Confirmed Bluetooth Audio Bug in Smart Storage Technology

[SteveS]

I am writing to report a BUG in the Intel Smart Sound Technology for Bluetooth Audio driver version 10.29.0.8276.   This version was installed on to my laptop by Windows Update yesterday (18 Apr 2023) and because of the BUG, the microphone of my Logitech H800 headset became non-functional.  Rolling back the driver to the previous version, 10.29.0.7919 restores the microphone functionality.   

The most visible symptom of the bug is that in Settings > System > Sound > Properties, the Format field for the headset mic is BLANK.    With the working driver, the Format field shows "1 channels, 16 bit, 8000 Hz (Telephone Quality)".    Another symptom of the bug is that on that same Properties page, the Volume is fixed at zero.

Additional symptoms:   Test your microphone produces no audio,  microphone test in Slack fails, and Teams reports a microphone error at startup.

My hope is that you will act upon this information and release an updated driver that does not have this problem, so that I am able to receive driver updates.

Please feel free to contact me (email preferred) if you require additional information.

[Jean_Intel]

Hello SteveS,

Thank you for posting on the Intel️® communities.  

For support for Intel® Smart Sound Technology on your laptops, we recommend that you refer back to your motherboard vendor (OEMs) for your laptop, as they can provide you with the required support. For this issue, you should contact Lenovo support for this matter.

Best regards.

Jean O.

Intel Customer Support Technician.

[SteveS]

I see no reason to bother my OEM (Dell) with what is clearly an Intel problem.

The problem was caused by an Intel driver that was made available in Windows Update.  The broken driver was part of the "Intel(R) Corporation - MEDIA - 10.29.0.8276" update.  Updates from my OEM (Dell) are clearly labeled as belonging to Dell.   I assumed that an update labeled as belong to Intel came from Intel.   I also (apparently wrongly) assumed that you would be interested in fixing a trivially reproducible regression bug.

Are you seriously saying that Intel has no responsibility for releasing broken drivers via Windows Update?

[kenthenry1]

This is happening on a dozen or so 12th gen i7 machines I manage for work. I rolled back to the previously installed version, 10.29.0.8276, which seems to work. I think the original post might be referring to the driver after they rolled back as well. 

100% has to be an intel issue, no? The CPU, PCH, BT module (AX211 wifi) are all made by intel. I've never seen a Dell issue this driver at all, it has only come through Windows Update.