How can i control the volume of a specific software in the windows Volume Mixer?

Question

This is a screenshot of the Volume Mixer:

I want to control the volume of the Game Capture HD What I did is adding a new class to my project:

using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.Linq;
using System.Text;
using System.Threading.Tasks;
using System.Runtime.InteropServices;

namespace Automatic_Record
{
    class AudioControll
    {
        public static void test()
        {
            const string app = "Game Capture HD";

            foreach (string name in EnumerateApplications())
            {
                Console.WriteLine("name:" + name);
                if (name == app)
                {
                    // display mute state & volume level (% of master)
                    Console.WriteLine("Mute:" + GetApplicationMute(app));
                    Console.WriteLine("Volume:" + GetApplicationVolume(app));

                    // mute the application
                    SetApplicationMute(app, true);

                    // set the volume to half of master volume (50%)
                    SetApplicationVolume(app, 50);
                }
            }
        }

        public static float? GetApplicationVolume(string name)
        {
            ISimpleAudioVolume volume = GetVolumeObject(name);
            if (volume == null)
                return null;

            float level;
            volume.GetMasterVolume(out level);
            return level * 100;
        }

        public static bool? GetApplicationMute(string name)
        {
            ISimpleAudioVolume volume = GetVolumeObject(name);
            if (volume == null)
                return null;

            bool mute;
            volume.GetMute(out mute);
            return mute;
        }

        public static void SetApplicationVolume(string name, float level)
        {
            ISimpleAudioVolume volume = GetVolumeObject(name);
            if (volume == null)
                return;

            Guid guid = Guid.Empty;
            volume.SetMasterVolume(level / 100, ref guid);
        }

        public static void SetApplicationMute(string name, bool mute)
        {
            ISimpleAudioVolume volume = GetVolumeObject(name);
            if (volume == null)
                return;

            Guid guid = Guid.Empty;
            volume.SetMute(mute, ref guid);
        }

        public static IEnumerable<string> EnumerateApplications()
        {
            // get the speakers (1st render + multimedia) device
            IMMDeviceEnumerator deviceEnumerator = (IMMDeviceEnumerator)(new MMDeviceEnumerator());
            IMMDevice speakers;
            deviceEnumerator.GetDefaultAudioEndpoint(EDataFlow.eRender, ERole.eMultimedia, out speakers);

            // activate the session manager. we need the enumerator
            Guid IID_IAudioSessionManager2 = typeof(IAudioSessionManager2).GUID;
            object o;
            speakers.Activate(ref IID_IAudioSessionManager2, 0, IntPtr.Zero, out o);
            IAudioSessionManager2 mgr = (IAudioSessionManager2)o;

            // enumerate sessions for on this device
            IAudioSessionEnumerator sessionEnumerator;
            mgr.GetSessionEnumerator(out sessionEnumerator);
            int count;
            sessionEnumerator.GetCount(out count);

            for (int i = 0; i < count; i++)
            {
                IAudioSessionControl ctl;
                sessionEnumerator.GetSession(i, out ctl);
                string dn;
                ctl.GetDisplayName(out dn);
                yield return dn;
                Marshal.ReleaseComObject(ctl);
            }
            Marshal.ReleaseComObject(sessionEnumerator);
            Marshal.ReleaseComObject(mgr);
            Marshal.ReleaseComObject(speakers);
            Marshal.ReleaseComObject(deviceEnumerator);
        }

        private static ISimpleAudioVolume GetVolumeObject(string name)
        {
            // get the speakers (1st render + multimedia) device
            IMMDeviceEnumerator deviceEnumerator = (IMMDeviceEnumerator)(new MMDeviceEnumerator());
            IMMDevice speakers;
            deviceEnumerator.GetDefaultAudioEndpoint(EDataFlow.eRender, ERole.eMultimedia, out speakers);

            // activate the session manager. we need the enumerator
            Guid IID_IAudioSessionManager2 = typeof(IAudioSessionManager2).GUID;
            object o;
            speakers.Activate(ref IID_IAudioSessionManager2, 0, IntPtr.Zero, out o);
            IAudioSessionManager2 mgr = (IAudioSessionManager2)o;

            // enumerate sessions for on this device
            IAudioSessionEnumerator sessionEnumerator;
            mgr.GetSessionEnumerator(out sessionEnumerator);
            int count;
            sessionEnumerator.GetCount(out count);

            // search for an audio session with the required name
            // NOTE: we could also use the process id instead of the app name (with IAudioSessionControl2)
            ISimpleAudioVolume volumeControl = null;
            for (int i = 0; i < count; i++)
            {
                IAudioSessionControl ctl;
                sessionEnumerator.GetSession(i, out ctl);
                string dn;
                ctl.GetDisplayName(out dn);
                if (string.Compare(name, dn, StringComparison.OrdinalIgnoreCase) == 0)
                {
                    volumeControl = ctl as ISimpleAudioVolume;
                    break;
                }
                Marshal.ReleaseComObject(ctl);
            }
            Marshal.ReleaseComObject(sessionEnumerator);
            Marshal.ReleaseComObject(mgr);
            Marshal.ReleaseComObject(speakers);
            Marshal.ReleaseComObject(deviceEnumerator);
            return volumeControl;
        }
    }

