Audio issues

Dell Latitude c500; XP Pro SP2. The Dell web site doesn't have any XP drivers for this laptop, and I think that's because all the devices are recognized and installed by Windows XP. It has an ESS Maestro3i audio driver. Windows install it just fine, but there's no audio. If I go to the Sound properties in the Control Panel, it shows 'no audio device' even though it's installed and 'working normally' in the Device Manager (see screen shots). I've even tried using a cheezy little USB audio adapter that plugs-n-plays with XP, and it's worked for me many times in the past, but there's no audio using it on this laptop. Windows recognizes it and immediately installs the drivers, but still no audio. The USB adapter is very similar to this: http://cgi.ebay.com/USB-to-Mic-Spea...4|66:2|65:12|39:1|240:1309|301:1|293:1|294:50 (actually, I think mine is identical but it's green).
So, any ideas on why there's no audio? Oh, and there's nothing in the BIOS for audio settings. It shows "Audio: Enabled" but you can't navigate down to it and disable (or enable) it; it's permanently greyed out.
THANKS

(and yes, I have tried downloading and installing the Windows2000 drivers from Dell for this laptop and others that use the same sound chip with no luck; I have also used numerous 3rd party sites and drivers, still with no luck; from what I remember, there was no sound from the start, right after a clean XP install so maybe it's a hardware issue)

 

Thanks Halo... yeah, I checked it and it was running and set to Auto... strange.... the owner of the laptop said he just wanted it wiped clean (which I didn't know 2 days ago) and that did the trick. I was leaning towards it being a hardware problem, but everything is OK with a clean install. I guess something got really messed up on a deep level....
:confused

Thanks for the help though! I'll remember to check the audio service in the future if something like this comes up again (and we know it will LOL )