Member Avatar for Element150

I had left my computer running. It went to standby, I didn't turn it back on until the next day. when I tried to adjust the volume by clicking on the icon in the system tray it said there was no device and it was going to close the program, then the icon disappeared. I can still adjust the volume by going to control panel, but the icon won't reappear.

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  • Latest Post Latest Post by Member #949369

Dani AI

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As confirmed, the simple notification-area / Sounds control-panel fixes that and mentioned solve this for many people. When the icon vanishes after a “no device” message (or after resume from standby), that error usually means Windows actually lost or failed to reinitialize the audio device or its service — the missing icon is a symptom, not the root cause. For cases like ’s (settings set to “always show” but nothing appears after reboot) try the following diagnostics in order.

  • Check Device Manager: expand “Sound, video and game controllers.” Make sure the device is enabled and shows no error icon. If it’s missing, right‑click and “Scan for hardware changes” or reinstall the vendor driver.
  • Restart the audio services: open Services (services.msc) and restart “Windows Audio” (and on Vista/7/10+ also restart the Audio Endpoint Builder service). This often restores the device and the tray icon.
  • Reload the shell: restart Explorer (Task Manager → End task for explorer.exe → File → Run new task → explorer.exe). That refreshes the notification area without a full reboot.
  • If UI toggles and restarts don’t help, use built‑in repairs: update/reinstall the audio driver from the manufacturer, run sfc /scannow, or roll back to a restore point.

For quick command-line restarts (run as Administrator):

net stop Audiosrv
net start Audiosrv
sfc /scannow

A note about downloaded binaries: reported copying a volume executable to System32 to fix the problem. That can work but is risky if the file’s source isn’t trustworthy. Prefer official drivers, Windows repair tools, or System Restore before using downloaded system executables. If the problem persists after these steps, it usually points to driver corruption, a failing audio device, or a deeper user-profile/registry issue that may require a repair install.

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Member Avatar for Johnathan

Right click on the system tray and go to customize notifications and you should see a bunch of options appear click the volume and make sure it say always show or hide when inactive then your problem should be solved. Good Luck. Let me know how it turns out.

Member Avatar for jbennet

theres a checkbox in sounds under control panel which says "Place Volume Icon In The Taskbar"

commented: nice easy feed back keep em comin +1
Member Avatar for Element150

theres a checkbox in sounds under control panel which says "Place Volume Icon In The Taskbar"

That was it, thanks.

Member Avatar for dick28

I am experiencing same problem but after I changes to {always show] & rebooted they still do not appear. any suggestions? thanks Dick

Member Avatar for Member #949369

I battled with this problem o but did I but I will not be beaten by a computer so after many long nites of research here us what I did I downloaded sndvl32.exe file saved it to my flash drive then ran it, I then copied the file from my flash drive to the windows syst32 file then went to control panel checked the the box for icon in syst tray or taskbar. icon now on task bar shut down laptop turned it back on still there all good, that bloody easy.

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