who knows? I don't for sure. I don't think so, but I don't know for certain. Do you? I won't bet money on it (I hate betting). It probably is not needed, but installing it probably does not hurt. I'm not a believer in wasting dozens of hours trying to find the optimal solution. Instead, if I think it might be useful, I simply install the application (making note of what I installed). We are not talking GBytes of wasted space here.

I hate being in the position of not installing an application, banging my head for dozens of hours 'cause the app that I thought was not needed, was indeed needed. But thats just me. I probably learn less as a result, but I also save time.

Hey its your call. Its your time that gets spent. Like you note, alsa-firmware "probably" is not needed.

well, some are more obvious than most. Some common sense needs to be applied. I'll try to give you some hints, but ULTIMATELY you have to try some. I definitely would NOT blindly apply some solution, ... not at least checking with the ALSA-Configuration.txt file (that IS on your computer) to see if it even makes sense.

Many thanks. That is helpful.

Thanks! Posting that script saves dozens of questions.

I see from the script you have a 32-bit openSUSE-10.3, and you have never applied any of the recommended security fixes to your SUSE kernel. I see your laptop has an ALC883 codec.

I note you have alsa-1.0.14. For alsa-1.0.14, the following options are possible in your /etc/modprobe.d/sound file as a "model" option:You could try in your /etc/modprobe.d/sound file:
Which was the Ubuntu recommendation. Then restart your alsa in an xterm/konsole with:
<span style="font-family:Courier New">rcalsasound restart</span>
... and then test your sound (don't forget to check your mixer).

If that doesn't work, instead of "lenovo-ms7195-dig" try "lenovo-101e". Restart your alsa, test your sound. If that doesn't work, then try (one at at time, restarting alsa between each attempt, and testing sound between each attempt) "lenovo-nb0763", "laptop-eapd", ... etc ....

Now I also did a search on your ALC883 (per the audio troubleshooting guide) to see if there were any updates to the ALC883 between alsa 1.0.14 and alsa 1.0.16, and there were:
http://www.alsa-project.org/main/index.php...LC883&go=Go
... with the following options being added to the ALSA-Configuration.txt file.
None of them appear applicable to your lenovo, but its possible the underlying alsa code has been improved for your Lenovo. If it were me, and the model=something entry in the /etc/modprobe.d/sound file did not work, I would update alsa, and after updating try the various lenovo options again in the /etc/modprobe.d/sound file. But thats just me.

In case you do decide to update alsa, since you have the un-updated kernel (with out the security fixes) you will need to use a different zypper command than is in the audio troubleshooting guide. In your case with the less secure kernel you will need to run (in an xterm/konsole with root permissions):
You can skip the alsa-firmware update, if you are happy its not needed. I suspect you don't want to lose that 3.0 MBytes of space.

Note if you update alsa, get your sound working, and then update your kernel, you could find your sound functioning strange again (or even broken). The alsa versions on that site are specific to certain kernel versions.

Also note if you do a hand edit to the /etc/modprobe.d/sound file (like I am recommending) then do NOT run alsaconf nor yast>hardware>sound as that WILL wipe out your custom /etc/modprobe.d/sound file settings.

Good luck.