setting up two soundcards with alsa.
 

ohk i have a builtin sound card (a cmedia card that isn't really supported by its own driver. it is ac '97 compatible but when it is used in debian it comes up as an intell chip). Alsright now to the meat of the situation.

alright i have a xitel md-port usb soundcard (it is a digital optical out only). well the reason that i want to activate my other sound card is because i play guitar and i can't really transfer stuff from my md to pc (i have to switch to oss and then plug the line out of my mdplayer to the line in of my pc). so what i want to do is keep my optical ad default and just have my built in so that i can record directly to pc. This would allow me to playback stuff on the us card while i record with the cmedia simultaneously (hear what i am playing in real time and other possile senarios).