In theory you don't need the dmix thing anymore. If your applications
use ALSA natively, it will automagically mix sound from several
applications (in software). If the applications use OSS, you can
force it to use alsa with aoss. BITD you'd run esddsp or artsdsp -m
<app> to do this sort of thing. Depending on the sound daemon of
choice you happened to be using. These days those daemons just get in
the way, chew up resources and cause XRUNs or other woes. If your
applications are configured to use ALSA, this should be a non-issue.
Assuming that you're running something current and not RH 5.1 from
some book or something.
In the few times that I tried to use dmix BITD, it was generally the
cause of problems, not the solution. If your applications use OSS and
you don't launch them with aoss, then they will lock the device (per
days of old). I'm not sure if that's addressed with oss emulation or
not. And aoss isn't perfect as something like a browser will launch
pop ups that are NOT launched with aoss and break the very thing you
were trying to avoid. Mostly problematic with internet gaming where
the games are pop ups. But for most other application you can select
the audio system of choice. alsa, oss, jackd, artsd, esd,
pulse-audio, and probably others. Alsa, having the least overhead
IMO, if you're coming up short on system resources.
check your .asoundrc and whatever system defaults were created for you
or by you in /etc/. I'm not sure of that locations default naming
convention as it probably varies between distros. alsa.conf?
asound.conf? +/- an /etc/ or /etc/alsa/ or /etc/sound/ or ??? And
various tricks of old to delete the asound.state file to force new
defaults. Located at /var/lib/alsa/asound.state on my system. YMMV
HTH,
- James
On 2/26/11, Bill Unruh <unruh@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> On Sat, 26 Feb 2011, Friedrich Ewaldt wrote:
>
>> Hi Matt,
>>
>> I didn't use a RME HDSP9632 for quite a long time (also I never used it
>> with the dmix plugin). However, the dmesg message sounds like a clock
>> source problem. All I can suggest is to check for the correct rate
>> settings, e.g. compare what hdspconf is showing to the output of
>>
>> cat /proc/asound/card0/hdsp
>>
>> --fe
>>
>> Matthew Robbetts schrieb am 26.02.2011 15:18:
>>> Hi guys,
>>>
>>> I've been trying off and on for weeks now, but I can't get my RME
>>> HDSP9632 configured under ALSA properly.
>>>
>>> (Is it me or does ALSA really not make this an easy process? I can't
>>> find anywhere to get any feedback from the system on configuration
>>> errors. Hell, if you make a typo in the config file, you only find out
>>> because of some scary-looking output from aplay. The docs on the website
>>> seem to be quite old and often conflict with each other and I can't find
>>> any relevant man pages.)
>>>
>>> Anyhow, the card works out of the box, insofar as it lets one
>>> application play sound through it at a time. So I'm trying to do the
>
> OK. It works. That finishes alsa.
>
>>> common thing of configuring dmix to let multiple applications output
>>> sound at once. Nothing fancy, really! At least, at this point.
>
> That in general has nothing to do with the card or the driver of the card.
> Most cards do not allow multiple inputs to all play at once. It is software.
> It is often pulseaudio or jack could be used as well.
> .
>>>
>>> My /etc/asound.conf file is as follows (pieced together from tuts and
>>> the like):
>>>
>>> ----------------------------
>>> pcm.!default {
>>> type plug
>>> slave.pcm hdsp9632_dmix
>>> hint {
>>> show on
>>> description "Default device: Plugs into hdsp9632_dmix."
>>> }
>>> }
>>>
>>> ctl.hdsp9632_dmix {
>>> type hw
>>> card 0
>>> }
>>>
>>> pcm.hdsp9632_dmix {
>>> type dmix
>>> ipc_perm 0660
>>> ipc_key 1025
>>> ipc_key_add_uid false
>>> slave {
>>> pcm "hw:0,0"
>>> rate 44100
>>> channels 2
>>> period_size 1024
>>> buffer_size 4096
>>> }
>>> bindings {
>>> 0 0
>>> 1 1
>>> }
>>> hint {
>>> show on
>>> description "hdsp9632_dmix: The dmix plugin - plugs into hdsp9632."
>>> }
>>> }
>>> ----------------------------
>>>
>>>
>>> Using this file, I get
>>>
>>> # aplay -L
>>> null
>>> Discard all samples (playback) or generate zero samples (capture)
>>> default
>>> Default device: Plugs into hdsp9632_dmix.
>>> hdsp9632_dmix
>>> hdsp9632_dmix: The dmix plugin - plugs into hdsp9632.
>>>
>>> which is what I hope for. But, if I try and play something with vlc, I
>>> get an error message and "No AutoSync source for requested rate" comes
>>> up in dmesg. The card is currently set to clock master at the same
>>> sample rate as the audio (44.1kHz).
>>>
>>>
>>> If anyone can shed any light on what I'm doing wrong (and, ideally, some
>>> methodology on configuring ALSA which doesn't require scrabbling around
>>> in the dark!), I will be grateful until the end of time.
>
> The alsa users documentation has long long long been its greatest shortfall.
> And noone seems to be stepping up to the plate to write the docs. One of the
> problems with the open software movement. In a proprietary system, the
> company
> would assign someone to write the docs, whether they wanted to or not. In
> the
> free software world, people do things they want to do. Noone wants to write
> alsa docs-->Noone does write alsa docs.
> (Despite that I like the free software movement, but it does have its
> problems.)
>
>>>
>>> Thanks a lot,
>>> Matt
>>>
>>
>>
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>
> --
> William G. Unruh | Canadian Institute for| Tel: +1(604)822-3273
> Physics&Astronomy | Advanced Research | Fax: +1(604)822-5324
> UBC, Vancouver,BC | Program in Cosmology | unruh@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> Canada V6T 1Z1 | and Gravity | www.theory.physics.ubc.ca/
>
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