i currently use slackware 9.1, which uses the alsa driver for sound support. i thusfar have not been able to rectify my sound issues that i have been having ever since installing slackware 8.1. the alsa driver detects the sound card correctly, which is a neo magic 256 laptop sound card but it cannot set it up properly. i haven't used the alsa driver before so i don't know what to change to make it work. here is the output in dmesg that describes the problem:

nm256: no ac97 is found!
force the driver to load by passing in the module parameter
force_ac97=1
or try sb16 or cs423x drivers instead.
NeoMagic 256 audio soundchip not found or device busy

hope that describes the problem enough for someone to help. if any other info needed to answer the question i will be quick to oblige. this problem has bothered me for quite awhile now.

You can try OSS, I know that it supported in the old method.

I have a Dell CSX laptop that uses the same card too. Mine worked just fine, expect that I have go into alsamixer and unmute the pcm. For some reason it unable to read the settings on bootup...

Im not sure how to load OSS instead of Alsa. Im still quite new =P

Hi, Have you run sndconfig from the terminal and tried loading sb16 or cs423x drivers to see if one of them work? Are you using KDE, Gnome, etc, etc?

I am not sure what is going on =(.
Maybe someone in the Slackware Destro message form would know.

i just tried to run sndconfig and the terminal returned that the command was not found. i am using kde to answer your first question (even though i said the problem was at boot so i don't know why my x manager matters) but i have no clue what etc, etc? could be asking...

also... as for unmuting...

root@gaia:~# /usr/bin/alsamixer

alsamixer: function snd_ctl_open failed for default: No such device
root@gaia:~#

i receive that message when i try to run alsamixer... so i assume that because it cannot configure my soundcard at boot, then it cannot load alsamixer.

i am pretty sure i just need to force it to use a different module... but i don't know where the file is located that i need to change.

well... i fixed the issue myself... i currently use the oss driver... if anyone wants to help with the alsa driver i will be grateful. also, i have had a problem with multiple devices using the oss driver. is it not capable of being used more than once?