Slackware 9.1 won't load dev/dsp (Soundblaster 16) when running with Virtual PC

theputer · 06-14-2004, 10:35 PM

I installed Slackware 9.1 on my machine with Windows XP using Virtual PC. Virtual PC emulates a soundblaster 16 driver. HOwever, when I log into KDE as root or normal user, I always get an "informational artsmessage" saying error when initializing the sounddriver. Device dev/dsp can't be opened (no such device) The sound server will continue using the null output device. Obviously, I have no sound in my applications as a result of this.

I don't know anything about linux, so I'll need some step by step instructions in how to solve this...

I checked dev/dsp and there is a link there pointing to dev0. dev/mixer is linked similarly. They are both under root/sys privileges.

Here's some information:

:::::::lspci -v::::::

root@Slackware:~# lspci -v
00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corp. 440BX/ZX/DX - 82443BX/ZX/DX Host bridge (AGP di
sabled) (rev 03)
Flags: bus master, medium devsel, latency 0

00:07.0 ISA bridge: Intel Corp. 82371AB/EB/MB PIIX4 ISA (rev 01)
Flags: bus master, medium devsel, latency 0

00:07.1 IDE interface: Intel Corp. 82371AB/EB/MB PIIX4 IDE (rev 01) (prog-if 80 [Master])
Flags: bus master, medium devsel, latency 0
I/O ports at ffa0 [size=16]

00:07.3 Bridge: Intel Corp. 82371AB/EB/MB PIIX4 ACPI (rev 02)
Flags: medium devsel, IRQ 9

00:08.0 VGA compatible controller: S3 Inc. 86c764/765 [Trio32/64/64V+] (prog-if 00 [VGA])
Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 0
Memory at f8000000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=64M]

00:0a.0 Ethernet controller: Digital Equipment Corporation DECchip 21140 [Faster Net] (rev 20)
Subsystem: Unknown device 0a00:2114
Flags: bus master, medium devsel, latency 64, IRQ 11
I/O ports at ec00 [size=128]
Memory at febff000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=4K]
Expansion ROM at febfe800 [disabled] [size=2K]

:::lsmod Output:::

root@Slackware:~# lsmod
Module Size Used by Not tainted
soundcore 3332 0 (autoclean)
usbcore 58400 1
tulip 40928 1
crc32 2880 0 [tulip]
pcmcia_core 40032 0
ide-scsi 9424 0

::::emu10k1::::
root@Slackware:~# modprobe emu10k1
/lib/modules/2.4.22/kernel/drivers/sound/emu10k1/emu10k1.o: init_module: No such device
/lib/modules/2.4.22/kernel/drivers/sound/emu10k1/emu10k1.o: Hint: insmod errors can be caused by incorrect module parameters, including invalid IO or IRQ parameters.
You may find more information in syslog or the output from dmesg
/lib/modules/2.4.22/kernel/drivers/sound/emu10k1/emu10k1.o: insmod /lib/modules/2.4.22/kernel/drivers/sound/emu10k1/emu10k1.o failed
/lib/modules/2.4.22/kernel/drivers/sound/emu10k1/emu10k1.o.gz: init_module: No such device
/lib/modules/2.4.22/kernel/drivers/sound/emu10k1/emu10k1.o.gz: Hint: insmod errors can be caused by incorrect module parameters, including invalid IO or IRQ parameters.
You may find more information in syslog or the output from dmesg
/lib/modules/2.4.22/kernel/drivers/sound/emu10k1/emu10k1.o.gz: insmod /lib/modules/2.4.22/kernel/drivers/sound/emu10k1/emu10k1.o.gz failed
/lib/modules/2.4.22/kernel/drivers/sound/emu10k1/emu10k1.o.gz: insmod emu10k1 failed

:::::::::::::::::::::::::::modprobe snd-card16:::::::::::::::::::
root@Slackware:~# modprobe snd-sb16
/lib/modules/2.4.22/kernel/sound/isa/sb/snd-sb16.o.gz: init_module: No such device
/lib/modules/2.4.22/kernel/sound/isa/sb/snd-sb16.o.gz: Hint: insmod errors can be caused by incorrect module parameters, including invalid IO or IRQ parameters.
You may find more information in syslog or the output from dmesg
/lib/modules/2.4.22/kernel/sound/isa/sb/snd-sb16.o.gz: insmod /lib/modules/2.4.22/kernel/sound/isa/sb/snd-sb16.o.gz failed
/lib/modules/2.4.22/kernel/sound/isa/sb/snd-sb16.o.gz: insmod snd-sb16 failed

::::::::dmesg just gives me many errors like this::::::
hdc: packet command error: status=0x51 { DriveReady SeekComplete Error }
hdc: packet command error: error=0x54
ATAPI device hdc:
Error: Illegal request -- (Sense key=0x05)
Illegal mode for this track or incompatible medium -- (asc=0x64, ascq=0x00)
The failed "Read Subchannel" packet command was:
"42 02 40 01 00 00 00 00 10 00 00 00 "

---possibly because the emulated hard drive expands as it gets bigger?....

