No Sound after installing new Ethernet Card

[Bee117]

Back story:

My house (and in turn) computer was struck by lightning. The why my computer was on, isn't the point, it happened over a year ago. My internet at school was fine, no disconnecting etc. When I graduated and came home this summer, it started acting up horribly. Lots of kicking off. Several friends recommended that I just buy a new PCI ethernet card. Simple and cheap fix and now everything with that is dandy.

Now:

My sound does not work. My original Sound Blaster Audigy 2 (I am on a 3.5 year old computer) stopped showing up in the Device Manager entirely. I noticed my sound "device" was the Realtek AC97 onboard sound.

Here's a list of what I've tried thus far:

1. turned off computer and checked connection of said card, it was loose, secured card in slot, checked all connections to card. Turned on computer, card is still not recognized.
2. Have checked BIOS settings and onboard sound is disabled. It was on auto, I just plain turned it off. No luck.
3. Have tried disabling new ethernet card, still no luck.

After this, I have generally assumed that my card is just plain broken if the computer is still not recognizing it whatsoever. I buy a Sound Blaster Audigy SE. I installed the new card, computer recognizes it, drivers all installed and updated. Device manager and SiSandra all say it's working great. I still do not have any sound. Now a new issue is that, and I do not know if these are related or merely coincidences, itunes will not play, winamp will not play, youtube does not play. I've yet to try anything else to play sound at the moment.

I am restarting my computer in between trying different settings. I know that can affect changes with new installations etc.

The only thing that brings up a red flag is the fact that in the IRQ my video card, sound card, and something called: VIA CHCI Compliant IEEE 1394 Host Controller all share PCI 16. Could this be contributing to my problem? Or possibly be the problem?

Any help of suggestions would be extremely appreciated. All explanations would be best given as simply as possible as I'm not terribly well versed in computer hardware issues. Thank you!

 

[crappybob]

#1. Did you put the new soundcard in the same PCI slot as the old soundcard? If so could you try to plug it into a different PCI slot on your motherboard.

#2. Do you have a speaker icon in your lower right hand corner of the desktop?

#3. Do you know for a fact that the speakers you are using work and they have power and are plugged in to the right jack on the back of your computer?

I guess we can start with those.

 

[Bee117]

#1. Did you put the new soundcard in the same PCI slot as the old soundcard? If so could you try to plug it into a different PCI slot on your motherboard.

#2. Do you have a speaker icon in your lower right hand corner of the desktop?

#3. Do you know for a fact that the speakers you are using work and they have power and are plugged in to the right jack on the back of your computer?

I guess we can start with those.

1. Yes, but the only other available slot has the ethernet card in it. Could I just switch them? and if I do that, do I have to reinstall software for the card or will it just recognize it on its own again?

2. yes, volume is up, all levels on speakers are at a normal level.

3. I did test another set of speakers and that did not help. Everything is plugged in where it is supposed to be.

 

[crappybob]

1. You could switch them if you want, you can see if it makes any difference. It should automatically take care of finding the card in a new slot.

ALso, is this Vista or XP or something else?

 

[Bee117]

I'm on XP home. Sorry I forgot to mention that in the post.

I will try switching them, but I won't be able to until after work tomorrow as I'm heading to sleep in an hour or so and don't want to dig in with the insufficient light I have right now.