I am new to Asterisk, I had downloaded, compiled and installed Asterisk 1.4.26.2 on CentOS 4.8. I have 2 sip softphones working (xlite). I installed a Wildcard TDM400p w/2 FXO ports, following instructions for downloading Asterisk it was recommended that I download and compile Zaptel drivers, so I did so. I then realized while installing the wctdm that asterisk had changed the Zapata channels to dahdi channels. I guess my question is (since it doesn't work as configured even though the ztcfg shows the card is good w/ 2 channels to configure) does the chan_dahdi.conf file work with the Zaptel drivers or do I have to download and install dahdi drivers?

Dahdi is for Asterisk 1.6 - you still need Zaptel for 1.4.

It seems odd though that I downloaded "zaptel-1.4-current", the zaptel.conf shows up in /etc but in /etc/asterisk (this took me a while to find) I was looking for zapata.conf but found chan_dahdi.conf. I configured it as if it were zapata but I can't place a call in or out on the card. I did'nt know if chan_dahdi.conf was trying to reference something zaptel didn't have. I also don't know why I ended up with chan_dahdi in /asterisk when I downloaded, compiled and installed zaptel.

In case you're still fighting with this, grab the current (2.2.1) dahdi package from:

https://downloads.asterisk.org/pub/.../dahdi-linux-complete-2.2.1+2.2.1.tar.gz

Stop Asterisk
Unload Zaptel (if needed)
unpack dahdi
cd to dahdi-linux-complete-2.2.1+2.2.1
Type make clean
Type make install
Type make config
Recompile Asterisk

The old zaptel.conf is now located in /etc/dahdi/system.conf and the old zapata.conf is now /etc/asterisk/chan_dahdi.conf.

Edit the two config files, load dahdi, and then fire up asterisk.

NOTE: You can now load the echo cancellers on a per-channel basis in the /etc/dahdi/system.conf file.

The README and UPGRADE.txt files located in /dahdi-linux-complete-2.2.1+2.2.1/linux contain a boatload of good info and help in getting things configured and running properly.