sis 7012 audio problems with ALSA 1.0.1
 

Hi,, I started using Mandrake linux 9.2 about 2 weeks ago.

So far I've had a few problems with it and I've been able to solve most of them, still this one is driving me crazy. When I installed Mandrake it automaticaly detected and provided the driver for my sound card (sis 7012 on ECS K7S5A motherboard), but I noticed it had the 3 problems:

1: no multichannel support, meaning I can't get 2 apps to use sound at the same time, if I play a mp3 on XMMS I can't get any other app to play a sound, Totem won't play files, there's no sound on aMSN or GAIM and such.
2: Everytime I play a mp3, after around 20 secs on playback the sound goes as if it was on fast forward for about 5 seconds and then goes back to normal, not such a big deal but it is kind of annoying.
3: Totem crashes on certain files, it reports a segmentation problem and plays the file with no sound till the end and then freezes.

So I updated ALSA from 0.9.6 to 1.0.1 following the instructions posted on their site regarding the sis 7012 soundcard

After this problems 2 and 3 were solved. But I still have the same multichannel problem.

I'm a total linux newb so I don't really know exactly what to do to enable this or to diagnose what's wrong.

here's my modules.conf:

alias sound-slot-0 snd-0
alias eth0 8139too
probeall scsi_hostadapter ide-scsi
probeall usb-interface usb-ohci
above snd-intel8x0 snd-pcm-oss
options bttv radio=0 card=13 gbuffers=4

# ALSA portion
alias char-major-116 snd
alias snd-card-0 snd-intel8x0
# module options should go here

# OSS/Free portion
alias char-major-14 soundcore
alias sound-slot-0 snd-0

# card #1
alias sound-service-0-0 snd-mixer-oss
alias sound-service-0-1 snd-seq-oss
alias sound-service-0-3 snd-pcm-oss
alias sound-service-0-8 snd-seq-oss
alias sound-service-0-12 snd-pcm-oss
alias /dev/nvidia* nvidia

------------------------------------------------------

I don't know if this is relevant but this is my etc/modules

# /etc/modules: kernel modules to load at boot time.
#
# This file should contain the names of kernel modules that are
# to be loaded at boot time, one per line. Comments begin with
# a `#', and everything on the line after them are ignored.

scsi_hostadapter
bttv

------------------------------------------------

And finally my XF86Config-4:

# File generated by XFdrake.

# **********************************************************************
# Refer to the XF86Config man page for details about the format of
# this file.
# **********************************************************************

Section "Files"
# Multiple FontPath entries are allowed (they are concatenated together)
# By default, Mandrake 6.0 and later now use a font server independent of
# the X server to render fonts.
FontPath "unix/:-1"
EndSection

Section "ServerFlags"
AllowMouseOpenFail # allows the server to start up even if the mouse doesn't work
#DontZap # disable <Crtl><Alt><BS> (server abort)
#DontZoom # disable <Crtl><Alt><KP_+>/<KP_-> (resolution switching)
EndSection

Section "Module"
Load "dbe" # Double-Buffering Extension
Load "v4l" # Video for Linux
Load "extmod"
Load "type1"
Load "freetype"
Load "glx" # 3D layer
EndSection

Section "InputDevice"
Identifier "Keyboard1"
Driver "Keyboard"
Option "XkbModel" "pc105"
Option "XkbLayout" "la"
Option "XkbOptions" ""
EndSection

Section "InputDevice"
Identifier "Mouse1"
Driver "mouse"
Option "Protocol" "IMPS/2"
Option "Device" "/dev/psaux"
Option "ZAxisMapping" "4 5"
EndSection

Section "Monitor"
Identifier "monitor1"
VendorName "Plug'n Play"
HorizSync 30-71
VertRefresh 50-160

# Sony Vaio C1(X,XS,VE,VN)?
# 1024x480 @ 85.6 Hz, 48 kHz hsync
ModeLine "1024x480" 65.00 1024 1032 1176 1344 480 488 494 563 -hsync -vsync

# TV fullscreen mode or DVD fullscreen output.
# 768x576 @ 79 Hz, 50 kHz hsync
ModeLine "768x576" 50.00 768 832 846 1000 576 590 595 630

# 768x576 @ 100 Hz, 61.6 kHz hsync
ModeLine "768x576" 63.07 768 800 960 1024 576 578 590 616
EndSection

Section "Device"
Identifier "device1"
VendorName "nVidia Corporation"
BoardName "NVIDIA GeForce4 (generic)"
Driver "nvidia"
Option "DPMS"
EndSection

Section "Screen"
Identifier "screen1"
Device "device1"
Monitor "monitor1"
DefaultColorDepth 24

Subsection "Display"
Depth 8
Virtual 1280 1024
EndSubsection

Subsection "Display"
Depth 15
Virtual 1280 1024
EndSubsection

Subsection "Display"
Depth 16
Virtual 1280 1024
EndSubsection

Subsection "Display"
Depth 24
Virtual 1280 1024
EndSubsection
EndSection

Section "ServerLayout"
Identifier "layout1"
Screen "screen1"
InputDevice "Keyboard1" "CoreKeyboard"
InputDevice "Mouse1" "CorePointer"
EndSection

-----------------------------------------------

I also added .asoundrc to root and home/"user" folder

pcm.intel8x0 {
type hw
card 0
}

ctl.intel8x0 {
type hw
card 0
}

--------------------------------------

I would really appreciate any help since I've been trying to get this problem solved for about a week and I'm getting kind of frustatred :(

Thanks in advance.

