Strange semi-lack of Audio problem

[northruption]

In a nutshell: My system sounds don't play. System Beeps come through fine. Media player will play the .wav system sounds and other audio/video. Embedded video will not play (ex youtube). In sounds and audio devices, the "play" button to preview the selected sys sound is grayed out.

I recently installed both the WMP 11 beta and Office 2007 beta, but don't recall if the sounds were playing before that or how long after they stopped. I have uninstalled the WMP beta (not o2k7) but still no luck. It is now re-installed. Drivers/bios are both up to date as far as I can tell.

There have been no other system changes.

Should I throw in the towel and restore the original config? I have searched these forums, but didn't see anything similar.

This is driving me crazy!

T42 (2373-4wu)