Problems with sound

[char@cse.unsw.edu.au (Rex Chan)]

Hey people, 

I've recently installed debian using a 2.4 kernel, woody distro,
on my asus a7v7x-x. I've tried both ac97 and ac97-codec sound modules
for the kernel, and tried playing mp3s with them using xmms.

However, xmms gives error messages, and cannot play any mp3s. I was
wondering if anybody knows how to access some better error messages, 
rather then the standard xmms can't play because it might be in use,
check no other device is using, bla blah error message.

-- 

Rex