Elke87 Asus offers a slightly newer audio driver here:
https://www.asus.com/rs-en/supportonly/h170%20pro%20gaming/helpdesk_download/
That would be the Audio_Realtek_Driver, dated August 2016. It may or may not help, but it's worth trying. Download the installer, run it, restart your computer, and see whether it helps.
The problem isn't EA, not exactly. Sims 4 keeps getting updates, Windows keeps getting updates, your other components' drivers may receive more updates; and these updates are not always going to be compatible with very old drivers, especially when a newer driver exists for the same hardware. It's simpler to support only the newest drivers, not every version ever released. Usually older drivers are still fine, up to a point, but compatibility can break for one reason or another, and it's possible that gets missed because no one is testing against that driver version, or ignored because users can update the driver. This is just how technology works.
I'm sorry, but it didn't work.
