So far I've tried so many different things suggested in various posts that I just don't know where I am anymore. I uninstalled alsa and then reinstalled, I've turned the sound-server on and off, I've chmod'd here and lsmod'd there.

So far...I can play a cd from the drive perfectly, no problems. I can play a music track from the hard drive but the sound quality is poor (dulled and crackly). This proves to be the same playing a stream from Shoutcast in xmms. Xine and Mplayer both play dvd's but with no sound whatsoever.

I'm sure I didn't have these problems setting up in 9.1

yea, it sucks when your app settings arent set up correctly. I figured since there where alot of viewers and no replys posted, someone should say it.

Do you have dma enabled?

I'm not sure what that is but I'll look into it, cheers.

hdparm -i /dev/hda

/dev/hda:

Model=Maxtor 2B020H1, FwRev=WAH21PB0, SerialNo=B1EYFRDE
Config={ Fixed }
RawCHS=16383/16/63, TrkSize=0, SectSize=0, ECCbytes=57
BuffType=DualPortCache, BuffSize=2048kB, MaxMultSect=16, MultSect=16
CurCHS=16383/16/63, CurSects=16514064, LBA=yes, LBAsects=39876480
IORDY=on/off, tPIO={min:120,w/IORDY:120}, tDMA={min:120,rec:120}
PIO modes: pio0 pio1 pio2 pio3 pio4
DMA modes: mdma0 mdma1 mdma2
UDMA modes: udma0 udma1 udma2 udma3 udma4 *udma5
AdvancedPM=yes: disabled (255) WriteCache=enabled
Drive conforms to: ATA/ATAPI-6 T13 1410D revision 0:

* signifies the current active mode

hdparm -i /dev/hdb

/dev/hdb:

Model=WDC WD205BA, FwRev=16.13M16, SerialNo=WD-WM9491069936
Config={ HardSect NotMFM HdSw>15uSec SpinMotCtl Fixed DTR>5Mbs FmtGapReq }
RawCHS=16383/16/63, TrkSize=57600, SectSize=600, ECCbytes=40
BuffType=DualPortCache, BuffSize=2048kB, MaxMultSect=16, MultSect=16
CurCHS=16383/16/63, CurSects=16514064, LBA=yes, LBAsects=40088160
IORDY=on/off, tPIO={min:120,w/IORDY:120}, tDMA={min:120,rec:120}
PIO modes: pio0 pio1 pio2 pio3 pio4
DMA modes: mdma0 mdma1 mdma2
UDMA modes: udma0 udma1 udma2 udma3 *udma4
AdvancedPM=no WriteCache=enabled
Drive conforms to: device does not report version: 1 2 3 4

* signifies the current active mode

Not sure if that means I do or I don't?