Automatically set your PC’s volume levels with SoundVolumeView

Changing your baseline volume level in Windows is easy -- click the speaker icon, spin the mouse wheel -- but if you want to adjust the volume of some other device then it quickly gets more complicated.

You might click the "Mixer" link, for instance. Or maybe the speaker icon. And then the levels tab. And then you adjust the various levels for that device, but what if you want to tweak something else…?

NirSoft’s SoundVolumeView is a tiny portable tool which displays the current volume levels for all the active audio components on your system, and allow you to mute, unmute or adjust them instantly.

The interface for all this is, well, basic. If you’re expecting pulsing meters and studio-like sliders in a sleek and stylish console, you’ll be disappointed: SoundVolumeView is visually closer to Windows 3.1 than Windows 10.

Still, this does have some advantages. Launch the program and immediately you’ll see a table listing all your current audio devices, as well as their current volume levels.

You’re also able to adjust individual volume levels by using various menu settings and hotkeys.

SoundVolumeView is best used from scripts or shortcuts, though, where it’s able to adjust all your volume settings instantly.

To try this out, right-click SoundVolumeView.exe, and select Create Shortcut. Name your shortcut Save, and launch the program with these switches:

SoundVolumeView.exe /SaveProfile test.vol

Now set up the volume of your speakers, headphones or other devices, then double-click the Save shortcut to save all those settings in the file test.vol.

Repeat the process to create a shortcut called Restore Volume, which runs the program like this:

SoundVolumeView.exe /LoadProfile test.vol

Pin that shortcut somewhere convenient, and whenever you run it the program instantly restores all your device volume settings.

There’s plenty more, if you need it, with other command line switches to set or change volumes for individual devices.

NirSoft has just added a command line switch to set the volume of the focused application, too:

SoundVolumeView.exe /SetVolume focused 50

SoundVolumeView won’t impress you with its interface, then, but there’s plenty of functionality here, and even a command line novice will have it working within seconds.

SoundVolumeView is a freeware application for Windows Vista and later.