[sororitysheep]

This is, I think, not a driver problem...

Well, I scanned the forum before I posted but I was so miserably confused by the other posts/answers (many of which I think I've already done, i.e. driver reinstallation) that I decided to post a new thread. If that was the wrong action, I sincerely apologize.

My sound died three days ago, just *poof* disappeared. I've had sound problems before in playing dvds, but got around it by just watching them through the Windows Express Media Player (which is a total pain, btw). But I never had a problem with music, streaming video, etc., till now. I thought it might be a driver problem, so I did all the uninstall/reinstall fun that I've seen recc'd in this forum and in other places. And I promptly got the blue screen of death. Which really freaked me out. I tried installing the driver again, not letting Windows automatically detect "new hardware", instead manually choosing the Realtek AC97 driver. I got a Code 10. (I have no idea what that means and troubleshooting didn't clear it up at all) Also, Windows Media Player is telling me the apparently standard (for this situation) message that the file cannot play because the sound device is already in use, or etc etc etc. I don't have system sounds either.

When I check the device manager, Realtek has a little yellow circle with an exclamation point over it. In Control Panel, Realtek Audio has disappeared from the menu, and under Sounds and Audio Devices it tells me that there are no devices installed.

Here are my stats:

Toshiba Satellite A105
OS: Windows XP
BIOS Version 1.50
Intel Celeron M Processor 1.60 GHz
DirectX 9.0
Realtek AC97 onboard sound


Unless I'm completely mucking it up somewhere, I don't think it's a driver problem. But I'm at a complete and total loss for what to do next. I'm thousands of miles from home studying abroad til next September and I don't have a single clue what to do about this sound problem.

Any help would be deeply and pathetically appreciated.