Realtek ac97 speakers not working

The laptop is a compaq presario with a amd turion 1.8ghz processor, 512mb memory, 40 gig hd with 20 free.
The problem:
Sound stopped working some time back. Trying to fux now, the speaker in the notification tray has an x next to it. I've clicked it and it tries to find a solution but never finds one. In device manager, there is a yellow triangle with an exclamation point unit next to the Realtek AC 97 speakers, I've tried updating the driver, but it says the best driver is already installed, I've disabled and re enabled it, ran windows update, safe booted to see if it would work. Looking for any ideas on how to proceed. TIA.

Delete the item with the exclamation and then re-scan, would be my next move.

Rescan? Like scan for hardware changes? I'll try it and post back.

It's pretty slow. Where do I find the model number? It isn't anywhere on the body of the laptop, the rescan started, said installing new hardware, then said it failed.

The System Requirements for 32-bit Win7, and later, call for 1GHz CPU Speed and 1GB RAM, double the RAM for 64-bit.
Windows 7 system requirements - Windows Help
As for the RAM, it may have 1GB physical RAM [on the motherboard] but show less in Windows, part of the RAM gets assigned by the BIOS to the video adapter, makes less available to Windows which in turn can cause the slowness in trying to do things. I always maximize the RAM the motherboard supports up to 4GB or 8GB, don't need anything above that for what I do.

The Realtek AC97 is not the speakers but the sound adapter in the computer the speakers plug into, usually built on the motherboard. There's at least 2 ways to control sound on a Notebook, one of course is the Windows volume control and the other is a key combination of Fn + another Fx key, may be 3, one for no volume/mute, one for lowering the volume and the third for increasing the volume. Most multimedia Notebooks may have another set of controls.

As for the model number, it can frequently be found in the BIOS or you could download SPECCY and install then run it.
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OK, It's a compaq presario v2000. It was on the bottom.

cyclops said:

See the attached picture for volume/mute control buttons.
Did you get the drivers from the HP website?
No Win7 driver, here is a link to the XP 32bit driver
http://ftp.hp.com/pub/softpaq/sp28001-28500/sp28482.exe

Thanks, but will an xp driver work on windows 7?