sound option toggles to none, stays that way no matter what

[SGseas]

playing Custom GX 2.15R.

Option in-game for ".sound" toggled to "none" without my input. Changed the option back to "Direct Sound", restarted game, now it's "none" again. Tried on a fresh install, only modified files were my char save (attached below). Sound worked correctly. Then manually changed all settings to my preferred ones in-game. Issue magically manifested again.

Setting config.txt to read-only does not fix issue. config.txt is attached. Note that it reads sound as "1", yet in-game reads "none".

Let me know if a dxdiag would help, I'll attach it too.

config.txt
sav_Accepted.zip