Why does the sound cut out when I'm playing a game or listening to music on my pc?

Question

Im using windows XP.When I play any game, it plays for a while and then suddenly cuts out. For example, while playing Hitman, the game runs smoothly for about 10 mins. After that, the sound cuts out but the picture still is there. When I try to exit the game, it freezes in the game menu. I then have to reset the pc at the power supply. It doesnt even respond to ctrl-alt-del.

Thats one example. The other is when I listen to music. This happens rarely over an extended period of time. While playing mp3s in windows media player 11, the song cuts out and when I try to move the mouse,it drags for about 10 seconds. It moves fluently after that. The only way to get the sound back is by restarting the pc.

Someone please tell me whats going on and how to resolve this. A friend says it could be a driver. If it is where can I get a new one, and how do I install such a thing?

Answer 1

Try DriverMax. It will go through your system and update all of your drivers. You download it and run it and follow the onscreen instructions.

Answer 2

It COULD be a driver or your soundboard

or it could be that the game is requiring too much

of the CPUs time, which mean it has to stop playing

sound for a split second in order to play the game.

Everything has prioritys, the CPU has to share it's time

with EVERYThing RUNNING on yor PC at any given moment.

Answer 3

it can be down to how fast you computer is better known as the (fps) frames per a second