Weird "No Audio" issue with VPX 10.7.2

[cerebusk]

For the record, I don't know if this issue actually has anything to do with VPX 10.7.2.  The problem started happening after I upgraded, but not immediately.

 

Here's what's going on:  Starting about a week ago, VPX stopped making audio on my cabinet.  Possibly coincidentally, the audio disappeared just after I was checking a ROM using the standalone version of PinMAME.  Now VPX won't make any sound.

 

Now this is the weird part:  I copied the executable and the associated DLLs/Scripts/etc. to another directory, but left PinMAME, the B2S server, all the tables, music and everything else in the original directory.  If I run VPinballX.exe from the new directory, audio works fine.  This took a lot of trial and error to figure out, but it works.  The original executable in the original directory still won't make a peep, though.

 

Does anyone have an idea what might be going on?  I'm baffled.  This feels like some sort of weird Windows registry thing, but I have no idea what to look for.

 

Some observations:

 

1. PinMAME still works fine and plays audio if I run it standalone, but if it is run through the copy of VPX installed in the original directory, it makes no sound.

2. To be clear, the broken copy of VPX doesn't make any audio whatsoever, either through the standard table sounds or emulated ROM sounds.

3. Tables that don't use PinMAME don't play audio either.

4. Everything else seems to be otherwise working fine including B2s, DOF, DMD, and other table functionality.

5. Windows play audio in every other situation.

6. Reinstalling VPX didn't help, but literally just copying the base VPX files to a different directory did.

7. I have a live backup of everything in my D:\vPinball hierarchy, which includes my PinUP Popper installation and everything else needed to make the cabinet work.  Restoring to a point prior to the audio issue showing up didn't help.  This backup doesn't include any Windows system stuff, though, which is why I'm suspicious that Windows may be the problem here.