Well, ralvez's tip got me right back on track!

BTW shilo - thanks for the tips about MythTV, but I wasn't planning on using swaret once I got everything all installed and working, I just wanted to use it at first to make sure it was using the latest software when I first install MythTV. Also, for now I can't ditch my DVD player since the PC I'll be using for that doesn't have a DVD drive, and I don't have a remote to hook up. But the TV Wonder Pro has a pigtail with S-Video In, and I can limp along with the keyboard and trackball. At least until my birthday, which is right around the corner. . .

If you don't mind me asking, what remote do you use? (Respond in an e-mail if you'd like - the e-mail button at the bottom of my posts should work, or you can use the forum if you want.) Apparently there's one from ATI that I could get specifically made for my TV , but I'd rather use one that I know should work with Linux - in the ExtremeTech article I read about MythTV in, they said they never got theirs to work.

Anyway, thanks to all of you for helping me figure this all out!

Thank you for this easy solution to my same frustrating problem!
ken

I am afraid I am having this very same problem yet seem unable to solve it, as my knowledge of Linux is still very limited.

After finally getting Slack working on my system, learning to compile the latest kernel and installing nVidia video drivers, I hop into KDE 3.2 to have my sound working. I then run swaret, without knowing the issues it causes with alsa, and have no more sound.

Using suggestions found in this forum, I have tried remove and reinstalling the drivers many times, amoung other things, yet I still get no sound. I'm not quite sure of where to continue now.

As it is now, I am using the 2.6.13.2 kernel (upgraded from 2.4.x.x) and have no alsa drivers or utilities installed. When trying to recompile alsa from source I get an error telling me that alsa is built-in to the kernel (as default, correct?). Would this mean I would have to recompile the kernel without alsa support, and try building the alsa module with the new sources then?

Recompile your kernel with alsa support as module and enable the correct driver
for your audio card (/sbin/lspci | grep -i audio may help to find the audio hardware).

Of course don't install the alsa-driver package

Just in case, when u edit/setup swaret.conf make sure there is EXCLUDE=aaa_
and EXCLUDE=alsa kernel in /etc/swaret.conf file if you dont want your alsa or kernel upgraded
by swaret. So next time you upgrade with 'swaret --update' and then 'swaret --upgrade' alsa and kernel will not be affected.
And to be safer keep version as 10.1 until you're ready for current.
I keep std 10.1 in one partion and latest current SLW in separate partion. Most recent current is very stable so far though.
The new version of swaret 1.6.3-2 has that EXCLUDE stuff already done. 1.6.2 version needs it done.
Good luck.

X_ArchAngel -
You're using kernel 2.6.13.2, you say? Did you apply a prepatch, or was that just a typo? AFAIK the latest stable kernel release is 2.6.12.4. . .

Anyways, if you know how to configure and compile your kernel (which I believe you said you did) then you can recompile your kernel with ALSA support in order to make sure that NOTHING can break ALSA. This isn't strictly necessary, especially since you can just blacklist ALSA, but if you do it, it does ensure that ALSA will always work.