Mplayer and alsa bug?

[Wackojacko <wackojacko32@ntlworld.com>]

I am unable to use alsa as the output plugin for mplayer.  mplayer -ao 
oss works fine but alsa (the default) gives

Starting playback...
alsa-play: write error: Broken pipe0) ??,?%
alsa-play: trying to reset soundcard
A:   0.3 (00.3) of 256.0 (04:16.0)  0.2%

the error is sometimes repeated several times before mplayer hangs.

The problem is on both my i386 and amd64 sid installs running self 
compiled 2.6.14 kernels.

some info

apt-cache policy mplayer
mplayer:
  Installed: 1:1.0-pre7cvs20060219-0.1
  Candidate: 1:1.0-pre7cvs20060219-0.1
  Version table:
 *** 1:1.0-pre7cvs20060219-0.1 0
        990 http://spello.sscnet.ucla.edu sid/main Packages
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status

apt-cache policy libasound2
libasound2:
  Installed: 1.0.10-2
  Candidate: 1.0.10-2
  Version table:
     1.0.10+1.0.11rc2-1 0
          1 http://amd64.debian.net experimental/main Packages
 *** 1.0.10-2 0
        500 http://amd64.debian.net etch/main Packages
        990 http://amd64.debian.net sid/main Packages
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status

I have ggogled and found one mention of this error on another list, but 
it was unresolved.  Anyone else seen this or got a solution, then I 
would appreciate their input.

TIA

Wackojacko