[Pkg-alsa-devel] Bug#506838: Hardware works with Knoppix, DSL, and Puppy Linux

[Peter Belew]

When I boot with the following live CDs, sound works right away:

Knoppix 5.1.1
DSL (Damn Small Linux) 4.4.6
Puppy Linux 4.00

In each case, once I mount the HD volume with sound files, I am able to 
play them with each distro's version of xmms.

In addition, when I reboot from (at least) Knoppix back into Debian 
etch, without turning the power off, sound works in Debian. But if I 
then cold-boot etch again, sound does not work.

What this indicates to me, is that the Debian etch version of the driver 
does not set some required settings in the sound hardware, but the 
Knoppix etc. version(s) do this - and the 'warm' reboot back into Debian 
maintains that setting (or settings).

Regarding trying the lennie version of the alsa software, I need some 
instruction on how to do that and which packages to reinstall. I believe 
the actual driver is in a kernel module - that would require a kernel 
upgrade as well, wouldn't it? And there's another issue:

I do have an entirely different system with lennie installed, and there 
is a minor problem with sound, which makes me hesitant about upgrading 
the driver(s) on this laptop.