Sound not working
Forum: Other Help Topics
Topic: Sound not working
started by: DonttPanic
Posted by DonttPanic on Aug. 20 2004,22:31
My sound does not seem to be working with DSL. When DSL boots up, it seems to recognize that it's there, but when I try to play something in XMMS, it returns an error message saying it cant open the audio. It says to check that I have the correct output plugin, no other programs are blocking the soundcard, and the soundcard is configured properly. Also, the little volume control at the bottom right of the screen doesnt show up on that computer. I also tried getting it to work on Knoppix 3.4, but still couldnt. Why wont it work?On bootup, it says i have an Intel Corp. I82801EB AC'97 Audio Controller driver=i810_audio
Any help would be appreciated.
Posted by cbagger01 on Aug. 21 2004,01:16
The solution is simple:Insert knoppix 3.4 disk into drive and boot the computer.
At the boot prompt type:
knoppix alsa
or
knoppix26 alsa
if you want to use the new 2.6.5 kernel option.
Your audio chipset is supported by the ALSA sound system.
Unfotunately, ALSA is not included in the DSL distribution so you would have to do a hard disk install and then install the ALSA packages to your computer before you could get your sound to work.
If you want to run knoppix with the Window Manager that is used by dsl, you can boot with the:
knoppix26 alsa desktop=fluxbox
Hope this helps.
Posted by DonttPanic on Aug. 21 2004,01:25
Would you happen to know what kind of package ALSA is, and would I be able to remaster a CD that already has ALSA on it?Oh, and I'd like to stick with DSL because its so much faster, especially when using the toram option
Posted by cbagger01 on Aug. 21 2004,01:43
First, make sure that ALSA really works with your computer. The chipset is supported, but it is always a good idea to test it before undergoing the installation.ALSA is available as a Debian package. Unfortunately, it is compiled for a specific kernel version and I am pretty sure that the Debian kernels are not the same as the DSL one.
However, if you are persistent you could do one of the following:
(1) Do a hard disk install. Do a dpkg-restore to enable apt and/or install Synaptic. Then install the development stuff like gcc. Search the forums for more details. Then you can download the source and compile. You may need the kernel sources too, so this could be a major effort.
(2) Get a copy of the exact version of knoppix that DSL was created from and manually copy the files over to your DSL installation. DSL version 0.6.x series and version 0.7.x series is based on knoppix 3.3 date 9/24/2003
Or you could wait until DSL version 0.8 comes out soon as it is going to be based on knoppix 3.4
FYI, you cannot use the 'toram' option with a full hard disk installation of DSL.
HTH
Posted by DonttPanic on Aug. 21 2004,01:49
Sounds like a lot of work for my lazy mind, but I'll check it out. Thanks for the help. But is it necessary to do a HD install?
Posted by cbagger01 on Aug. 21 2004,03:47
Instead of a HD install, you could complicate things even further by instead doing a "remaster" of your modified DSL into a new livecd.Obviously, it would no longer be only 50MB but you could probably use "toram" in a 128MB RAM computer and almost certainly for a 256MB RAM computer.
Jusy make sure to remove all of the extra stuff that you installed before recreating the livecd or your disk size will be huge.
And be prepared to spend a week or so of your spare time to make all of this stuff work.
Posted by ke4nt1 on Aug. 21 2004,05:46
In trying some similar things myself, some other issues came to light.When you apt-get the gcc, g++, and make files.. you get version 3.3
It seems that the kernel and sources were made with versions gcc 2.95,
which complicates things , and creates a minimum of a lot of error messages.
Many things just don't like it...
I would follow cbagger01's advice, and first search for alternatives to
DSL that support your sound chipset .. like another mini-knoppix..
He suggested using the knoppix disc to see that alsa even works with it..
Good Idea....
You could easly get another soundcard for your box,
disable the i810 in your bios, and live happily ever after ...
Does anyone know if there will ever be a "ndiswrapper" for
sound cards that want windows drivers , like we have now for
modems and ethernet cards ?
If AMD, NVidia, Via, Adaptec, etc... can design hardware that works with linux..
WTF does "Intel" have in mind, and WHO is footing the bill for their R&D ??
73
ke4nt
Posted by clivesay on Aug. 21 2004,15:52
One way to try alsa on a mini distro is with Feather. When booting up the CD, type knoppix=alsa. It detects my audigy 2 platinum card. I will add that I have only gotten this to work on the Feather liveCD. On a HD install, alsa appears to break. I reinstall alsa via debian but it does not detect my sound card! It's very strange.
