if you are recompiling the default suse kernel, the modules_install part of the make process cleans out the old modules before installing the new ones. you need to re-install the alsa drivers either by downloading the drivers as above, or re-installing the rpm that comes with suse.
any time i recompile my kernel for whatever reason, i have to re- install the kernel modules for both alsa and my nvidia card. quick and simple, just one more thing i have to remember.
Well, I could see where this would be a useful feature, if one were aware of it. Unfortunately, I wasn't aware of it and did not take appropriate measures. Is this a feature of the normal linux kernel makefile modules_install, or is it a SuSE tweak?
part of the standard kernel makefile. suse does make a couple of changes, but they are quite usefulle (make oldconfig for example). -- trey