Hello everyone,
I'm very lost and confused on how this happened all of a sudden. I've tried searching for a solution by reading community forum pages and watching Youtube tutorial videos, but nothing worked. I can't listen to the audio from my laptop unless I use Bluetooth wireless headphones. My laptop is fully updated - Windows 11.
I suspect that this is due to the missing drivers for Sound, video and game controllers in the Device Manager. I couldn't even find Sound, video and game controllers until I pressed "Show hidden devices". When I click on Realtek(R) Audio Properties, it said "Currently, this hardware device is not connected to the computer. (Code 45) To fix this problem, reconnect this hardware device to the computer". So, I added legacy hardware, and tried to install another Realtek driver. But, I was met with a blue screen with a " :( Your device ran into a problem and needs to restart..."
I don't know if this is related in any way, but I noticed that there's a warning symbol next to the Intel(R) Smart Sound Technology (Intel(R) SST) OED in the device manager. Device status is "This device cannot start (Code 10) The driver was not loaded because it failed its initialization call".
Please, I'm really desperate. Thank you in advance.