*System Specs

AMD Athlon XP 2000+ 1.6 Ghz
ECS K7S5A motherboard with integrated SIS 7012 soundcard
Nvidia Geforce4 MX440 64 mb video card

just to update a little when I run harddrake and I choose my sound card and click on run config tool it says something like the driver "" is not on the list (I don't remember exactly because I'm not home on my pc).

Okay, quick question, if you are playing a song in XMMS, and you get an IM, does the sound "queue" up? As in, after XMMS is finished using your soundcard, does the IM sound play? If that's the case, check these threads/websites out: http://www.alsa-project.org/alsa-doc...e=intel8x0#aso
http://alsa.opensrc.org/index.php?page=DmixPlugin
http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...5&pagenumber=1
http://alsa.opensrc.org/index.php?page=intel8x0 Goto the threads on LQ first, and then check the other ones. Most of the ones I listed were found in the threads. I had a similar problem as you, but it was much worse, so I crawled back to OSS :P. I hope you have better luck than I did ^_^.

Well I'm really happy to report that my problem is solved!!, I can now play mp3s on xmms while hearing sounds on aMSN, gaim and Totem. Meaning the mixer is up and running.

So this is what I did to get to where I am:

First of all this is my soundcard: sis 7012 integrated on ECS K7S5A motherboard

Ok so I'm running Mandrake 9.2 download edition, from the first time it configured my card and installed drivers for it as i810 audio using ALSA 0.9.6. Since this driver caused 3 main problems:

1: no multichannel support, meaning I can't get 2 apps to use sound at the same time, if I play a mp3 on XMMS I can't get any other app to play a sound, Totem won't play files, there's no sound on aMSN or GAIM and such.
2: Everytime I play a mp3, after around 20 secs on playback the sound goes as if it was on fast forward for about 5 seconds and then goes back to normal, not such a big deal but it is kind of annoying.
3: Totem crashes on certain files, it reports a segmentation problem and plays the file with no sound till the end and then freezes.

I decided to download ALSA 1.0.1. After I installed it, It solved problems 2 and 3. But still no multichannel sound.

So after a lot of searching and reading this is what my config files look like and this is the config that works:

/etc/modules (plain modules, no modules.conf)
-----------------------------
# /etc/modules: kernel modules to load at boot time.
#
# This file should contain the names of kernel modules that are
# to be loaded at boot time, one per line. Comments begin with
# a `#', and everything on the line after them are ignored.

snd-intel8x0

scsi_hostadapter
bttv
-------------------

I added snd-intel8x0in there which solved a problem on harddrake when I ran the soundcard config tool that said my soundcard drivers where not listed.


/etc/modules.conf

------------------------------------------

alias eth0 8139too
probeall scsi_hostadapter ide-scsi
probeall usb-interface usb-ohci
above snd-intel8x0 snd-pcm-oss
options bttv radio=0 card=13 gbuffers=4

# ALSA portion
# module options should go here

# OSS/Free portion

# card #1
alias /dev/nvidia* nvidia
# --- BEGIN: Generated by ALSACONF, do not edit. ---
# --- ALSACONF verion 1.0.1 ---
alias char-major-116 snd
alias char-major-14 soundcore
alias sound-service-0-0 snd-mixer-oss
alias sound-service-0-1 snd-seq-oss
alias sound-service-0-3 snd-pcm-oss
alias sound-service-0-8 snd-seq-oss
alias sound-service-0-12 snd-pcm-oss
options snd device_mode=0666
alias snd-card-0 snd-intel8x0
alias sound-slot-0 snd-intel8x0
# --- END: Generated by ALSACONF, do not edit. ---

------------------------------------------

I copied as it is but I guess you should probably skip lines that contain nvidia, bttv, eth and such since those are my vid card, lan and tv tuner card.


/home/"you user"/.asoundrc
--------------------------------
pcm.intel8x0-hw {
type hw
card 0
}

pcm.!default {
type plug
slave.pcm "intel8x0"
}

pcm.intel8x0 {
type dmix
ipc_key 1234
slave {
pcm "hw:0,0"
period_time 0
period_size 1024
buffer_size 4096
rate 44100
}

-----------------------------

this is the one that worked for me. Also on XMMS on preferences I chose eSound output plugin or else it won't share sounds with other apps. gaim worked with no modification whatsoever, and on aMSN on preferences / applications / sound server / I put esdplay $sound

Well that's it, It seems to be working now with the only flaw being that every once in a while XMMS starts going into like fastforward and I have to shut it down and open it again, not that big of a deal though since it's not that often.

Hope this helps for ppl with the same problem.


thx a lot GT_Onizuka, reading those links you posted lead me to figuring this one out :D

I'm glad you got it working, and I'm glad I could help!