After quiet some time hunting down the issue. I think I solved it. Looks like there are some sort of driver conflicts.
Two driver files
audioendpoint.inf and
c_swdevice.inf have the same versions (10.0.19041.1) but DIFFERENT driver dates. The first one has 12/06/2019 while the second one has 06/21/2006. Is this even possible?
After uninstalling and scanning for hardware change in Device Manager, I got a warning in Event Log:
Device SWD\MMDEVAPI\{0.0.0.00000000}.{ba8a4a41-2189-412a-81a6-d027431da88e} was not migrated due to partial or ambiguous match.
Last Device Instance Id: SWD\MMDEVAPI\{0.0.0.00000000}.{02e8c993-5c78-44f7-ae00-bf167db655a8}
Class Guid: {c166523c-fe0c-4a94-a586-f1a80cfbbf3e}
Location Path:
Migration Rank: 0xF00000000000F120
Present: false
Status: 0xC0000719
After which the following log:
Device SWD\MMDEVAPI\{0.0.0.00000000}.{ba8a4a41-2189-412a-81a6-d027431da88e} was configured.
Driver Name: audioendpoint.inf
Class Guid: {c166523c-fe0c-4a94-a586-f1a80cfbbf3e}
Driver Date: 12/06/2019
Driver Version: 10.0.19041.1
Driver Provider: Microsoft
Driver Section: NO_DRV
Driver Rank: 0xFF0000
Matching Device Id: MMDEVAPI\AudioEndpoints
Outranked Drivers: c_swdevice.inf:SWD\GenericRaw:00FF3001
Device Updated: false
Parent Device: HDAUDIO\FUNC_01&VEN_10EC&DEV_0887&SUBSYS_104386C7&REV_1003\5&319e220&1&0001
Hence as of now audioendpoint.inf is loaded and the sound issue is fixed.
The only bummer is that the below listed items have no drivers loaded. Device Manager says "No driver files are required or have been loaded for this device". Weird!