Conexant audio issues

Hello, 
I am having issues with my audio on my Dell Inspiron 13.

I get the message from Conexant that "A Conexant audio device could not be found. The application will now exit." and it doesn't play any sound. I got this message quite a few times before in the past years, and I always managed to resolve it, but not this time. I tried just about everything I could find online:
1. Reboot - didn't fix it
2. Stopping/starting/restarting related services - didn't fix it
3. Uninstalling/reinstalling the drivers - didn't solve it
4. Rolling back the driver in Device Manager - didn't solve it
5. Going through ProgramFiles/Conexant trying to install/update Conexant - didn't solve the issue, in fac now Conexant refuses to stay installed altoghether. 
6. Tried adding it as a legacy device in Device Manager - didn't solve the issue
7. Tried it all from this article: https://techwiser.com/fixes-for-no-audio-output-device-is-installed-in-windows/
8. I ran the Dell Support Assistant troubleshooter, but it found no issues. 
9. Windows troubleshooters cannot find any meaningful/helpful issues either

I do not have any audio devices listed in the Sound utility/window at all. 
Only one device is listed in Device manager, when this used to be more when the sound works. 
I tried plugging in an external audio device, however that doesn't solve the issue either, still no sound. 
I am running on Windows 10 21H2, but also have Linux Kubuntu (not quite sure of the version at the minute but it should be Ubuntu 18 or 20). Neither has sound. The above troubleshooting was done on Windows. 

I do not believe there is a hardware issue, but I honestly don't know what else to try, I feel like I ran out of everything I can think of. Without sound, there isn't much I can use my laptop for. Any help would be greatly appreciated. 

Thank you!