Any help?

Thanks

J.W. · 06-15-2004, 06:37 PM

Have you tried running (as root):
chmod 666 /dev/dsp
chmod 666 /dev/mixer

The issue you are reporting may be due to insufficient privs, and the above commands will give rw privs to all users. -- J.W.

theputer · 06-15-2004, 10:06 PM

Thanks for the advice! I chmod'ed both files like you said. Then I logged out and logged back in. However, I am still getting the messages. I tried playing a DVD and it played without sound.

What should I try now?

J.W. · 06-16-2004, 02:34 AM

OK - I went back and totally re-read your post. I'm not familiar with Virtual PC, but as I understand it, it emulates a bunch of stuff so that a non-Windows OS will work under Windows. The previous sentence may be 100% wrong, but in any event, it seems that there are 2 major issues in play here: a) Slackware hasn't actually been installed to its own physical partition on the hard drive, and b) it's not entirely clear to me whether you actually have a sound card installed. If Virtual PC emulates a SB driver, that's all fine and dandy, but it isn't going to produce sound unless an actual sound card is installed. (Again, let me emphasize that I am not familiar with Virtual PC, so I may be talking nonsense.)

In any event, I will assume that your primary interest is in learning Linux, but that you want to do so without disturbing your existing Windows installation. If that is a reasonably accurate description, the next question would be: Do you have available (unallocated) free disk space that you could define as a Linux partition?

If Yes: excellent - download the actual Slackware 9.1 installation CD's (available at either www.slackware.com or www.linuxiso.org ) then install Slack on that available partition. This to me would be the best approach, and if it's feasible, and you'd end up with a very nice dual-boot machine. As for the sound issue -- most likely if you do have a soundcard, Slack will successfully detect it. If you don't have a soundcard (or a built-in soundcard on the mobo) then obviously you will not be able to play sounds, irrespective of whether or not a driver is being emulated.

If No: get a copy of a Live-CD, which essentially is "Linux on a CD". I'd recommend Knoppix (also available at www.linuxiso.org ) and what you'd want to do here is burn the Live CD image to a blank. It will be bootable, so you can then simply drop it into the CD player and reboot (make sure the BIOS goes to the CD-ROM before the hard disk). What will happen is that you will be running the Knoppix distro off the CD, entirely in RAM. Your hard drive will be left untouched while you are running a LIve CD, so there would be no concern that something would "break". The beauty of this approach is that you can have a fully functional Linux installation without being concerned that it will interfere with your existing Windows system -- as soon as you want to go back to Windows, just remove the CD from the player and reboot. There are some limitations (it's not easy to save a file to your local drive) but as a learning experience, a Live CD such as Knoppix or SuSE is excellent.

Hopefully some of this will be helpful. Good luck with the project. -- J.W.

jong357 · 06-16-2004, 01:51 PM

You should be seeing your card listed under 'lspci'... It looks as if Slackware doesn't even see a card. I would say thats problem number one. Fred Langua tried this same thing and then bashed Linux for not supporting a soundcard that Windows 95 does on one of his articles.......

The flames are still raging on his forum a month and a half later. I would like to try this myself but I think that software is pretty pricey if I'm not mistaken... I don't know enough about trying to get Linux to run on an MS app.... I never thought they would even consider doing something like that honestly. Without seeing your card listed under 'lspci' I don't think your going to get much further... It could be trying to emulate it as an entirely different card.... Might want to go over to 'informationweekly' forums and sift thru the madness there if your interested in it. He would never state what card he was using, at least not that I could find so it's hard to find any valuable info except for pointless flame wars.... It was either a SB card or an intel i810 or one being emulated as the other for some strange reason.

I would have to agree with J.W on this and say forget using MS's virtual PC if you really want to learn/mess with Linux... Your just imposing a whole set of stipulations and external factors on your linux install that shouldn't even be there... Another thing to consider is that new Dell's are shipping with OEM cards but I think thats just their SB live 5.1 card and not the SB16... Can't be sure tho. 'lspci' even listed that crappy dell card that didn't work so I'm sure thats not it...

I'll bump this again if I find out any good info on this subject... Good luck tho.

Heres the article that started the whole flame war and theres a link for the forums at the end of the article...

http://www.informationweek.com/story...8901660&pgno=1

theputer · 07-03-2004, 01:55 PM

thanks guys. Just so you know, the soundcard does work under different operating systems if they're emulated in virtual PC (like windows 98, etc). But in any case, I think I am going to try the livecd idea. Thanks!

jong357 · 07-19-2004, 10:30 AM

I don't know if your still messing around with this but I thought I'd throw in an update anyway...

