IE interference
 

I've seen other posts with similar symptoms but the source of the problem in my case is very specific.

When Internet Explorer is loading a page, either initially or in response to user input, the sound from Winamp is saccaded / has an echo chamber effect. After a page is loaded the sound returns to normal. No other applications or actions affect the sound. This occurs with both mp3 and wav files.

I've adjusted the preferences based upon other posts:

DirectSound:

Device tab - selected sound card, enabled hardware acceleration and checked "create primary buffer".

Buffering tab - enabled cpu usage, set buffer ahead on track change to 500 ms

These adjustments haven't solved the problem.

This is an older PC with an AMD K6-2 450 megahertz processor
BIOS - Award 4.51PG chip upgraded (Release 4.2)
512 MB memory
WinXP Professional Service Pack 2 (build 2600)
DirectX version - 9.0
Creative AudioPCI ES1371 / ES1373 WMD sound card (drivers updated)
SiS 5598/6326 display adapter

IE interference
 

One other bit of info, this was a clean install of 5.xx, currently running 5.22.

Probably a limitation of your old soundcard.

Try disabling sounds for IE navigation.

Sounds & Audio Devices Control Panel > Sounds tab:

Set the following under "Windows Explorer" to "None":
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