Distorted sound on Windows Explorer and IE but not WMP or Live Mes

[ChemGuy88]

Setting: Toshiba Satellite laptop w/ Wind. XP Pro SP 3. Recently fell 2
feet. A small blue plastic chip fell out of my laptop. Have defragged,
checked disk, scanned for viruses, and updated all drivers.
Problem: Sound is distorted like a screech-y scratching on IE, windows
explorer, Google Video downloads, and the windows logon/logoff sounds. This
happens both on the laptop speakers and the earphones, which led me to
believe that my sound card was physically damaged. Also, online videos,
besides having distorted sound, play very slowly.
However, I then heard that all the sounds comming from Live Messenger
were clear and crisp. I tried WMP and it also works perfect.
Question: Why does sound work on some programs and not others? Is it
possible that the computer uses different sound-card properties depending on
the program? If so, can I ask it to use the same resources WMP is using so I
can have good sound again?
-Thanks!

 

[ChemGuy88]

I actually found the solution, although no explanation. And apparently a
forced reboot (holding down the power button) will cause the sound to be
restored. Googling for answers I found this forum:

http://www.techsupportforum.com/har...ards/236880-laptop-sound-fuzzy-distorted.html

Problem solved!