System stuffed after pacman update [SOLVED]

Question

I have just updated to the new kernel, udev, etc. Doco states something about module loading which I did not really understand, so I did nothing.
Now when I try to run arch, gdm no longer comes up, with error messages about /opt/gnome/sbin/gdm not existing. There is a file there but it will not run by typing in gdm, but it does by typing in sh gdm. Not sure what that means. I can then get into Gnome, but now also my networking is no longer functioning.
I assume this has something to do with modules and the new udev. Can someone explain?
As to the changes to fstab, which I also do not understand, I never had any /dev/discs/blah/blah entries anyhow.
One last question, is this whole issue of udev and device naming going to settle down sometime soon - no one can seem to decide what anything si called these days.
Thanks,
8)

Answer 1

Having got networking working (hehe) with the forcedeth driver, I decided to try and get the e1000 working. So I swapped the ethernet cable to the Intel E1000 port, booted up arch (expecting the networking not to work) and then to embark on a series of trial and error config file mods.
Amazingly though, the ethernet now worked despite having made no changes whatsoever. Init conf files are exactly the same as when the ethernet connection failed.
THi seems odd since I did not change eth0 to eth1 (surely I should if the hardware detect finds both devices)!? Apparently the e1000 was eth0 originally, and again now, but when the e1000 was not located, the forcedeth became eth0. This makes sense, but only if the e1000 was not picked up by the hardware detect (which conforms to what I currently believe), but then why is it now being picked up?
I am more confused than ever.
Regarding the previous post from the guy who said disabling his soundcard oss emulation fixed a similar problem - even more surprising that the sound card driver should affect networking - unless I misunderstood what he is saying.