[FIXED] Sound gone after leaving game alone/minimizing/tab out

Before this last update, while playing Sims 4, I could turn on my headset and my laptop would automatically connect to my headset, and turning off my headset would automatically reconnect to the external speaker, and I can keep doing this over and over and Sims 4 sounds would automatically know how to connect to the appropriate device.

Ever since this last update, this functionality is gone. Turning off my headset makes Sims 4 totally lose sound instead of automatically connecting to my external speaker, and even if I turned on my headset again, the sound is simply gone. My only way to recover Sims 4 sound is to exit and restart the game.

Apparently, the last update broke something to this end. Can anyone advise? Thanks.

This is happening to me too, and it's super annoying. My headphone jack has a faulty connection so a light tap can disconnect my earphones, meaning I need to restart the game every 10 minutes or so.

I am speaking from a software developer perspective as I report this new issue since the last update.

When the game starts, it determines the default audio of the system and uses that for sound output. There should be error trapping routines on code sections that output to the audio device. It seems to me that when the audio output device is changed WHILE the game is already running, the error trapping routine no longer checks what the new audio output device is. So if I started the game using my external Bluetooth speakers, AND THEN turned on my Bluetooth headset (which my laptop recognizes and properly overrides my external Bluetooth speakers with), Sims 4 loses sound. Prior to the update, Sims 4 knew how to handle this situation and properly routes sound output to the new active sound device (i.e., my headset). But now, the sound disappears and trying to exit the game just causes Sims 4 to hang as if it's still trying to output sound to a disabled sound device. As a result, the game can't exit normally and just hangs; I'd either have to choose the "Close" application option as the game grays out or end the task via the Task Manager to exit the game.

I very quickly noticed this because I switch back and forth often between my external Bluetooth speakers and my headset, and Sims 4 had always properly changed to the active device. This adaptive functionality disappeared since the last update.

Please fix this and restore it back to the way it was because it's now a pain dealing with this as I have to exit the game fully BEFORE changing active output sound devices.

@GrendallEA  Thanks for posting this and for the explanation.  I've passed it on, although I don't know whether anything will come of it.

I'm also having this problem, and since my computer is super slow it takes forever to save, close, and restart the game when it happens. 

I take comfort in knowing that this is not an isolated issue. I've been experiencing this problem -- my Bluetooth earbuds cut out if I put them in the charger while I step away -- and it's incredibly frustrating. I have to Save and Exit and then restart the game to establish sound again.  When the disconnect happens, I can't even switch (manually) to external speakers while in game.

Hello.

We are investigating this issue.  For those of you that are experiencing a crash or hang when changing audio, could you share your dxdiag?

EDIT: Never mind on the dxdiags.  We see the hang issue now.

@limiV  I've merged your post with another thread on this issue.  It seems that there's a general issue related to switching sound output devices while the game is running; if you'd like a more detailed explanation, please see the first post.

As you can see from the post directly above yours, EA is aware of the issue and is looking into it.  Hopefully it will be addressed soon.

I wonder if there is an official bug report thread on this in addition to this thread in the Tech issues section? (I couldn't find one) I was just thinking that we'd get more Me too clicks on it if people were able to find it. Maybe it would have an effect on how soon we can expect this to be patched. Also I appreciate the highly informative title of this thread but I imagine most simmers having the same issue don't have the technical savvy to use such key words in the search field of the forums and find this exact thread. :D