No Sound for MP3s and Video Files on HD

Although I did not change any settings, when I open songs and video files on my HD I am no longer getting any sound. Videos and music I find on a website (like video.google.com) play normally, but all of my files on my HD dont seem to work. I reinstalled VLC and tried WMP and WinAmp, but nothing seems to work.

Does this sounds like a virus or something else?

Also, my internet connection status went to "unknown" with the error "Server execution failed" at around the same time as the sound problems started. I had no problems and was listening to a mp3 file while I installed AIM 6.5. The file finished playing around the time AIM finished installing. When I went to replay the file, there was no sound.

 

Perhaps try doing a system restore to before you installed AIM?

 

System Restore was disabled a long time ago. Sigh

 

Have you uninstalled AIM? If not that's the first thing I would do. You're not the only person to have this problem:

http://www.gregsmind.com/2007/11/16/aim-65-remix/

 

I will never understand why people turn system restore off.

 

What I personally do is clean out all my restore points once a while (maybe every month or two) and then create a new one right away. That way you free up some space and keep yourself from these situations

 

That's a much better idea than turning it off.