I DLed WinRottGL 1.46 and despite using Alchemy to restore DirectSound with my X-Fi some sounds are cut out.
I downgraded to version 1.44 and that fixed the sounds being cut out but now I have to deal with distortion. (usually at the end of a sound)
WinRott 2.24 works fine in all respects so I am unsure what is causing this. My laptop does not have the distortion under 1.44. (The sounds on the laptop cut out though in 1.46) The Laptop runs XP.

Is this for both sounds and music? Have you tried the latest release of winrottgl, 1.48? It corrects many errors from 1.46. In its launcher, select sound options and check the Use soundfix option.
As an extra bonus, if you want better quality mp3 remakes of the original rott MIDI music, you could try using this pack:
http://tinyurl.com/rott-addons
Create a folder in your Rott game directory called Music, unpack the files content into that folder start winrottgl 1.48, and in the sound settings from the launcher select Use external SFX.
enjoy!