I have this same problem, relatively. I have a Toshiba quad core laptop fairly new just over a year old. When i play music or video or any sound period via the speakers, it will after about 1 minute sometimes less just stop silent. Then if i pause whatever is making the sound usually about 30 seconds later it will play sound again and repeat the same issue forever.Headphone jacks and HDMI sound out work perfect. For the record I am a very able computer technician with great skills in electronics, electrical repair. I have tried full system restore (windows 7), No Dice. Tried the driver disable, re-enable, upgrade, downgrade, removal of driver , re-installation from scratch. Even registry level manual cleaning, still no joy. Oh try a live cd! everyone says. This means nothing to most people unless you tell them perhaps an EXACT cd you think will work like say ubuntu live,or hirens boot cd or Joe Blows not real recovery! be more specific for the un-tech savy masses out there. I myself also tried the live cd, bootable usb thumb drive aproach(a windows 7 Barts PE build with tech tools added custom), same issue for me. Microsoft's MicrosoftFixit.AudioPlayback.RNP.Run.exe tool said my laptop was 100% no problem. So after all of this I have deduced that I'm "pooched". A technical term for a hardware failure of some sort. Bad ground on one of the speakers in laptop? an on-board sound chip malfunction? Maybe a solder point, or a trace needs to be corrected? I will have to eventually take it all apart down to the motherboard and have a look. For your average cat, i would not recommend this. If you are past your warranty like me and you do not feel comfortable ripping apart a perfect working laptop otherwise, I recommend external setup of some sort like a wireless usb speaker setup, or a plug in small speaker, a Bluetooth speaker,(real nice if you have Bluetooth on board) or a USB bluetooth mini dongle, then bluetooth speaker would be good. I would recommend CHINA for all, cheap cheap dx.com or Deal Extreme to those not in the know comes to mind. (I buy everything there, slow but free shipping) Just some suggestions, Hope that helps someone.