2010/6/23 Colin Guthrie <gmane@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> > 'Twas brillig, and Raymond Yau at 22/06/10 16:29 did gyre and gimble: > > 2010/6/22 Colin Guthrie <gmane@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> > >> As I said above, anything that comes from alsa is considered h/w > >> amplification for the purposes of PA's volume scale. It's not practical > >> to differentiate them > > > > > > Software gain is different from hardware gain. > > Really? Wow, thanks for that :p > > > Clipping due to software gain +12dB cannot compensated by -12dB by > hardware > > atten > > Another obvious statement, but not really anything to do with the > discussion. > > This only becomes a problem if the softvol plugin is configured to go > >0dB. And if it is, then I've got to ask why.... > > You can configure all sorts of crazy and weird shit in alsa if you care > to, but it's totally impractical for something higher in the stack to > deal with all the nuances of the ultimate results of that configuration. > As far as anything further up the stack is concerned, if it's > represented in alsa, it's "hardware". > > Just like softmodems, I don't care further up the stack whether or not > the functionality is implemented in firmware or software, I just care > that I have an interface to use a modem. > > So, yes, of course you could configure softvol plugin to do nuts things > in ALSA if you're that way inclined. I don't think anyone who is not > trying to do weird things will do that, however, and I don't know of any > particular h/w that is setup in a weird way by default either. > > >> Does any card actually configure softvol, by default, to provide any > >> gain, > 0dB for outputs? If so, then this is IMO a bad idea. > >> > > > > -51dB to 0dB is also software atten of softvol plugin > > So that's not > 0dB then is it? > > Col > > > > As you have modified /usr/share/alsa/cards/HDA-Intel.conf HDA-Intel.pcm.front.0 { @args [ CARD ] @args.CARD { type string } type softvol slave.pcm { type hw card $CARD } control { name "PCM Playback Volume" card $CARD } you should notice that the front device has a softvol plugin with name "PCM Playback Volume" why PA server still insist to open front device for capturing ? http://thread.gmane.org/gmane.linux.alsa.devel/67912/focus=68248 As Takashi had already mention that "I agree that the capture from "front" PCM isn't considered as valid. The "front", "rear", "center_lfe" definitions are rather for multi-channel playbacks. The capture on these channels aren't useful in most cases." you can perform an experiement pcm.test { type softvol slave.pcm "hw:0,0" control { name "PA Playback Volume" card 0 } arecord -D test -f CD -d 10 -v test.wav you will find "PA Playback Volume" in playback screen of alsamixer I am not sure the softvol control created when PA open front device for playback and capture is used for playback or capture BTW , PA still using "front" to open CTL device too _______________________________________________ Alsa-devel mailing list Alsa-devel@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx http://mailman.alsa-project.org/mailman/listinfo/alsa-devel