Yet another sound question

pjp · Administrator Joined: 16 Apr 2002 Posts: 20476

Been working on getting sound installed for quite some time now. I _think_ I've got the correct stuff compiled into the kernel. I'm using oss, persistant dma, 100% soundblaster compatibles and awe 32. Those were all options under sound in kernel config and appear to be related to the SB AWE32 ISA card.

I'm following the Sound section of the Desktop Configuration Guide. I've emerged the alsa-driver and done the depmod -a. I have a problem with the next step. Code listing 17 indicates what you are supposed to put into /etc/modules.autoload. This is my problem:

dArkMaGE · Apprentice Joined: 20 Apr 2002 Posts: 152

unfortunately, those instructions are for the .5x series, while gentoo very recently switched to the .9x ones...
to get my alsa stuff to work, first i removed the old oss drivers cuz i had mine compiled in(make sure to leave sound support in general though)
then, edit the /etc/modules.d/alsa file to suit your card (it tells you what line to edit)
finally, add snd-emu10k1 (or whatever your cards driver is) into /etc/modules.autoload

the sound drivers for alsa are now stored in /lib/modules/yourkernelversion/drivers/sound (i believe) and instead of snd-card-whatever its now just snd-whatever
however, to get oss compatability support you can add in the snd-pcm-oss line to /etc/modules.autoload as per the instruction manual

hope this helps

pjp · Administrator Joined: 16 Apr 2002 Posts: 20476

These are the modules I found in the kernel/sound directory. This is the order they load in (all OK).
sound, sb, sb_lib, awe_wave, uart401, snd-pcm-oss

When I run amixer, it reports this: amixer: Mixer attach default error: No such device

At this point, I'm wondering about isapnp or something like that. It is an ISA card, so I'm thinking maybe I need to configure IRQ's etc.

pjp · Administrator Joined: 16 Apr 2002 Posts: 20476

I wouldn't have thought sound would be this much of an issue...

I tried loading stuff as modules. Still no success. Somewhere along the way, snd-pcm-oss (or whatever its called) quit working.
The .o file appears to have disappeared. I went back to loading everything in the kernel. When I start Gnome now, I get an error
message about not being able to open the device. I am in the audio group.

How would I pass settings at boot time to configure the card?

salimma · n00b Joined: 29 Apr 2002 Posts: 25 Location: York, UK

pjp · Administrator Joined: 16 Apr 2002 Posts: 20476

Salimma: Thanks for the suggestions, but I'm not sure that sound is even working yet. Also, I'm trying to do it in the kernel and without modules.
When I was working with modules, there was never a snd-mixer-oss.o file. I suspect it wasn't part of the modules for my card or something.

As for passing arguments at boot time, I found this in the menuconfig help:
sb=<io>,<irq>,<dma1>,<dma2> We'll see what that does... first attempt of course has failed.
Other than the parameters, is this how it should look?
kernel /boot/bzImage root=/dev/hda4 sb=220,5,1,5

io is the only one i'm not sure how to enter properly... trying 0x220 next

EDIT: using 0x220 seems to have stopped the error when starting gnome. However, amixer still reports the same error.
I guess thats progress. (Now where did I leave that gun? :evil:

)

seb.gauthier · n00b Joined: 02 May 2002 Posts: 3

Please let us know if you get it working. I'm in the same situation and I have to say I have stopped trying building that kernel again and again :oops:

Coogee · Apprentice Joined: 23 Apr 2002 Posts: 184 Location: E.U.

kanuslupus:
Do you want to use the kernel sound drivers or the Alsa sound drivers?
You can not use both. If you want to use the Alsa drivers you have to choose "Sound card support" only (!) in Sound section of kernel config. No further card/etc. adjustments.
Then you have to find out the correct Alsa driver for your card and add it to modules.autoload. More infos in the well-known Gentoo Alsa howto...

pjp · Administrator Joined: 16 Apr 2002 Posts: 20476

Very interesting. Actually, it doesn't matter to me. Is one "better" than the other from a quality standpoint?
I'm thinking Alsa might be updated more frequently than kernel sound, so I'll probably give that a go.

Thanks for the info.

Guest · Posted: Sat May 04, 2002 7:12 am Post subject:

Are you referring to the Sound section of the Documentation Guide?

pjp · Administrator Joined: 16 Apr 2002 Posts: 20476

That was me.

Coogee · Apprentice Joined: 23 Apr 2002 Posts: 184 Location: E.U.

No, I meant the submenu "Sound" in the Kernel configuration tool (what you get if you "make menuconfig" or "make xconfig"). For Alsa: just enable "Sound card support", nothing else.
Difference between Alsa <-> Kernel sound: Depends on your card: sometimes the quality of Alsa is better than kernel (in my case), sometimes the kernel sound is better. Just try and find out...

salimma · n00b Joined: 29 Apr 2002 Posts: 25 Location: York, UK

pjp · Administrator Joined: 16 Apr 2002 Posts: 20476

Well, I just don't get it. Here's what I configured in make menuconfig:
<*> Sound card support, <M> OSS sound modules, [*] Persistant DMA buffers, [M] 100% Sound Blaster compatibles, [M] AWE32 synth

After that, here's whats in /lib/modules/2.4.19-r1/kernel/drivers/sound/
awe_wave.o sb.o sb_lib.o sound.o uart401.o

