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I'm having a rather strange problem where sound won't play from my speakers. If I insert something into the microphone jack, and remove it, I get about half a second of audio playing. At times, it seems to stick on after doing this, but after a few hours (or sometimes a day), it goes back to refusing to play audio. The computer seems to know whether or not something is plugged into the microphone, as in the audio dialog, plugging something in causes it to become the default recording device. If I boot into Ubuntu (I have it installed through Wubi), I can disable "Auto Mut" in alsamixer and get it to play correctly (and continue to mute when headphones are plugged in). I'm not sure what is wrong with it, but nothing I do helps. In Ubuntu, with "Auto Mut" enabled, it exhibits the same behavior as Windows 7.

Is there a Window's equivalent to "Auto Mut"? Does anyone know what "Auto Mut" does (does not disable speaker muting when things are plugged in)? Any ideas as to what is actually wrong with my computer?

If it is important, this problem appeared a few days after spilling soda on my laptop's keyboard.

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"Auto-Mut" sounds like automatically muting the speakers whenever something (like a headset) is plugged in. Perhaps the soda created a sticky connection that makes the computer think you have a headset plugged in, thus automatically muting the speakers for you.

Did you install a VOIP client like Skype? That can also mute sounds if it thinks you're communicating. Rightclick the speaker icon in your taskbar, make sure your speakers are default playback devices, and check whether "Mute all other sounds" is enabled in the Communications tab (it should be set to "Reduce the volume of other sounds by 80%").

In the Sound devices Playback tab, you can also test your speakers (rightclick, Test) and set default volume levels etc. Play around with the options; it's less likely to break anything than spilling soda is.

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