An alsa .deb package is available so maybe you can d/l it for DSL and get it to work? I don't know.
Good luck!
Chris
Posted by cbagger01 on Aug. 21 2004,17:01
The Debian alsa packages are intended for a specific version of the linux kernel.I believe that the DSL 0.6.x/0.7x kernel is not compatible with the Debian ALSA packages in stable/testing/unstable.
But I could be wrong.
How in the world did Feather keep ALSA support with their distro? I assume that ALSA is a disk hog. Maybe my assumption is incorrect. Of course Feather has an extra 14MB of compressed data available in the iso.
I have the same (or very similar) chipset in my Dell 400sc / Intel 875p motherboard, so when I use DSL I have no sound
My best guess for a strategy is:
Wait for DSL 0.8 to come out. See if it has ALSA. If it doesn't, use knoppix 3.4 dated ??/??/
? to copy that ALSA files and build an extension, which could be very difficult or very easy. The answer will be unknown until it is tried.
Posted by DonttPanic on Aug. 21 2004,17:35
Unfortunately, ALSA did not work on the computer. It got rid of the error from XMMS about the sound card, and XMMS started playing, but i got no sound. Go figure (damn intel). I guess I'll either get a new sound card or just play with DSL on my older computer (which is what I'm doing now anyway). Maybe I'll check out Feather too.
Posted by clivesay on Aug. 21 2004,18:53
CB - If the alsa.deb is for specific kernels, that is a dirty trick to play on us clueless people who think you just apt-get and it should work!
In Feather I can get get the alsa debain pkg to run on the HD but it tells me I do not have a card installed. That may be the "kernel factor".
DSL .8.0 might help alot of these types of things. A couple dozen of my PC's have CMI8330 chips that gave me fits figuring out with Knoppix 3.3 but 3.4 sets it up right out of the box!
Chris
Posted by cbagger01 on Aug. 22 2004,11:45
To be honest, I don't know if the ALSA package is specific to a kernel because I haven't tried too hard to make it work.However, inside the package name is a reference to a SPECIFIC kernel version, which is why I draw the conclusion that it is intended for a specific kernel version.
Posted by cbagger01 on Aug. 30 2004,03:38
FYI,I am typing this from a livecd boot of DSL version 0.8 and am using alsa to listen to music with xmms.
Unfortunately, I don't know exactly how I got this thing working and I will lose everything at the next reboot.
I will try to figure things out and hopefully create an alsa extension soon.
Here are some things that I have done that I am pretty sure helped:
Boot up dsl with the "dsl alsa" boot command. This avoids the activation of bad non-alsa sound drivers.
Installed the gnu utils dsl package
Tar'ed up the alsa files from knoppix 3.4 livecd and untar'ed them in DSL using the mydsl button as user 'root' in emelfm.
Replaced the symlink /etc/init.d/alsa-autoconfig with one that points to /sbin/alsa_init file
apt-got the following packages from unstable: pciutils, libasound2, ncurses5, aumix, alsa-oss
exited fluxbox to text screen
sudo su to become root
/etc/knoppix-autoconfig
/etc/init.d/alsa-autoconfig
exit
startx
Changed XMMS preferences to point to the ALSA driver.
Started up XMMS from commandline as user 'root' sudo xmms
started up wmix as user 'root'
[Update] I was able to get it to work as a regular user by changing permissions to the /dev/snd directory and also the directory contents. I also did /dev/dsp /dev/adsp type stuff but I believe it was the /dev/snd stuff that made it happen.
I probably missed something, but that's most of what I did.
Stay tuned.
Posted by ke4nt1 on Aug. 30 2004,06:16
I've been messing around with this some as well ...Getting alsa working would solve a lot of sound card issues from
trying to use kernel drivers..
I don't have a clue how to accomplish all of this and make a ".dsl"
out of your final config..
My downfall was not using the "knoppix" files, but the debs..
If I can assist, let me know..
73
ke4nt
Posted by KumarLinux Fan on Sep. 20 2004,17:31
hey every one i have a problem. i have a DELL server which has Windows XP, but i am using knoppix live on CD v3.6. everything is working. the only thing that is not working is the sound card. it is a on broad sound card. they stupid thing is that i reads that i have a sound card and the driver Intel 97 somthing like that. but no sound comes out. i have tried everything (alsa & etc...). but it still doesnt work. i would appreciate any one would help me with this matter. thank u for ur time .