    [ComImport]
    [Guid("BCDE0395-E52F-467C-8E3D-C4579291692E")]
    internal class MMDeviceEnumerator
    {
    }

    internal enum EDataFlow
    {
        eRender,
        eCapture,
        eAll,
        EDataFlow_enum_count
    }

    internal enum ERole
    {
        eConsole,
        eMultimedia,
        eCommunications,
        ERole_enum_count
    }

    [Guid("A95664D2-9614-4F35-A746-DE8DB63617E6"), InterfaceType(ComInterfaceType.InterfaceIsIUnknown)]
    internal interface IMMDeviceEnumerator
    {
        int NotImpl1();

        [PreserveSig]
        int GetDefaultAudioEndpoint(EDataFlow dataFlow, ERole role, out IMMDevice ppDevice);

        // the rest is not implemented
    }

    [Guid("D666063F-1587-4E43-81F1-B948E807363F"), InterfaceType(ComInterfaceType.InterfaceIsIUnknown)]
    internal interface IMMDevice
    {
        [PreserveSig]
        int Activate(ref Guid iid, int dwClsCtx, IntPtr pActivationParams, [MarshalAs(UnmanagedType.IUnknown)] out object ppInterface);

        // the rest is not implemented
    }

    [Guid("77AA99A0-1BD6-484F-8BC7-2C654C9A9B6F"), InterfaceType(ComInterfaceType.InterfaceIsIUnknown)]
    internal interface IAudioSessionManager2
    {
        int NotImpl1();
        int NotImpl2();

        [PreserveSig]
        int GetSessionEnumerator(out IAudioSessionEnumerator SessionEnum);

        // the rest is not implemented
    }

    [Guid("E2F5BB11-0570-40CA-ACDD-3AA01277DEE8"), InterfaceType(ComInterfaceType.InterfaceIsIUnknown)]
    internal interface IAudioSessionEnumerator
    {
        [PreserveSig]
        int GetCount(out int SessionCount);

        [PreserveSig]
        int GetSession(int SessionCount, out IAudioSessionControl Session);
    }

    [Guid("F4B1A599-7266-4319-A8CA-E70ACB11E8CD"), InterfaceType(ComInterfaceType.InterfaceIsIUnknown)]
    internal interface IAudioSessionControl
    {
        int NotImpl1();

        [PreserveSig]
        int GetDisplayName([MarshalAs(UnmanagedType.LPWStr)] out string pRetVal);

        // the rest is not implemented
    }

    [Guid("87CE5498-68D6-44E5-9215-6DA47EF883D8"), InterfaceType(ComInterfaceType.InterfaceIsIUnknown)]
    internal interface ISimpleAudioVolume
    {
        [PreserveSig]
        int SetMasterVolume(float fLevel, ref Guid EventContext);

        [PreserveSig]
        int GetMasterVolume(out float pfLevel);

        [PreserveSig]
        int SetMute(bool bMute, ref Guid EventContext);

        [PreserveSig]
        int GetMute(out bool pbMute);
    }
}

And in form1 constructor:

AudioControll.test();

Then used a breakpoint in the class on the line:

if (name == app)

And I'm getting two results. Once the variable name contain: @%SystemRoot%\System32\AudioSrv.Dll,-202

The second time the variable name is empty ""

Now I tried to play with this line:

// set the volume to half of master volume (50%)
SetApplicationVolume(app, 50);

If I set it to 0 there will be no sound. But if I'm not mistake this is the master volume not the Game Capture HD volume. Am I wrong?

Another problem is this line that should mute the application sound but it's not:

// mute the application
SetApplicationMute(app, true);

What I want to do is to be able to change the specific Game Capture HD software volume level from 0 to 100. And also to be able to mute/unmute this software.

Next time please [only post code and details that are relevant to the question you ask](http://stackoverflow.com/help/mcve). Also, if you have several questions, like "why am I getting empty name?", "how do change specific app's volume?" - post them as several questions. — torvin, Nov 16 '15 at 04:29

score 1 · Accepted Answer · edited May 23 '17 at 12:31

According to the Internet, GetDisplayName() returning blank is OK. What you could do instead to get the actual information is to use IAudioSessionControl2 interface. Just cast your existing IAudioSessionControl ctl to it to obtain a reference:

IAudioSessionControl2 ctl2 = (IAudioSessionControl2)ctl;

After that you could use ctl2.GetProcessId() to obtain the PID and from that you could've used Process.GetProcessById(pid).MainModule.FileName to obtain the full exe filename.

Some pitfalls:

Use ctl2.IsSystemSoundsSession() to check if current session is "System Sounds", since there is no process associated with such session and ctl2.GetProcessId() will fail on it.
Be sure to compile your program targeting x64 if you are going to run in on an x64 OS. Otherwise you will get exception upon trying to get the exe names of other x64 processes.
Several sessions could be associated with the same process, giving you duplicate results.
You can then use FileVersionInfo.GetVersionInfo().FileDescription to get the description from the executable file's resources, if you want to show the UI similar to Windows mixer. To get the icon as well, you could use something like this: How can I get the icon from the executable file only having an instance of it's Process in C#

After that you could try to call SetApplicationVolume on the process you are interested in.

How can i control the volume of a specific software in the windows Volume Mixer?

1 Answers1

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