Just today I start up my computer and start playing a game only to find that once I start up said game if I double click the volume icon in my taskbar and nothing opens up it says that there is no audio device installed. In my sound+audio device control panel everything is grayed out and it says there is no audio device, no playback device, etc. Now the game still sounds fine until I close it, at that point if I try to open it again I get no sound, and same goes for other programs like itunes, and youtube, I cant hear anything. Now here are the kicker, if i have ventrilo (a voice communications program) running before i start up the game and leave it on after i close the game I can talk and hear my teammate. Once I close and reopen it however I no longer can, and I can't even open the setup because it says I have "no sound mixer".

Obviously it is the game that is causing this but why would it just start doing it out of the blue, and what exactly is it doing? It only seems to happen once I join a gameserver.

windows xp pro
p4 3.2
x850
ASrock mobo
audigy 2 value

heres a screenshot to give a better idea

http://img19.imageshack.us/img19/8559/shotfx1.jpg

reinstalling the game and the drivers seems to have fixed the problem for now, but im still curious as to why this problem would have occured to begin with