Posted by cbagger01 on Sep. 21 2004,02:50
I have a Dell server (Poweredge 400sc) and my sound works just fine in knoppix and in DSL (with the alsadebs extension).The solution is to boot with the "alsa" command parameter. For example:
knoppix alsa (for a knoppix cd boot)
or
dsl alsa (for a DSL cd boot, WITH the alsadebs.dsl extension in your root directory)
or
dsl alsa mydsl=hda3 (DSL boot with the alsadebs.dsl file located in the top directory of the hda3 drive partition)
Posted by KumarLinux Fan on Sep. 21 2004,16:31
REPLYING:i understand wat ur saying, but i dont know how to write the code . if it is possible for u ti give me a commmand i would really appreciate it . i am new with linux so i dont know much thank u very much for helping me
Posted by cbagger01 on Sep. 21 2004,16:54
OK,Here is a more thorough description of the instructions.
For Knoppix:
1) Make sure your computer is set up to allow booting from CD disk.
2) Insert Knoppix CD
3) Reboot computer
4) At the Knoppix welcome screen and "F2" boot prompt, type in:
knoppix alsa
and press the ENTER key.
5) Sit back and enjoy. Your should will probably work now.
For DSL, it is a little bit more complicated:
1) Download latest DSL ISO (version 0.8.1.1)
2) Go to the home page:
< http://damnsmalllinux.org/ >
and click on the "The myDSL repository is now online!" Link.
3) Click on the "Testing Area" Link.
4) Right-Click on the "alsadebs.dsl" link and save it to disk.
5) Use the WINISO program to edit your DSL iso image and copy the alsadebs.dsl file into the top level directory inside the image (IE: the one that has a directory called "knoppix" inside it).
6) Save your edited ISO file and burn it to a CD using your favorite burning program.
7) Reboot. At the DSL welcome screen "F2" prompt, type in "dsl alsa" and hit ENTER.
I can't provide any more details on the WINISO program because I don't use it, but I expect that it is pretty user friendly. Search for WINISO on Google or download.com and you can probably find out where to download it. Hope this helps.
Posted by KumarLinux Fan on Sep. 22 2004,21:49
thank man ur a real cool person.
Posted by Kumarlinux Fan on Sep. 22 2004,22:55
hey cbagger01 it is again i have tried tryed everything that u have told me . but nothing works. it is giving me errors stating that the sound card is not installed properly, i have not pluged it in the correct port , and that ther might be a program that is blocking it . i am not sure wat to do . if it is possible can u help me. i like to get rid of windows and install knoppix in it . thank u for ur time
Posted by cbagger01 on Sep. 23 2004,01:04
It is possible that your Integrated Sound is turned OFF in the computer's BIOS.Try pressing the "F2" key during the initial Dell boot screen.
Then go into your BIOS menu and see if you have your Integrated Sound set to "enabled" or "on". If it is turned off, then change the setting and then save and exit and reboot.
Hopefully this will do it. If not, I am at a loss to explain why the sound does not work.
Posted by sindhugshankar on May 23 2005,12:20
Hi,I am running DSL on emulator and i've problem runnig audio and video files using XMMS. it gives error like "cant open the audio. check that I have the correct output plugin, no other programs are blocking the soundcard, and the soundcard is configured properly."it also gives a warning "oos_open(): failed to open audio device (/dev/dsp) : no such device"
i dont face this problem while running DSL using USB drive. please help me out guyz.
cheers,
sindhu
Posted by cbagger01 on May 23 2005,15:56
You need the backup.tar.gz that comes inside the DSL-embedded virtual drive. It contains a command for your /opt/bootlocal.sh that loads the sound driver.
Posted by sindhugshankar on May 24 2005,05:46
Hi,I will not have backup file in the virtual drive unless i save something. am i missing something important here? I ran audio file, booting DSL using USB drive. later gave backup/restore to sda1. then copied the backup.tar.gz file to the virtual drive. whilel booting from emulator it says tha it is restoring data from the virtual drive(hdc4 in my case)...but still sound is not there. what could be wrong. plz help.
Posted by sindhugshankar on May 24 2005,11:03
hey,also my soundcardconfig command is not working. when i chked out, i found that the executable was not present in my modified DSL...remastered one. then i imported it from the original DSL and put it to the same location i.e /usr/sbin ...after this when i try soundcardconfig it says " can't execute sndconfig" ...whatz happening here??!!!pls help
cheers