Will I ever have sound??????????

[larryboz]

I have installed SuSE 7.1 on my gateway at home but can't get sound working. I have a PlugNPlay bios and do not have the option of turning it off. I have the SBLive and after multiple attempts I still have no sound. I grabbed a different soundcard and reinstalled but have not configured the soundcard yet but I don't think I will get sound this time either. Any Suggestions?

Larryboz

[rppp01]

I don't know Suse, so I can't tell you what config program to run, but I do know that many linux distros do not configure sound out of the box. Your SBLive should work. Sound is not detected by kudzu (IIRC), you need to get it going.
In RH and Mandrake, sndconfig is used to detect and install the sound drivers.
In Debian, you would use modconf.
Again, I am unsure about Suse.

[ 08 March 2001: Message edited by: rppp01 ]

[yard21]

Try to configure it with yast. Just log in as root and start yast, then search for the sound configuration option. You could also recompile your kernel to support your soundcard and edit your modules.conf, but I don't know how familiar you are with this. Wish you good luck!

[Kinjana]

If you can't turn off plug and play aware os in the bios (a proposistion I find dubios) then no I don't think you will get the soundblaster live working. After trying all sorts of other options, I never could.

sorry

Kinj

[ 09 March 2001: Message edited by: Kinjana ]

[wtsamatta]

I think that Kinjana is correct. I had that same problem myself and no matter what I did the damn thing wouldn't work till P&P was disabled. Maybe there is a fix in a bios upgrade<contact gateway and see what they say.

[SCuSI]

You may also want to try OSS instead of ALSA that ships with 7.1.

note:you may have to fool the install script into thinking that it is 7.0 and also you may need to disable ALSA. and this may end up being an exercise in futility.

[ShadowGoblin]

Try this should help.

web page (http://tweakfiles.com/bios/)


web page (http://tweakfiles.com/bios/tweakbios.html)

[twentyfan]

I'm having the same problem.

So Linux still hasn't figured out how to get soundcards to work huh?

[Hayl]

yes - linux has "figured out" how to get sound cards to work. i have an SB Audigy and a SB Live and both work fine under Linux.

OSS and ALSA both work just fine.

if you can't get ALSA to work with the SB Live card because of your BIOS, then recompile your Kernel with support for the SB LIve in the Kernel (OSS) - it works every time.

[mdwatts]

Originally posted by twentyfan
I'm having the same problem.

So Linux still hasn't figured out how to get soundcards to work huh?

Any soundcards I have used (pci or builtin) have all worked in Linux without any further configuration on my part.

[jglen490]

Originally posted by twentyfan
I'm having the same problem.

So Linux still hasn't figured out how to get soundcards to work huh?
Linux has no problem. Perhaps you do?

If so, some info on your distro, your hardware, and errors returned would be useful in resolving your problem. :rolleyes:

[twentyfan]

Yeah, I don't have the option to disable PnP. But why they make it necessary to DISABLE pnp on a PNP CARD is beyond me.

Like I said, they STILL haven't figured out sound.

[mdwatts]

Originally posted by twentyfan
Yeah, I don't have the option to disable PnP. But why they make it necessary to DISABLE pnp on a PNP CARD is beyond me.

Like I said, they STILL haven't figured out sound.

It's kinda hard to help with only 'my sound doesn't work' to go on.

If you have a PnP ISA soundcard, then you must disable PnP on the card using either jumpers or the dos configuration utility that will be included on the driver diskette.

[banzaikai]

Originally posted by twentyfan
Yeah, I don't have the option to disable PnP. But why they make it necessary to DISABLE pnp on a PNP CARD is beyond me.

Like I said, they STILL haven't figured out sound.

Well...

The reason for this is kinda simple, actually. When Linux sets everything up on your system, it has to log what addresses, IRQs, ports, DMAs, and handlers your hardware is using. Okay, you say, so what? Well, when PnP boots, it scans all your devices, and sorts out which card/device needs/wants what, and assigns the resources (kinda like how Redhat scans the dependencies when doing the up2date). If nothing EVER changes, you're okay (I was running fine with my Solo-1 audio and PnP on for months).

