Shoutbox

First thing to do is to find the make and model of the sound card (or if it's integrated on the motherboard, find that)

Open up the System Properties by pressing WINKEY + Break, navigate to the hardware tab, clicky on Device Manager. The sound, video and game controllers section is where you are looking. There will be a list of items there, mostly for codecs. Ignore these. Look for something about your sound card, for instance mine is SoundMAX Digital Audio.

If you're lucky, the device will be listed there, and will only require a driver update. If not, it's time to 'Add New Hardware in the control panel.

Before that, time to go and get some drivers for your board. Best place to start would be the manufacturer's website, and Google is your friend.

OK, so it's on the motherboard. Find the motherboard's make and model, probably stenciled in white on your MoBo. The manufacturer should have a whole list of drivers that go along with that board on their website.

Once you have the driver, if it's in an exe format you should be good to go and just run it. if not, go to control panel, add new hardware. Say that you HAVE attached the new device, click next. There will be a big long list of devices to add, but skip this and scroll right to the bottom, with 'Add new hardware device'. Next.

select sound, video, game controller, Next. Press the 'Have disk' button, and browse for the driver files.