Hello, I had a very strange problem this morning with my Dell Dimension desktop running Windows XP. The computer started up normal, and I tried to open a voice-chat program (Ventrilo). However, I couldn't hear anything and when I tried to setup the sound it said "No audio mixer detected". I tried open windows' sound mixer and got a message along the lines of "audio device not detected, mixer not detected". However, I was able to log onto a game (World of Warcraft) and the sound worked fine in the game. The computer would also not play sound from video or play music, I ran Dell's diagnostic and it came back that my midi and wave drivers/mixers were not installed. I tried reinstalling them, no fix. Also, the taskbar at the bottom of the screen and the windows around open programs were randomly reverting back to "old windows" style (plain grey boxes). I tried doing a system restore, no fix.

I am also on a wireless internet connection on that machine, and for some reason my adapter was trying to connect to my neighbors weak signal even though my home signal was working fine. When I would try to click "Show available networks" I got a message that windows explorer had crashed and it would restart. This happened multiple times.

The strangest thing is that during this whole process I rebooted about 10-15 times, and just when I was going to give up it rebooted and everything worked fine as if nothing had happened. I figured it was just a fluke and was glad it was working. The computer worked fine for the rest of the day, I ran a virus scanner and found nothing.

However, I turned the computer off later in the afternoon and turned it back on this evening. The computer is doing the same thing it was doing this morning except this time nothing I do is helping it at all.

I apologize for the long post but I don't know much about fixing computers and wasn't sure which information was relevant. If anyone has any ideas on what to do or even what the problem is I'd appreciate it. I don't even know what to search for or ask, since it seems everything is malfunctioning at once. The most confusing part for me is that it worked fine out of nowhere and then started doing the exact same thing. By the way, the computer has been working completely fine for the past two years, never had a problem with it until now.

Try running Check Disk:

Go to start Run... and type: cmd

Then type: chkdsk /f

You will be told the volume is in use do you want to run chkdsk on next boot? Type: Y and reboot.

Sir, you are magic.

I followed your instructions, and when I rebooted the computer everything was back to normal, thanks very much.

My only questions are: Do you know what the issue was or what triggers it? If so, is it likely to happen again and will these steps work again? Is this something I need to get checked out by a professional?

Thanks so much for your help, and if you can't answer these questions it's fine, I'm just curious/worried. THANKS!

Glad it helped!

This page explains what Check Disk (Scan Disk) does:

http://www.bsu.edu/ucs/article/0,137...7-4756,00.html

If the problem recurs I would run the manufacturers diagnostic on your hard drive.

If you do not know the manufacturer look in the Device Manager under Disk Drives.

The Device Manager is found via: right clicking My Computer then click Manage then Device Manager

The manufacturers web site will have diagnostic tools. Generally a boot floppy you can download and boot.

As always you should back up any vital data on your hard drive.

Well, unfortunately, the problem is still happening every time I boot up. The good news is that for some reason every time I do the same thing you suggested and so far the computer has always booted up properly and acted like nothing happened after doing so. Thanks for the quick fix though, really appreciate it. I'll try the additional steps you suggested, and hopefully can pin down what the issue is.

Thanks again!

Try this command from: cmd

fsutil dirty query c: