it's a PCI card, combination sound card and joystick card. fortunately, this computer also has onboard sound. the PCI card (or its chipset) seems to be ~1999 technology, while the onboard sound is probably from 2002 or 2003 (the computer was manufactured in fall 2003), so Dell probably just included the card for its joystick capabilities.
i haven't done your recommendation yet, but it inspired me to try a couple things:
1) turn computer off, unplug, and hit power button to discharge capacitors.
2) disable sound card driver, turn off, restart, enable sound card driver, turn off, restart.
neither remedied it.. but i'll try yours when i'm less lazy.
