Hi,
I'm kind of a newbie to linux and i've been having some trouble getting my sound to work.

Ubuntu Fiesty Fawn
Kernel 2.6.20-16-generic
lspci results:
00:00.0 Host bridge: ATI Technologies Inc RS480 Host Bridge
00:01.0 PCI bridge: ATI Technologies Inc RS480 PCI Bridge
00:11.0 IDE interface: ATI Technologies Inc ATI 437A Serial ATA Controller
00:12.0 IDE interface: ATI Technologies Inc ATI 4379 Serial ATA Controller
00:13.0 USB Controller: ATI Technologies Inc IXP SB400 USB Host Controller
00:13.1 USB Controller: ATI Technologies Inc IXP SB400 USB Host Controller
00:13.2 USB Controller: ATI Technologies Inc IXP SB400 USB2 Host Controller
00:14.0 SMBus: ATI Technologies Inc IXP SB400 SMBus Controller (rev 04)
00:14.1 IDE interface: ATI Technologies Inc Standard Dual Channel PCI IDE Controller ATI
00:14.3 ISA bridge: ATI Technologies Inc IXP SB400 PCI-ISA Bridge
00:14.4 PCI bridge: ATI Technologies Inc IXP SB400 PCI-PCI Bridge
00:14.5 Multimedia audio controller: ATI Technologies Inc IXP SB400 AC'97 Audio Controller
00:18.0 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] K8 [Athlon64/Opteron] HyperTransport Technology Configuration
00:18.1 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] K8 [Athlon64/Opteron] Address Map
00:18.2 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] K8 [Athlon64/Opteron] DRAM Controller
00:18.3 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] K8 [Athlon64/Opteron] Miscellaneous Control
01:05.0 VGA compatible controller: ATI Technologies Inc RS480 [Radeon Xpress 200G Series]
02:01.0 Network controller: RaLink RT2561/RT61 802.11g PCI
02:03.0 Ethernet controller: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTL-8139/8139C/8139C+ (rev 10)
02:04.0 FireWire (IEEE 1394): VIA Technologies, Inc. IEEE 1394 Host Controller (rev 80)

Any advice would be helpful. Thanks

What have you done so far? The AC'97 controller should be fully supported in linux, at least mine is. Try opening up a terminal and running the command:
You might need to do it as root.

See if there are any error messages that are given from the alsaconf tool. I had some problems with my Ac'97 some time back, but that was with debian.

Also are there any errors given when you play music or whatnot. lspci is a good place to start, but try running xmms from a terminal and see if there are any specific errors given. Also, check out the settings in the configuration of your audio player.

You could also check if there is a /dev/dsp device. To test the device try a:

(trust me, turn your speakers right down first!!! ) If you get sound output, then it might be a problem with the audio player application you are using.

Sorry if it doesn't make much sense - I'm getting a bit tired.

thx jimmy, tried that stuff. no luck though.

i've been surfing around and it looks like alot of people are running into the same issue. i guess the problem is that my system wrongly sees the audio device as atiixp 97. i think the device is actually ALC658D, but i have no idea how to tell the system this.
As far as sound playback goes, the computer sees no problem, music players work, there's just no sound coming out. i tried installing the newest version of alsa, but still doesn't work, idk if there's something more that needs to be done there.

hope that clarifies alittle.