Reinstalling sound card drivers made soundman disappear, how can I get it back?

[teenage kicks]

I reinstalled my Chaintech AV710 (Envy24) drivers today (using the exact same installer and exact same version) and it made the Windows sound manager disappear. This is the app that controls the left/right balance, which is something I use every single day and absolutely need. I've reinstalled the drivers again and again using every installer I can find and nothing will bring it back. If anyone has any idea of anything I can do to get it back, I'll love them forever.

When I go to use it, an error pops up saying "There are no active mixer devices available."

 

[ditzydj]

hmm, well I have the Chaintech and inadvertently while doing a normal windows update, it did a software "update", which messed the control panel up. Rolled the drivers back - control panel still a mess and now the card sounds "tinny".

So I just used CCleaner to uninstall, did not reboot, went into Registry and ran that cleaner, then ran the applications cleaner. Went into Programs and searched for the Via folder - deleted that. Shut down, reseat card, boot up, then ran the drivers from my desktop (v.437) and all was well.

If you're using vista I think you need v.530 driver.