How do I bypass KMixer in Windows XP

No, it did not on my PC, I already experimented with your question.

Control panel > Sounds, speech and audio devices > Change the sound scheme >
The first bar has windows default option and no sounds, you can choose from there and save.

Or, you can select individual sound options from the box near the bottom.

I fully admit I am no PC wiz but I tried following the instructions step by step and lost all sound from my computer. I couldn't get it back, my computer guru couldn't get back, and I ended up having to dump and reload XP. It was a long and costly venture that I am afraid to try again. I hooked up a USB DAC and am going to live with it as is.

Thanks for the responses, but I'm not trying to disable the windows sounds, I'm trying to prevent them from being disabled.

I guess I don't really understand how this can work. If you select "Do not use audio features" for a sound controller in the device manager, how can it be available to programs in windows?

I've tried this with my old desktop with an audigy 2zs pci card and an m-audio audiophile usb external device, and basically it just disables the device in windows, making it no longer available to foobar or any other app. If I select "Do not map to this device" but leave the "use audio features" on, then it works, and it does seem to bypass the kmixer, using either the creative mixer, or the maudio mixer instead.

Am I missing something?

BTW - while I was experimenting with this, I also compared foobar 0.9.x to 0.8.3 (per Steve's suggestion) and boy it is a pretty big difference. It is unfortunate that a lot of the new interface plugins don't work on 0.8.3, but I'll happily sacrifice those for better sound.

Another alternative is to upgrade to Vista SP2, use the WASAPI plugin with Foobar or J.River and be done with it. You can get up to 24/192 output if your Dac is capable and you use the SPDIF output of the PC.

Ok, well I finally got this to work and, more importantly, I think I understand how it works. For some reason, I had to reboot several times before foobar worked.

Since the solution disables the sound controller in windows, making all features (including recording and windows sounds) unavailable except for playback, this is overkill for me. I am sticking with ASIO. I can detect no audible difference between using ASIO and by disabling the sound controller in windows when using foobar, and I can still use the other features of my soundcard.