Hey guys, I have Debian 3.0, and my creative labs sound card won't work! I initially went back and used discover to find that I had not had the correct module installed, so I went and modconf, added the module, did the whole spiel. That resolved the error message that my sound card was configured improperly, however, I still get no output. I have tried the mixer for adjusting volume mute/unmute. Nothing is working! Well I noticed that alsa was a popular resolution to this issue, which seems quite common. I downloaded alsa 0.9 with aptitude it installed it but id doesn't like my default kernel which is 2.4.18b24 alsa from debian.org wanted to run 2.4.16, which it installed, but now I come to a related but less pressing issue. I can't get any kernel to boot other than the 2.4.18b4. Next I decided to try installing alsa from scratch, I went to alsa-project.org downloaded followed instructions, and it says a module snd-emu10k1 is supposed to be generated I cannot rpt CANNOT find it, I am lost I need sound, guys what can I do what am I doing wrong?

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I appreciate any help you guys have I am at a loss I have googled I have dogpiled, I have searched here and searched at other posting sites, I cannot find anything to resolve my problem.

PS if anyone knows a good place re: lilo and multiple kernel boots that would be appreciated too, thx all!!

Well I found a short term solution to my problem... I'd still like to get my SB 5.1 card working, however, at this time my speakers are working well plugged into intel's AC_97 chipset......hope you guys can still help with the SB problem thanks guys!

Yup, had the same problem. I had to go to download kernel 2.4.16 sources, run make xconfig and enable the drivers for soundblaster - in the config for the kernel is the emu10k1 module.

I compiled the kernel and changed lilo to boot to the new kernel (don't for get to run "lilo" after making changes). I also used apt-get to install alsa for 2.4.16 and it all worked okay.

Note: while the sound worked finally, it broke my network... probably something dumb I did.

If you still are having trouble with lilo and the mutliple kernel boot, re post and give the exact output when you boot.

Matt

Thanks for the tip....Although I have been attempting a different solution....I am trying to download the current alsa and compile it that way I can use it with the current kernel. I decided I'd try this sine alsa is up a couuple notches on version numbers. However, I keep getting an error when compiling the module. I may heve to go back to 2.4.16, but then again thats causing me a problem too. When I try to boot any kerel image other than the 2.4.18b24 It goes trough initial boot up fine, but then as soon as it starts to read from disk I get a root file system not found...Kernel panic. I wonder is this is due to the EXT3 file system I have instead of EXT2. It doesnt mater though I tried booting 2.4.16, as well as 2.4.18-686, and it gives me that message. I might try switching kernels to 2.4.16 but I have to get it to boot. Im in windoze right now....its up for other users in the house till I get Linux working properly...when I log on linux partition next time probably tonight Ill post my lil.conf thanks guys.

--Alex Scheidel

on the new kernel image, run rdev:

#rdev /boot/vmlinuz
it should then give you output like

Root device /dev/hda2

if it gives the wrong device as output, then that's your problem. Just run rdev again, but pass parameters to it:

#rdev /boot/vmlinuz /dev/hda4 (or whatever the root system is mounted on)

BTW, after screwing with Debian for many many hours, I went back to RedHat 9. Everything works like a champ. There are lots of things I love about debian, but it would have taken me weeks to get video, USB, firewire, sound, scanner etc. working. RH9 it all worked out of the box - 0 configuration needed.

I wimped out cause I didn't want to take all the time - dunno if you have used Debian a lot in the past but it's a b!tch to get setup.
Just my 2 cents
Matt

yea, I have used RedHat, Mandrake, SUSE, on both PPC an i386....honestly all of these distros are good out of the box becuase of their automatic hardware detection. As a matter of fact the way I got X to work in debian was an old XF86Config-4 file from a previous Mandrake install. I however, like the way debian is put together, and I prefer its package handling better than RPM. I am hopeful with the Sarge distro that they get auto detection working properly (I never thought like many that the install procedure was bad) Autodetection would make debian take a large bound forward to easier out of the box perfection, and bring it more mainstream. Thanks for the advice when I logon to Linux next Ill try it.

Thanks a million,

Alex

I have a problem! but what new? THanks for the rdev suggestion and I did it, however, I still get the same error although I did rectify rdev vmlinuz

Im going crazy!

--Alex

This may help and a better guide to compiling a custom kernel in Debian than the method suggested in the first link you would substitute emu10k1 where necessary. When I installed somehow something changed the /etc/alsa/modutils/0.9 after the first reboot and I had do some searching to find the correct settings so make a copy somewhere for reference.