Windows 10: Upgrade Killed My Sound !

Yes, thanks. It had the latest driver.
by 'blacked out' I just meant that a black box comes up when clicking that 'caret' thing and there's 11 little icons for different things including the realtek thing.

Then when I click on the realtek thing its page is all black with white writing, too, and I can't see much.

So I don't know what I did but I've got the speakers now - and no headphones.

I've always been screwed by this audio thing. Always seems to be too many controllers - sometimes there's an AC'97 thing and then a Microsoft or windows thing and then maybe a Mobo manufacturer's thing...

And sometimes I plug things in and it makes no difference and that thing just starts working - speaker or 'phone - and sometimes I plug things in and all hell breaks loose, things popping up everywhere demanding answers from me.... and sometimes interfaces pop up which show pictures which don't suit what I've got; like they've got ports showing where I don't have them or they don't show ports I do have.....

big mess.

Is it all really a big mess or is it quite simple? If its simple in essence then please tell me.....

Currently I just go around opening up anything audio related that I can find just change configurations almost as random - because there's never anything I can find where I can say: plugging speakers into the light green plug at the back, plugging the earphones into the earphone marked socket at the front... let's go... !