I am afraid no.Wyzai wrote: I suppose I could try a repair when I have time. There's no workaround?
You should definitely have sound testin your dxdiag. When you chose the 'sound-tab', windows would normally show a popup about 'collecting information', then in the notes (lower part of screen) a result would be shown.
Unfortunately MS has optioned not to include a tab for direct-x in win7 and later. (imo a mistake), but there could also be a test-facility in your software driver.
To find that you go to your HW overview, and find sound-drivers. There you should have a button for at test of the unit-driver. Try that.
But the fact that you cant get VLC to play, and that you also are missing sound in some games, points in the direction of a generic sound problem