Once I installed LiteStep, I tried playing my winamp & I recieved an error message saying "Bad DirectSound driver".

Now, the only sound I get on my computer is a beep.

I've tried restarting & I've also tried switching back to the Windows shell, but no luck.

Has this happened to anyone else? Or does anyone know what the problem is?

No idea, but it's probably not LS-related. Try deleting your sound card in the device manager and letting windows reinstall it. Perhaps that'll fix the driver issue. You might also try selecting a different sound output codec in winamp.

...and since it's saying "Bad DirectSound driver", you can also try reinstalling DirectX. Could be worth a shot.

It's not just Winamp though. Even my AIM alerts, I just get a beep. So system sounds are making beeps, & otherwise I have no sound.

I tried updating my sound driver & it says I have the latest driver.

This sucks. :-/

I'm going to try reinstalling DirectX. I'll let you know if that works.

Updating your sound driver won't help at all. It will just go out and try and see if you have the latest version. You need to actually uninstall/delete the device and reinstall after a reboot.