Alsa problems

Hi, using FC3 I can no longer use esd fro sound, it's just so distored to by unlistenable.  I can use OSS, but then only one app can use sound at a time.

I cant select ALSA as output in gstereamer preferences as it give me :

Failed to construct test pipeline for 'ALSA - Advanced Linux Sound Architecture'

So obviousl;y some thing is wrong with my setup, I did reformat and do a clean install of FC3 and not an upgrade.  But now I am stumped.