All it takes is one little hiccup, and the next thing you know...
Your IRQs, addresses, ports, DMAs, etc., are now allocated to different values, which screws up your Linux boot, since it's looking in one place for a sound card, when the BIOS just shoved it in another.

By disabling the PnP in the BIOS, all this stuff stays put once assigned, and you don't have that problem. To ensure this, you may want to boot with PnP turned off, set everything in Linux to the right values (if not already there), and reboot a couple of times to make sure everything's staying there, then use the "update ACPI/ESCD" option in the "PNP" section of your BIOS setup. This will force writing the settings into nvram, and if another card is added, it'll make sure the existing cards stay put while the new one is assigned. Then kudzu will have little trouble finding new hardware.

As for the sound, WHICH SBLive do you have? You may need to go to the SB site and punch in your model number to get the chipset used, and then try loading that module.

Hope this helps...

banzai

[ovf]

Hi,

I have an SBLIVE! card and the only way I could it to get it to work with PnP enabled was to use loadlin to run the DOS setup utility mdwatts mentioned.

[twentyfan]

Originally posted by ovf
Hi,

I have an SBLIVE! card and the only way I could it to get it to work with PnP enabled was to use loadlin to run the DOS setup utility mdwatts mentioned.

Do I need Windows to run it?

[twentyfan]

bump

[Fryguy8]

Err SBLive is extremely easy. At least in debian, I compiled in kernel support, added myself to the audio group (for perms, a debian-only thing IIRC) and it worked. No configuration necessary.

[twentyfan]

Originally posted by Fryguy8
Err SBLive is extremely easy. At least in debian, I compiled in kernel support, added myself to the audio group (for perms, a debian-only thing IIRC) and it worked. No configuration necessary.

I assume you're able to disable PnP in your BIOS, whereas I'm not.

[ovf]

Originally posted by twentyfan


Do I need Windows to run it?

I never tried to do it without windows. I know you at least need DOS for loadlin and you might be able to pull the DOS tools off of the CD or download them from creative labs without doing the windows installation.

Unfortunetly I don't have windows anymore , otherwise I'd give it a try.

[banzaikai]

Originally posted by ovf
Hi,

I have an SBLIVE! card and the only way I could it to get it to work with PnP enabled was to use loadlin to run the DOS setup utility mdwatts mentioned.

Ahem.

WHICH SBLive card? They've got the SBLive Value, Gamer, 5.1, MP3+, etc., and each one may use a different chipset. Anyhoo...

What's happening is the DOS SBConfig is setting a standard config to the soundcard, which is retained after loadlin is executed. Linux then see the card at the programmed settings, and continues. If you find the right driver for the particular chipset (ESS, SB, 10k1, etc.), then Linux can do this without the help of DOS - and that, as Martha would say, "is a good thing".

Hope this helps...

banzai

[ovf]

Hi,

Thanks for the follow-up. I believe it's the mp3+ version and it uses the emu10k1 chipset. Currently I'm using SuSE 8.0 and boot through lilo. If I enable PnP I get an error message during boot-up saying the card can't be found. Is there something I can do to get it to work? It's always bothered me that I couldn't get it to work with PnP. And, it would be nice to pass the information along if the question comes up on another message board.

Here's the error message.

"Sep 17 09:07:11 linux kernel: PCI: No IRQ known for interrupt pin A of device 01:0d.0. Please try using pci=biosirq.
Sep 17 09:07:11 linux kernel: EMU10K1/Audigy soundcard not found or device busy"

[TheManThatCan't]

when i put mdk 8.2 on my laptop i had no sound, it took me ages to figure out it was just the sound mixer had all the volumes down and mute as default (kde menu-multimedia-sound-sound mixer). The sound was fine on all my other machines tho'.

CC

[compsec]

my compaq 266mhz, and my friends compaq 300mhz never got the sound to work with RH7.2 or 7.3.

However, every desktop i've ever installed, running a HUGE configuration of sound cards from PnP, to on board, to PCI have all worked with no configuration.
As well as my two compaq m700 laptops, and my IBM thinkpad.

I think the best answers lie in like the first 5 posts of this thread.
May take some tweaking, but after you looking around the config files I'm sure you'll see what the problem is.

In fact, I think by reading this I see what my problem was with my 266mhz. I'll probably have that sound up and running tonight.