Thank you both.

It turns out the problem went way after I installed the alsa-base package, with apt-get.

Still, wasn't as simple as it could have been, because the debian installer does not configure apt during the first stage, and apparently alsa-base in not included in disk-1. So, one has to configure apt to reach a debian site over the net, and apt-get the package.

Nevertheless, I am still getting some strage messages during boot off, and may have to do more work on this problem.

Among other things, the verison of the kernel 2.6 that comes with debian would not run on my system. Interestingly, knoppix (as well as ubuntu) run without problems, and without special boot options. Why can't debian do the same is a mystery to me. Presumably, the debian installer is less "friendly" to be able to support more systems... seems to be back-firing when it comes to laptops.