driver/sound/soundcard.c lock_kernel()/unlock_kernel()

Hello all,
I've been looking through the sound drivers in the 2.4.5-ac series
.
drivers/sound/soundcard.c has a few lock_kernel()/unlock_kernel() calls, esp. in the read() and write() functions. Could these calls be easily replaced with semaphores or spinlock calls? I vaguely remember emails on lkml a while ago regarding the removal of lock_kernel()/unlock_kernel(), but I'm don't recall what the replacement was (if any). Regards,
Frank

btw, Sorry in advance if the mailer causes probelms.

This is intentional. FIxing up the old OSS drivers is not worth the pain