Hey I dont know if anyone can help me but I have seen a few threads on computer problems and there seem to be quite a lot of all knowing computer people on here so I thought it was worth a try. Its not a major problem but it is a little annoying. My laptop runs on windows vista and its running fine, however the little speaker on the notification area of the taskbar has disappeared, I have no idea why, im guessing perhaps I clicked something I shouldnt have and now its not there. I found the little tick box where you can select or deselect the clock and sound and so on but the box for volume was greyed out so I couldnt click it. I have no idea how to fix it. All help gratefully appreciated.
at the very left of the system tray (where that icon used to be) is a little up arrow/triangle. click on it, then choose customize (or so), there you can configure the speaker symbol to show. at least it's like that in win7 .. i skipped vista. in win XP you had to go to your control panel, sounds .. and tick some box there for it to appear.
I have a Vista and I have the same problem occasionally, although it isn't too often. I recommend just shutting down your computer then turning it back on, that always does it for me.