Here's my modules.autoload (everything loads with [OK]):
sound
sb
sb_lib
awe_wave
uart401

My aliases file has these settings:
alias snd-card-0 sound
alias snd-card-1 sb
alias snd-card-2 sb_lib
alias snd-card-3 awe_wave

And my devfsd.conf:
LOOKUP snd MODLOAD ACTION snd
LOOKUP dsp MODLOAD
LOOKUP mixer MODLOAD
LOOKUP midi MODLOAD
REGISTER sound/.* PERMISSIONS root.audio 660
REGISTER snd/.* PERMISSIONS root.audio 660

I've emerged the alsa driver and utils. Running /etc/init.d/alsasound start reports [OK].
Next step is to run amixer. This is the error I get:
amixer: Mixer attach default error: No such file or directory

As for kernel vs. modules, I was just trying to get sound working. Kind of like throwing darts blindfolded when you don't know where the target is

. When I first ran into this, I just tried loading everything in the kernel to see if it would work. And I hear no sounds.

Thanks for your persistance & patience.

Coogee · Apprentice Joined: 23 Apr 2002 Posts: 184 Location: E.U.

Sorry, didn't read that you got an ISA card.
For ISA you have to configure ISAPNP.

I found this installation howto which is about your card:
http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/mini/Soundblaster-AWE-3.html

My advice: Get rid of all ISA cards. They can be a real pain in the a..

pjp · Administrator Joined: 16 Apr 2002 Posts: 20476

pjp · Administrator Joined: 16 Apr 2002 Posts: 20476

I've looked at the URL, but it seems to be unrelated to what I've seen with Gentoo. Modules look different,
and there are steps shown that I've not seen.

May just be that it is beyond me (big shock).

Thanks anyway

pjp · Administrator Joined: 16 Apr 2002 Posts: 20476

Progress? gmix will now load, but no sound. amixer still reports the same error.

Coogee · Apprentice Joined: 23 Apr 2002 Posts: 184 Location: E.U.

Ok, the URL is not Gentoo specific, but it is easy to find out what to do:

emerge isapnptools
do a "pnpdump > /etc/isapnp.conf"
edit /etc/isapnp.conf (can't help you here)
add a new init script: "rc-update add isapnp boot" or "rc-update add isapnp default" (don't know what is the correct one)
adapt kernel config (but I think you already did)
reboot

There is also a lot more information about configuring midi etc. but this is not so important for now.

pjp · Administrator Joined: 16 Apr 2002 Posts: 20476

I've emerged the pnptools, but my card is not PnP. I think I've actually read somewhere that they
shouldn't be used with nonPnP cards (could be mistaken).

And I'm new enough to linux that converting the instructions to Gentoo is not within my grasp. When
I read them, I did not see the paralell into Gentoo. I had done what you suggested though.

I'm going to dig up another sound card. Maybe its PnP, but I don't think its as good. Oh well, if it
works, it'll do until I can afford something decent.

I certainly appreciate everyones efforts. I may keep at it, but for now I've had enough failure
with this card

.

MarkG · Posted: Sun May 05, 2002 7:41 pm Post subject:

I've successfully configured a ISA SB16 on a number of Linux distributions from Redhat 4 to Mandrake 8.1. If your card is the same when you do a "pnpdump > /etc/isapnp.conf" you'll see things talking about Sound Blaster and Joystick in the file, then it should be a case of multi choice. I've found in the past it work to copy the IRQ and memory addresses from the ones windows uses (at this point you point out you've wiped out your windows installation like me). I haven't tried configuring my SB under Gentoo as it's in a machine that's a firewall and print server so I never sit at it. I might just do it now to see how difficult it is...

MarkG

pjp · Administrator Joined: 16 Apr 2002 Posts: 20476

MarkG:
So isapnp.conf will work with non PnP cards? I thought I had read it wouldn't, probably something I misunderstood.
My isapnp.conf file has a bunch of lines remarked out that look like this:
# Trying port address 03f3
Then, the last line is:
# No boards found

None of the lines match the addresses for my card... for whatever reason, I didn't think I should put different settings
in there. I'll try putting 0220 on a line by itself... maybe thats the trick.

pjp · Administrator Joined: 16 Apr 2002 Posts: 20476

isapnp.conf is quite complicated. I did discover this though... more /proc/ioports

0220-022f : soundblaster
0330-0333 : MPU-401 UART
0620-0623 : sound driver (AWE32)
0a20-0a23 : sound driver (AWE32)
0e20-0e23 : sound driver (AWE32)

That suggests my card was recognized somehow. 0x0388 seems to be missing though. I say missing because Win 2K Pro reported it.
Under Win, 0x0388 was grouped with 0220 and 0330, while 0620, 0a20 and 0e20 were grouped together.

MarkG · Posted: Mon May 06, 2002 7:59 am Post subject:

Sorry I think I gave you a bit of a bum steer there I just check the output from pnpdump and it seems I don't have the card I thought I had. From pnp dump:

pjp · Administrator Joined: 16 Apr 2002 Posts: 20476

No problem, I learned something new which is always worth it. I'm giving up on this card. I have an AWE64 as well.
It too is ISA, but at least it is PnP. Hoping to get that installed in a day or so.

Thanks for the help folks.