[lug] How do you make sound work?

rm at fabula.de rm at fabula.de
Mon Jan 7 18:59:34 MST 2002


On Mon, Jan 07, 2002 at 01:14:19PM -0700, Glenn Murray wrote:
> Thanks for the replies.  I couldn't find anything about OSS
> independent of ALSA in dselect.  As for ALSA,
> 
> glenn/$ sudo /etc/init.d/alsa start
> Starting ALSA sound driver (version none): no driver installed.
> 
> The alsa-modules are not in the stable distro.  The alsa-sources won't
> configure:

Grr, i forgot. I just dug into sound setup during the last week to get
some sonds from my notebook, but that's my development box, so i run
'testing' on it.

> checking for kernel version... expr: syntax error
> expr: syntax error
> expr: syntax error
> failed (probably missing /usr/src/linux/include/linux/version.h)

Yes, you need the kernel sources for ALSA to compile.
 
> 
> I gather this is because I haven't configured my kernel sources---but
> these (2.2.17) are no longer in the stable distro, either.

oh, i actually run generic kernels, not debian source kernels. That 
shouldn't make a difference.

> 
> At this point ALSA is looking like a waste of time.  Linux is the
> strong, silent type anyway, right?

Well, it's not the most perfect OS for sound production at this point
(see the discussion on latency in the kernel mailing list) but once
it works there are some pretty impressive apps. running on it (my favourite
being 'snd'). It's definitely worth the try.

Ralf Mattes

> 
> Thanks, anyway!
> Glenn Murray
> http://www.mines.edu/~gmurray
> 
> On Sat, 5 Jan 2002 rm at fabula.de wrote:
> > On Debian you first need to decide what OS level sound system
> > you want/need to use, OSS(either free or commercial) or ALSA.
> > Iff you want to use ALSA (my current pick) you only need to enable
> > basic sound support in the kernel but no compiled in sound card driver.
> > On a stock Debian system (i.e.  no custom kernel) it should be enough
> > to install the alsa modules package (alsa-modules-n.n.n-mmm, where n.n.n
> > is the version of your kernel package and mmm is the processor type
> > of your current kernel package). Otherwise get alsa-sources, install it,
> > read the documentation in /usr/share/doc/alsa-source and compile the modules.
> > On Debian ALSA is configured with files in /etc/alsa/ - have a look at the
> > sample file that come with the package.
> > 
> > On trap with ALSA: when you insmod the modules the sound is muted by default!
> > Get some ALSA capable mixer app. (xaumix or the like) and unmute it.
> > This can also be done in the startup script with alsamixer (package alsa-utils).
> > Feel frere to contact me if you need more help/infos.
> > 
> > 
> >  Ralf Mattes
> 
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