Computer only plays MIDI sound

[Dianabol]

OK, today I went to play some music on my computer and to my surprise it would not play any of the sound files I have. Winamp would not even open up! However, it will play MIDI sounds. This just doesn't make sense to me. I opened DXDIAG and ran a test on the "Microsoft Synthesizer" and "Realtek AC97 Audio" and got nothing. When I tested "Microsoft MIDI Mapper [Emulated]" and "Microsoft GS Wavetable SW Synth [Emulated]," both succesfully played sound. I am a musician and use my computer for writing,  direct recording, and mixing, so I need to resolve this problem as soon as possible. Please advise me on how to go about fixing these problems. Thanks for all your help!

[T-Chai]

What your Computer Model and Spec

[Dianabol]

Bump

[Dianabol]

What your Computer Model and Spec

It's T2596 eMachine
2.50GHz Intel Celeron Processor
60gGB Hard Drive

Sound: Realtek AC97 Audio
Drivers: ALCXWDM.SYS

What other specs do you need to know? Thanks for your time

[Windows98]

Bump lol!

Anyways you did list your computer specs with AC97' I am assuming that you have a built in sound card to your motherboard.

Questions:

When did this problem started to happen?


How long has it happen?


What Operating System do you have?


What did you do prior to this happening?


Did you install a new program recently?


Do you get any error messages?


Did you check volume control and see if Wav is not muted


What devices are on your volume properties?
ex. Playback AC97
Recording AC97
My Computer-> Control Panel->  Volume Control

[Dianabol]

Questions:  
 
When did this problem started to happen?
 Yesterday afternoon.
 
How long has it happen?
 1 day now.
 
What Operating System do you have?
 Windows XP
 
What did you do prior to this happening?
 Nothing, it was working fine, left it on overnight came home and tried to play a sound file, it didn't work.
 
Did you install a new program recently?
 Nope.
 
Do you get any error messages?
 Nope. Only thing close to an error is winamp will not open, the tab appears at the bottom of the screen but the codec will not appear.
 
Did you check volume control and see if Wav is not muted  
 Interestingly enough I did, and it wasn't. But, I checked again just now to be sure and when I open a sound file even if the Wave is not muted no sound comes out. Then when I move the Wave output level up or down sound does come out, but winamp still doesn't open up. The song starts from 0:00 as soon as I move the level and winamp remains tabbed but no codec. Talk about wierd.
 
What devices are on your volume properties?
It just has:
Playback
Recording
Other
   and subcategories of each

Thanks

[GX1_Man]

How about going into Control Panel, deleting all sound entries and rebooting the machine. Did that help?

[Dianabol]

How about going into Control Panel, deleting all sound entries and rebooting the machine. Did that help?

I haven't tried that yet, but I'm not exactly sure what you mean. Can you please explain what  exactly I should do?

[GX1_Man]

Control Panel/Device Manager and look down the list til you see and entry for sound (near the bottom). Click to expant the list for the sound items and then right click on each of them to delete. Then reboot. Windows should load the appropriate drivers.

[Dianabol]

OK I did that, and now sound works with windows media player and in system sounds again. For some reason winamp is still messed up so I will try re-installing that tomorrow. Thanks for all your help.