Closing all the file tabs does not make the stack of windows any smaller -- because they all are on the same level.

What you have to do is totally different:
-dock side tabs, such as Help, Functions, NuSoap client, Terminals, Launchbox etc
-drag them away to undock
-close the floating windows (if you don't need them at the moment), or group together away from the main window, or leave floating

I consider this awkard. This topic is more than 2 years old, and the issue still exists. I agree it's not a showstopper, and I agree it might not be Dmitri's fault, but still... I'm also suffering it on a W7 x64, and it's a major annoyance.

Imho it's the same as with the cursor in the undo buffer: it's an annoyance within an otherwise great product that an otherwise excellent developer just refuses to fix. Please tell me when I missed an update that did fix any of these.

Igor, why do you think we refuse anything to fix?
After all, MS confirmed the issue 4 years ago and stated that it won't be fixed. Hope it's clear who's refusing.

I'd like to confirm this as a "workaround"
I've got rid of nearly all of them (bar the code navigator, I use that) and voila, the volume controls work.

Windows 7, 64 bit here. I've closed down every panel, except for the workspace and the file window (which has now only 1 file open, just to be sure). I still can't control the volume when the file window has the focus. I _can_ use it when I give focus to the Workspace.

Closing the panels is not enough.
And YES, if stack of windows below the focused one is small enough, OS won't have problems.
So if you move focus to Workspace and its stack is small, it will work fine.

What I suggested is:
You have to 1) SHOW all the panels by selecting them in View->Tabs and View->Debug 2) UNDOCK them all 3) Then either close (while they are floating undocked), or leave them floating, or group floating panels together. Important point - they must be out of the main IDE window. In this case stack below editor window will be the smallest and you won't get problems.

Anyway, v7 has no this problem because we stopped using docking library which creates so big stack of windows.