sound problems

[Peter Lesterhuis]

Hi,
I sent a post before about my sound problems. Since then a few problems 
are solved thanks to some useful reactions, but not allsound problems 
are solved.
The problem is that i don't hear sound with applications like gnome
cd-player, tv-time and zapping (excellent video with the latter two, but 
no sound).
Xine lets me play audio-cd and (movie-)dvd with sound. Xmms even so.
The soundcard ( Intel Cor. 82801EB/ER (ICH/ICH5R) AC'97 ) is working
well. Test sound is all right.
WinXP (dual boot on the same box) has shown no sound problems.
My conclusion is that wrong settings are the cause of the troubles.
But whatever i try, for instance in zapping...no sound. I tried every 
audio option listed in the preferences panel.
The fact that i am having the same trouble with several applications is 
the reason that i am bothering you with this post. Is it my clumsiness 
in setting the right configuration, or could there be an underlying 
problem with ...(alsa, soundcard, snd mixer?) which is causing everytime 
the same configuration difficulties?
Thanks in advance.
Peter.