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[DJHamp]

Just got a new HTPC put together and running.
ASRock Z87M Extreme4
Intel 4770K (I know - overkill but I got the great Microcenter deal on both of those and I figure its future proofing for whatever comes down the road)
8 GB ram, no video card, this case
iStarUSA D-213-MATX Black Metal/ Aluminum 2U Rackmount microATX Server Chassis (which I like by the way & its cheap)
Windows 8.1 Pro
iTunes & JRiver installed so far.

I have it connected to a Denon 3311ci (HDMI) and a Samsung TV is connected to that. It came up right away but no sound, installed all the drivers from ASRock's disk but no difference.
Under Digital Audio (HDMI) (in windows) it says not plugged in & its red. I tried uninstalling the digital audio through control panel and rebooted but that didn't work. All the HD audio options are enabled in ASRocks bios.
Getting a little frustrated with it - I have a little Logitech keyboard/trackpad  - between that and Windows 8 (which is new to me also) its a pain to get to the settings.

I would imagine I could connect a SPDIF cable up and get it working but I would rather not

Any help would be appreciated!

[glynor]

Under Digital Audio (HDMI) (in windows) it says not plugged in & its red.

Nothing will work till you get that fixed.

I'm guessing here, but the best bet would be to try reseating or swapping out the HDMI cable.  You could have a bad one.
Second guess would be that you mentioned you installed the drivers from ASRock's disc.  The drivers included on the disc are often woefully out of date, and might not be Windows 8.1 compatible.

Download the latest versions, particularly of your chipset drivers and GPU drivers.  You can get drivers specifically for your board on ASRock's support web site, and that's probably good enough for most components.

For the Intel Chipset and GPU drivers, I'd get them directly from Intel.
Intel Chipset Drivers: INF Update
Intel GPU Drivers: Iris and HD Graphics Drivers

To install them:

1. Uninstall the ones you have (at least these two, you can leave the utilities).
2. Reboot.  Don't skip this step because you are lazy.
3. Install the ones you downloaded.

[astromo]

I'd back glynor's key message. I was thinking similar thoughts.

I had a similar hassle with a build of an Asus mobo recently and (seems stupidly obvious to me now) but I didn't realise the significance of the display driver and that part of it is an audio driver.

I know for Asus that some of their driver versions are specific to the board. So, you may find no advantage in getting the latest from whereever. Worst case you may inject a conflict. Worth checking back with Asrock. Post a query on their forum if need be. I found guidance on the Asus forum that sorted me out.

[glynor]

You won't have a conflict on those two Intel items, as they don't allow the OEMs to customize the hardware (they wouldn't have the facilities to do so anyway).  Keep in mind, on a Haswell CPU, this stuff is all integrated into the CPU die now.

In the old days, they could use different versions of components and wire things up differently and whatnot.  Not anymore, and not for quite some time.  Now, any customizations they do here are all about branding, and their validation is often quite a few versions back.

Realtek drivers for audio can sometimes be customized by OEMs, but it is increasingly rare on non-laptop boards.  Usually the customizations they do to these drivers are all branding, and you can almost always use the Realtek audio and LAN drivers from their website.

Other components are still a crapshoot.

[astromo]

You won't have a conflict on those two Intel items, as they don't allow the OEMs to customize the hardware (they wouldn't have the facilities to do so anyway).  Keep in mind, on a Haswell CPU, this stuff is all integrated into the CPU die now.

In the old days, they could use different versions of components and wire things up differently and whatnot.  Not anymore, and not for quite some time.  Now, any customizations they do here are all about branding, and their validation is often quite a few versions back.

Realtek drivers for audio can sometimes be customized by OEMs, but it is increasingly rare on non-laptop boards.  Usually the customizations they do to these drivers are all branding, and you can almost always use the Realtek audio and LAN drivers from their website.

Other components are still a crapshoot.

Thanks for that reality check. Always useful to get a different perspective. Appreciated.. 

[DJHamp]

Update on this - ended up installing a older Intel graphics driver and that fixed the sound issue Yeah!