I just put my computer all together and everything seems to be working great except one very strange thing. For hardware I have:

Asus P4PE/L Mobo
1gb PC2100 DDR
Maxtor 80GB 5400rpm HD
ATI Radeon 8500 LE 64MB
Liteon 48x12x48 CDRW
Basic 48X CDROM

In my case I have front panel with 2 usb and 1 headphones 1 mic. I got all that hooked up ok. When I go into windows I get no sound from the back panel, however I get it if I stick my speakers into the front panel jack. The second strange thing is my microphone, I can't get input from the front jack but I can from the back jack. I've looked and relooked over the mobo board and reinstalled drivers. I couldn't find any jumpers that might turn sound on or off and I couldn't find anything in the bios. I tried unplugging the front panel stuff from the board and still no go. I'm at my wits end. This board is too new and I cannot find anything on the internet as far as support or anyone who might have had this problem. Help??

Ok I found out what the problem was. I was too tired to figure it out at the time. Sometimes its the simplest things. The jumpers had to be on to hear the sound in the back and because the front wires don't continue the circle of sound card to front panel and then front panel to back panel I couldn't hear sound back there. So that has to be fixed. But now that I have sound I'm playing some songs in XP and I'm getting some crackling every now and then. Anyone know about an issue with this with the SoundMax onboard sound on the P4PE?

first off...nice with fixing the orginal issue...second...try updating drivers...i know u said u did...but try MS if available through windows update. sometimes WHQLs will work much better than than reference or out of the box drivers. my Cmedia asus sound was poop before i did...i think i have the 8738...can't remember...been a while and i'm at work. but anyways...try that and another set of headphones/speakers...if haven't already to isolate the cause. btw...thats a really nice asus board u bought...how come...ur loading up with older tech...i.e. the slow ram and hard drive? GL though...post back whatever happens.

One of the first things I did was update windows xp and everything. THe sound is working beautifully. Now I'm having a problem where my Microphone stopped working. I've gone through all the normal sound settings and can't find anything. It worked yesturday in the same slot.. it makes no sense!

As far as your question about loading it up with slightly older tech is because I cannot afford anything faster. I had already 512 PC2100 DDR and so I bought another stick to upgrade to 1gb. The hard drive is an upgrade from my last one anyway. LOL