Hardware problems after installing 5.4 pre-release

[Todd Shirk]

I'm running FreeBsd/amd64 on a Gateway 7422GX.  I installed the
5.3-release version and configured the OS to function properly with
the hardware except for the built-in wireless and the infamous
conexant softmodem.  I read up on some wireless setups to get my
wireless card working.  In the process, I decided to try my first
attempt at a rebuild of world with the latest cvsup stable-supfile
download (March 24, 2005).  I used the method of:

# make buildworld
# make buildkernel KERNCONF=MYKERNEL 
# make installkernel KERNCONF=MYKERNEL
# reboot

selected singleuser mode from startup menu

# fsck -p
# mount -u /
# mount -a -t ufs
# swapon -a
# mergemaster -p
# make installworld
# mergemaster
# reboot

(MYKERNEL is the GENERIC plus the lines needed for loading the sound
system and the via8233 sound driver for my sound card)
  device       sound
  device       "snd_via8233"
(with mergemaster I chose "i" for each file, indicating to use tempory)

I booted into the new environment and started KDE3.4.  I noticed that
I had no sound and no usb mouse functionality.  I did the following:

# cat /dev/sndstat
FreeBSD Audio Driver (newpcm)
Installed devices:
pcm0: <VIA VT8235> at io 0x1000 irq 10  (5p/1r/0v channels duplex default)


 So, the driver seems to be loading, but I'm getting no sound.  I've,
also, done the following to try to get the sound back.

# sysctl hw.snd.pcm0.vchans=8
# sysctl hw.snd.maxautovchans=8

I checked my mixer levels in KDE and added

hint.pcm.0.vol="100"

to the /boot/device.hints

being that the usb mouse also stopped working, I think there might be
an issue with the hardware discovery routines in bootup or a
configuration file that 5.3 used was overwritten with the rebuilding
of world.

I'm quite new to FreeBSD and am trying to get a good grasp on the
general workings of the OS.  So, assume that I need step by step
guidelines.  Perhaps, since I'm dealing with a pre-release, some of
the functionality is missing by design.  I have assumed that STABLE
would mean that functioning hardware from the prior release will
continue functioning with STABLE.  I've stayed clear of CURRENT
assuming things may often be broken in that branch, as it is
experimental.

Any help in enlightening me on my hardware issues will be greatly appreciated.

# uname -a
FreeBSD Todds-Notebook.linksys 5.4-PRERELEASE FreeBSD 5.4-PRERELEASE
#0: Thu Mar 24 14:26:05 UTC 2005    
root at Todds-Notebook.linksys:/usr/obj/usr/src/sys/MYKERNEL  amd64