socket exists

[J. W. Ballantine]

In trying to start gnome-devel on a 5-STABLE box, when I do a startx,
I get the full "grey" screen with the X cursor, where it hangs.
When I exit and check the log I find:

SESSION_MANAGER=local/tinlizzie.patmedia.net:/tmp/.ICE-unix/666
esd: Esound sound daemon already running or stale UNIX socket
/tmp/.esd/socket
This socket already exists indicating esd is already running.
Exiting...

** (gnome-session:666): WARNING **: Esound failed to start.

So I remove the socket and try to startx again.  It fails with the same
error, so it appears that something creates the socket and then something
else also tries to create without first checking if it exists.

Any thoughts/ideas on where to look?

Thanks

Jim