Shooting sound troubles in ( Debian ) - Linux 
        
        A systematic approach from bottom to top:
        
        ( 'do:' means open a terminal and give command )
        ( '| grep' is just a filter for the output )
        
        ------------------------------------------
        
        
        -- Onboard soundchip enabled in BIOS ?
        
        -- do: lspci
           or, ( as root ): lsusb
           
                your card(s) should show up.
           
        -- do: cat /boot/config-$( uname -r ) | grep SND | grep =y
        -- do: cat /boot/config-$( uname -r ) | grep SND | grep =m
        
                the driver for your card should show up
                with '=y' ( compiled as part of the kernel )                
                or '=m' ( compiled as a loadable module ) 
        
        -- do: lsmod | grep snd
        
                this shows kernel-modules loaded.
                ( note: everything that is compiled in
                the kernel does not show up here )
                ( minimum ? )
        
        -- do: dpkg -l | grep alsa
        
                this shows installed alsa-software
                ( minimum ? )
        
        -- do: ls -l /proc/asound 
        -- do: cat /proc/asound/cards
        
                information about cards that alsa has found       

        -- do: ls -l /dev/snd
        -- do: ls -l /dev/dsp*
        
                this shows the devices alsa has created
                ( if there is no /dev/dsp, there is no
                OSS-compatibility )
        
        -- do: lsof | grep snd
        
                If your soundcard -is- basically working, but 'busy' 
                then you can see here what keeps it busy.
        
        -- do: killall -bugger-
        
                where -bugger- is one of...
                esd, jackd, artsd (?), ...
        
                OR, tell your application to use this -bugger-,
                that is what these 'sound-servers' are meant for.

        
        ------------------------------------------
        Jasper, dec 2007.
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