Disabling users changing the name of playback devices

[JTaylor]

Hi There

 

I am having an issue where student at our school change the name of the playback devices to all kinds of stuff which I don't really want to repeat. I have had a look at using group policy to disable users having permission to change the name of the playback devices but can't seem to find a way without disabling the volume control along with it. I then looked at a policy to update the registry for that playback device so it would refresh every time the machine was restarted and that didn't seem to work either. Has anybody come across this issue before and have come up with their own resolution. Any help given will be greatly received.

 

Thanks in advance

 

James

[DJ-1701]

Hi James,

 

I've had the same issue before, the only way I found around it was backing up the HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\MMDevices\Audio and restoring it every reboot. I made a PowerShell script (below) which I put in a GPO to be action on workstation start up.

 

$RegEdit = "C:\Windows\regedit.exe"

# Protect Audio Settings from Manipulation.
If (Test-Path ("C:\Windows\SoundCheck.reg"))
{
   &$RegEdit /s "C:\Windows\SoundCheck.reg"
}
Else
{
   &$RegEdit /E "C:\Windows\SoundCheck.reg" "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\MMDevices\Audio"
}

 

On any machines that have been previously effected prior to using this method, just change the playback names back to normal, delete the C:\Windows\SoundCheck.reg (if exist) and reboot to generate a clean restore registry file.

 

Hope this helps.

[JTaylor]

Thanks for the help this is brilliant I have started deploying it to the entire school.