Sound Blaster (Yes, Round Two For DSwain)+Gentoo

[DSwain]

lol, well this time its along with an SB Live card. Here's the deal:

Using some notes and things from my last post, i obviously knew that the driver is the emu10k1, which i built into my 2.6.4 kernel. Gentoo alsa detected the card during installation, and shows it on boot. Strangly though it does not show it under lsmod. It also won't work with XMMS. Strangly enough, i decided to emerge totem and try it there. It works fine (quite well, as a matter of fact) so I am kind of confused. I tried to do modprobe and insmod emu10k1, but it keeps telling me that it can't be found, though its in my system. I also tried some other things, with no sucsess. The only thing listed under lsmod is my nvidia driver, and no other programs will give me sound. I tried manually compiling the driver but it keeps failing saying certain files do not exist. Any idea's for me?

[DSwain]

just another update, gqmpeg happens to work also, which i am happy with because it is very quick and has a good playlist editor. So, if my issue cannot be completly resolved, it should be okay, but i would still like to have it working correctly, and not just magically.

[Hayl]

- if it is a 2.6.x kernel, did you compile alsa and the emu10k1 driver right into the kernel or make them modules?

- do you have alsa in your USE variable? less /etc/make.conf

- do you have the alsasound init script in the "boot" runlevel? rc-update -s | grep alsa

- is alsa-lib installed? emerge -s alsa-lib

[hard candy]

Just happened to have this on the clipboard, from Gentoo Alsa config (hope its relevant):
Last thing to do in this file, almost at the end, check if these lines are there and uncommented:

Code Listing 2.9: Near the end of /etc/modules.d/alsa

alias /dev/mixer snd-mixer-oss
alias /dev/dsp snd-pcm-oss
alias /dev/midi snd-seq-oss

After double-checking the file /etc/modules.d/alsa to make sure everyting is ok, run modules-update.

Code Listing 2.10: Running modules-update

# modules-update

Note: Running modules-update here will insert the data from /etc/modules.d/alsa into /etc/modules.conf

You should also verify that /etc/devfsd.conf has the alsa devices and permissions correctly registered.

Code Listing 2.11: /etc/devfsd.conf

# ALSA/OSS stuff
# Comment/change these if you want to change the permissions on
# the audio devices
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

Note: Notice that devfsd.conf sets /dev/sound permissions to be root.audio. Thus, for non-root users to use audio they will have to be part of the audio group.
But like Hayl says, they have to be modules.

[Hayl]

Originally posted by hard candy
But like Hayl says, they have to be modules.

Um, no, I did not say that. I asked if his were modules. I have mine compiled right into my kernel.

I asked him if his were compiled right in because that would be why he can not lsmod them.

I am failry certain that that is the case.

I think that he A: does not have alsa in his USE variable and/or B:has not set up his apps to use ALSA.

[DSwain]

1. Built straight into ther kernel
2. Alsa is (and has been since the installation) in the USE variables
3. I do not have ALSA in the runlevel, i will try that now
4. The ALSA Lib seems to be built, as portage can only rebuild it.

as for running it as a non-root user, it does not really affect me as i run straight root user anyways (yes, insecure, i live on the "edge")

and i tried setting XMMS to use the ALSA driver, but that does nothing to help out.

[Hayl]

what output plugin do you have xmms set for?

and seriously - do NOT run your system as root, that is so stupid and unnecessary.

make a normal user, add him to the audio and the games group, as well as the wheel and users groups and you are set.

PS: you can't lsmod the alsa stuff because it is built right into your kernel... which is perfectly fine.

PPS: Most apps have settings where you tell them what sound system to use.

PPPS: Did you put these into your kernel as well (under ALSA)?
<*> OSS Mixer API
<*> OSS PCM (digital audio) API
OSS Sequencer API

[DSwain]

The output plugin i am running for XMMS is the alsa output plugin, specfiically libALSA.so

sorry about running root, i've just become so accustom to going "su" then my password it just gets annoying, though i know its dangerous, its a risk i take.

as for the rest, the lsmod makes sense, it was just the only idea i had really to try, but it now makes sense why it won't load it lol. Yes, as i've seen many do by looking at them, and finally yes those are built into my kernel

[Hayl]

odd

what is not playing in XMMS? CDs or MP3s/OGGs or all?

[DSwain]

i don't use OGG's, only mp3's which don't work and i didn't try an audio cd, but everytime i try to it complains about it not being able to make use of any sound device, or to check if something else is using it (which nothing is) i will try a cd in a moment. The cd seems to play, giving me no errors, but no sound. I also check aumix, and all of those are up, plus totem/gqmpeg are bothing working fine.

[Hayl]

try re-emerging xmms.

[JohnT]

You do have alsa utilities installed, do you not?

[DSwain]

...

as a matter of fact i don't! I'm emerging it now, we'll see what happens. Do i have to add it to the runlevel like with rc-update script?

[JohnT]

I have no idea on Gentoo.....Slack only runs it when called explicitly.
Visit the Alsa site for usage.