_ numbers are off by more than afew, you might have the wrong driver. 
For examlple, in the above zip, the TPShin5a.inf file has the following line:
%HdAudioFunctionDriver.Pebble5071.DeviceDesc% = HdAudModel,HDAUDIO\FUNC_01&VEN_14F1&DEV_5067&SUBSYS_103C360A
In my case, I changed one of the lines to read
%HdAudioFunctionDriver.Pebble5071.DeviceDesc% = HdAudModel,HDAUDIO\FUNC_01&VEN_14F1&DEV_5067&SUBSYS_1179FFD5
You'll notice more than one of those. You don't have to change them all, its just a list of chip IDs that tells Windows this driver will work.
10. Point driver update to that directory.
11. You should have sound! If you don't, make sure you have conexant chipset, if you don't use other drivers.
OK Problem, I'm sure you'll notice that you'll lose sound every time you reboot. Well,
12. Copy that UAAstart.bat to the Start->Program Files-> Startup
That way it will force the sound to start when you log in.