It's funny you would openly admit you overpaid for your laptop. I will be joining that MSI club soon, so you won't be alone. We can whine about their cost together.

As for your sound issue? On my current laptop with Win 10 (I've mentioned this issue here before), I didn't like the RealTek audio driver. It sounded much quieter in my headphones and didn't seem to have as much bass. I forced it to use the Windows High Definition audio driver and it sounds way better. In the beginning of Win 10 (I took the free upgrade at 10's launch from Win 8.1) it would every so often revert back to the Reaktek drivers and I had to go through the process again and again. After a month or so of doing this, it stopped reverting back to the Reaktek drivers.
Every now and then it does revert back, but rarely. I think certain Win 10 updates caused it to do so.
Why did it stop reverting back for long periods of time? I don't know. Maybe it got the hint after several times changing it back to my preferred audio driver. Who knows?!?! I don't have a permanent solution for you, but my method of keep changing it back for whatever reason seemed to have stuck... at least for months on end now. I like to think I beat Win 10 into submission and every once in a great while it likes to test me and revert it back to RealTek.
Does your model of MSI have that Nahimic sound software? I'm wondering cuz my current HP laptop came Beatsaudio software installed that works in conjunction with the Reaktek drivers and I'm curious if it's responsible for yours reverting back in Win 10. Cuz I always suspected Beatsaudio (through never proven) was the one bugging my windows to revert back cuz when I have the Windows High Definition audio driver installed, Beatsaudio software is completely disabled and useless.
