If you have sound answer this...

[sparkles43]

I've never done the audio thing before. The speakers are plugged in and the hardware and everything looks good but how do I just run a test sound or something to see if the speakers are actually working? Do I need to install some sort of audio player software....or if I get an mp3 file how can I play it?

[mdwatts]

i have sound. Do I really HAVE to answer this?

[sparkles43]

Just pretend I am totally confused and dumb and answer my questions so I can die peacfully. Thanks;

[mdwatts]

Distro/version? KDE/Gnome?

If KDE, look in the Multimedia menu and you should find CD Player, KDE Media Player, XMMS etc.

[Musquo]

I tested my sound by playing a game in the KDE.

[CrashTestDummy9]

Ive got sound and I didnt have to touch a thing . I installed my distro and "wam bam thank you maam " Ive got sound . Just lucky I guess . I tested it by playing a CD in xmms .

[bwkaz]

Playing a CD isn't usually the best test of your sound drivers...

CD audio goes from your CD drive directly to your sound card (through the 4-conductor wire between them). Other audio, that comes from normal files, goes through the PCI (or PCI then ISA, if your card is an ISA card) bus to your sound card, which is a different hardware path. You should probably check both of them.

To the original poster, if you're running RedHat (actually, try this if you aren't, but I don't know if the utility exists in other distros), try running sndconfig as root. At the end, it will play a little sound clip of Linus saying "I pronounce Linux, Linux". If you hear that, you're good. If not, *hopefully* sndconfig will tell you possible problems.