Comment 14 for bug 37020

I also get this problem on my laptop. The audio is an Intel HDA controller, part of the 915GM chipset:
82801FB/FBM/FR/FW/FRW (ICH6 Family) High Definition Audio Controller

With the default alsa settings, both video and audio are interrupted around once per second with the kind of error reported earlier.

Workarounds I've found include:
1. adding "srate=48000" to /etc/mplayer/mplayer.conf
2. adding "-ao alsa:mmap" when running mplayer
3. adding "-ao oss" when running mplayer

If you search google for the error, this page appears:
https://bugtrack.alsa-project.org/wiki/wikka.php?wakka=HighDefinitionAudio
All reports of this problem include mentions of this type of hardware.