Well, first off, I'm no expert, so take everything I say with a grain of salt.
Now then, AFAIK, ALSA doesn't care about /dev/dsp* entries. Again, AFAIK, those are part of OSS, not ALSA. If I understand how things work correctly, they kind of run parallel to each other, and are independant. So I'm guessing you have a problem with ALSA, not permissions. I recommend that you try these to fix it. If one doesn't fix it, try the next. 1. # dpkg-reconfigure alsa-base (might just need to reconfigure it) 2. # apt-get update; apt-get install alsa-base (might need to upgrade it) 3. Upgrade your kernel to 2.6.10 or higher. I've never used 2.6.8, but I've never had any problems with 2.6.10 or higher. If none of that fixes it, perhaps it's a problem with the Audigy drivers? I don't know anything about the quality of those, since the Audigy is newer than my cards. FYI, I have two SoundBlaster Live! Value cards, and the onboard AC97 is off. ~/.asoundrc is your friend. :)
