When I installed fedora core 3 the sound test worked and I heard my computer's speakers. As a side note, my speakers on computer always go into a sleep like mode, and usually they have to "wake" up to be heard. During the installation when the sound file played the speakers woke up in the middle of playing the sound. I say this becuase I am pretty sure that fc3 had no troubles with my sound card which is old but I think it is soundblaster live. I tried to get mp3 support for comp using yum, but being the newbie I am I could not get the livna rpm repos configured right in yum so I went got apt from freshrpms. It downloaded several dependencies, don't remember what exactly. I have not had a lick of sound since then. I don't know if getting apt from freshrpms messed up a software configuration or if it is something all together different. I am currently using KDE and in the control center under sound system, general tab, I have enabled the sound system and I do not have the auto-suspend checked. In the hardware tab I have autodetect for the audio device. I have considered just completely reinstalling fc3 and basically wiping everything clean and trying to learn yum to avoind freshrpms all together, but, I will have a hardtime convincing my wife that linux really is better than windows if a reinstall is the solution. Another side note, she is coming around - she was a windows user forever and I have basically pushed linux on her. IF she was to use my comp. then she had to try to navigate linux gui's. But, to make this a better deal for both of us I have to get my sound working and I don't want her thinking that a fresh install of the os is how you fix problems. Anyway, thanks for your help in advance.

if the sound was working try the command "alsoconf restore" it might work