Strange sound behavior

[William Case]

Hi;
As user I still get event sounds after I have muted everything in
alsamixer - volume control.  Even stranger, if I go to /usr/share/sounds
in File Browser and just focus the cursor (i.e. don't click) on a *.wav
event file I get the sound in spite of everything being muted and the
files being owned by root (other is set to r).

As root user I don't get sounds being played on focus, but I do get
sound through Helix even though everything is muted.

In both cases the sound has background distortion, which is the main
problem I am trying to solve.

Is it possible that something is somehow getting loaded before ALSA and
taking over the sound system before ALSA has a chance to take control??

Rather than fill this post with data as I did earlier, if someone can
help, I will be happy to post any configuration information that might
help.

Regards Bill