Linux is great in many ways however in the hardware department the OS is crucially flawed. There are many many different types of linux available but even the most user friendly distro some hardware does not still work. I've been trying for several months now trying to get my sound and TV card working properly under linux. The support for most hardware drivers is poor to non existent. I'm not saying that the linux community was unhelpful, I had many responses to my posts however no one was able to help. To get linux to work with the sound and TV card i would have to replace both items of hardware costing $100 up-wards which as a student i do not have. So i think that before any extra work is done on making linux desktop distros looking nicer more work should be done improving the drivers and documentation for them so that even the most inexperienced linux user can understand.

Boffy

This is posted constantly. As long as hardware manufacturers make their stuff without providing drivers to the community or opening their specs, Linux hackers have to reverse engineer all the drivers out of the goodness of their hearts. It's not a Linux problem. It's a hardware problem. Considering the circumstances, Linux's hardware support is incredibly good. And as it gets more popular and more manufacturers wake up, it'll only get better. Write your manufacturer and complain.

You're right that it's a problem and it's frustrating, but the title of your thread isn't accurate.

Get involved!

Make note of the specific hardware that was problematic or not supported and contact people that devleop the drivers and auxiliary software that makes things work.

Your word of caution and disappointment is quite understandable, and it proves itself as a good example of why you need to spend a little extra time before purchasing hardware to make sure there will be support.
Good luck finding some better hardware, and stick with Linux, it'll be worth it!

Sorry about the thread title.

I do really want linux to work and as per your advice i have contacted c-media to ask for better linux compatability (how much good it will do im not sure) but i the mean time does anyone know of a cheap 5.1 sound card that will work with linux for definate. I currently have a cm8738 5.1 and its driving me mad. Linux would be good with full sound. (I live in the uk so the card has to be from the uk )

I appriciate the hard work people do with linux and i hope that they keep up the good work. I currently teaching myself linux programming so maybe onday soon i can help reverse engineer a driver to help another newbie.

Boffy

No problem. Just that such threads often get kind of heated.

I've apparently got SiS SI7012 with C-Media CMI9738 chipset. It was kind of buzzy for a bit, but worked fairly well under OSS and ALSA and, for some reason, started working perfectly (as well as that can work perfectly). Also a general i810 worked. It's kind of weird - I play music constantly on my boxes but have three boxes with bad audio and one with none. Whatever is in a Tandy Sensation does not work with Linux. So that's all I know.

Great spirit regarding the driver-writing. I wish I wasn't an idiot - simple shell scripts push me to the limit.

digiot - Sounds like we have ALMOST the same motherboard! My sound wasn't working either and then I used the i810 as alternative... works perfect.

I think people get frustrated with linux the first week or so they have it - the time when hardware issues get ironed out and frustration level is critical (so to speak). Once the hardware is working perfectly, there is no going back to windows (IMHO).

Well, I was speaking of two separate machines, but cool that that worked for you. I don't know what did it for mine - I think maybe it was never a software problem at all and just a hardware thing - maybe I turned up my speakers loud enough once to shake them into cooperating or something.

You're absolutely right - that's a critical phase when you've got a semi-functional or non-functional box and everything's a pain to get working. I imagine that's when a lot of people lose it. But if you can get through that once and get everything going and experience a true Linux box, yeah, that's all she wrote.


-- Oh, but for me it took a *lot* longer than a week. Long story.

Unless you have some VERY eseoteric hardware SUSE 9 will run on pretty well anything -- about the only distro I've tried where I haven't had to do a lot of fidlling to get everything to work.
It might not use hyperthreading or all the bells and whistles but IT WORKS.

I'm running this on 5 different desktops and 2 Laptops.

Perhaps if you can be a bit more specific on what hardware device you've got a problem with then we might be able to get somewhere.

Also congrats to Nvidia -- who seem to be one manufacturer who posts Linux drivers for their graphic cards regularly on their website.

The only "niggle" I've had with SUSE 9.0 was in getting some wireless network cards to work -- and even then there was a get around.


Hi Boffy -- see your from near Newcastle --

Hope to see the 'Toon Army in the UEFA Champions League next season !!!


Any Soundblaster compatable sound card will work including the Augiy-- other good one's are the Via one's

Linux has moved a long way from where Sound used to be a perennial problem.

BTW this might be a bit obvious so excuse -- but sometimes all that's necessary is to adjust the levels in the mixer (AUMIX) --sometimes the default sound is muted -- I had this problem with KWINTV -- TV application for Hauppage WinTV card on SUSE -- after showing the mixer and enabling the sound it was fine.

HI again,

I use a CM8738 6 channel card that claims to be linux compatible however only 4 channels work. Ive unmuted everything and i have really tried with it. The main problem is that i have no bass which makes everything sound horrid! Any way thanks for the advice on the soundblaster cards one i have saved up i will probably get one.
Your right about nvidia, I use a geforce card and i had no problems with it whatsoever and i can get all features to work. Works better than it does with windows.
Nice to hear from a north east local who supports Newcastle. Everyone here in my town supports sunderland for some strange reason(very odd).

Boffy

Most places are market economies and once demand starts, supply will. Remember, at first you get pissed off at the system, and then you learn how to manipulate it. However, there's no piece of computer hardware I own that does not work with Linux at this point. Remember, the GUI's in distros like Mandrake never make up for the Portage system in Gentoo, or a newly compiled kernel with everything that you need and nothing that you don't need.

Is this Portage system you speak of easy to use?

Boffy:

sound blaster live's are in the $30 dollar range- check it out


Channels: 5.1
Max Sampling Rate: 48KHz
Hardware Encode: Dolby Digital
Digital Audio: 16-bit
Hardware Polyphony: 64 Voices
PC Interface: PCI
Connectors: Analog out, Mic-in, GAME/MIDI(See Details)
Package included: See pics
Special Features: EAX, Plug and Play, DirectSound® 3D

http://www.trustreseller.com/product...=13549&specs=1
Anyone know if this card will work on linux only £10 ($20)

FYI I have a cMedia CM8738 and it runs fine under linux. I have a 5.1 logi's for speakers and all seems well. I do not use alsa which maybe I should. I recompiled my kernel with support for the sound card and presto. If you want to use alsa good luck I have tried to compile alsa for my sound card many times with no luck. I may be able to help you get the kernel drivers to work.

Slack 9.1
Kernel 2.4.22

init from this moment on you are my god! I've been looking for someone who has the cm8738 with5.1 for months. Can i ask how you did it. Please be gentle im still not brilliant with recompiling thus my use of mandrake.