He still has a high and mighty judgemental attitude about the whole thing. The Virtual PC emulates all of your hardware as something completely different. I have it installed on my computer tho I haven't gotten around to installing Slackware on it. I looked at 'Device Manager' and boy is that screwed up. It's emulating ALL of my hardware as something different.... It seems as if 'Virtual PC' was emulating his sound card as an ISA card.... He admits to getting sound working but then on a reboot, it suddenly dissappears.... Hint, hint.... We all have run into that at one time or another with ALSA.... He however was mystified with the concept of 'alsamixer' and then 'alsactl store' apparently.... This guy irks me sometimes... Some people are just meant to stick with Windows and it appears as if he is one of them.

Quote:

13) Plus! Edition Extra: Xandros Speaks!

I finally got Xandros sound working on my PC. (See
http://www.informationweek.com/story...cleID=20300852 )

Initially, I bought a new basic sound card, disabled the on-board sound
in the new PC, and tried that. Windows instantly saw the change, added
the drivers on its own, and just worked. The existing install of Xandros
did not automatically see the change, but a fresh install of Xandros did
see the new card, and used it properly.

This, at least, definitively proved that it was a driver/OS issue: Linux
simply had no clue what to do with the PC's original on-board sound,
even though it was listed as a supported type. At best, I could get
Linux sound to work on a per-session basis, although the sound would
fail at the next reboot. (Windows had no such problems.)

But it really bugged me that the Linux sound would *almost* work on the
original card. Surely there had to be a way to get it running.

Well, neither I nor the many support techs and Linux volunteers who
helped could find a way, so I went to plan B. I removed the unnecessary
second sound card from the PC, re-enabled the on-board sound, and then
sought to enable Linux sound in the simple confines of a virtual PC.

Once again, Windows had no problem at all with the virtualized
SoundBlaster 16 PnP card provided by my VPC software; but on its own,
Linux was totally stymied. All the techs and Linux gurus I communicated
with kept telling me that it *should* work....

I finally found out what the problem was: The virtualized card is a
SoundBlaster 16 PnP ISA card. Windows picks up on the PnP part of that--
- Plug and Play--- and properly enables the card. But Linux can't
automatically handle ISA PnP. It apparently can only deal with PCI PnP.
Such a simple thing, but you think any support tech thought to mention
that? Sigh. My guess is that many of them don't know themselves.

In any case, once I pretended it was 1993 again, back in pre-PnP days,
and manually edited the configuration files in Linux to tell the system
the card's memory address, IRQ and DMA channels, the virtualized card
worked fine. Man, it had been a *long* time since I'd had to do anything
like that--- not hard at all, but a total anachronism: a stab from the
past, from the dark days of manual hardware configuration.

And note that this virtualized card, while ISA, still *is* PnP--- it
will communicate its settings to any system that knows how to ask.
Windows has had that ability for a decade. But Linux apparently does
not, and requires manual twiddling to work with ISA PnP cards--- it
ignores the "PnP" part. But once the manual edits are done, everything
works fine, just as it did back in the days of Win3.1.

Bottom line: Just because you have PnP hardware doesn't necessarily mean
that Linux will treat it as such: You may need to assist the OS. Here
are the resources that helped me, once I realized what was going on:

http://www.google.com/search?q=insta...r+16+linux+isa

http://www.linuxsux.com/index.html

http://www.linux.ie/newusers/beginne.../awe-setup.php

http://www.pclab.uni-bk.ac.yu/linux/ch32/575-578.html

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&l...ke&btnG=Search

So, I now have sound in Linux on my PC's using the factory-installed
sound system. All I had to do to get it to work was play with it for
over a month on and off, buy extra and unnecessary hardware, enlist the
aid of many support techs and Linux gurus, find a way to hide the real
sound system from Linux, and pretend it was 1993 again in terms of
hardware configuration. No problem at all! ;-)

Did he try to install Linux on it's own partition, without using Microsoft Software that they stole from somebody else like most of their other "Inovative" software? Nope.

"Well, golly gee!!! Linux sucks because my sound doesn't work on Ms Virtual PC"......

Some people amaze me... They really do....

motub · 07-19-2004, 11:19 AM

Of course, had he enabled ISAPNP in his kernel (it's disabled by default, afaik, because most motherboards don't even come with ISA slots anymore), there would have been no problem.

But what do I know?

jong357 · 07-19-2004, 05:09 PM

Your right. Thats the part that baffled me and I forgot to mention it.... ISA???? Who uses that anymore anyway.... There are alot of computers out there with them. But chances are 4 to 1, you have a PCI card or an onboard chipset. Because 'Microsoft Virtual PC 2004' decides to emulate his onboard sound as an archaic ISA card, he writes condecending crap like above. Or the Article on the link up towards the top of this thread.... Man.... I bet there are Flame Wars anew on his forum.... Think I'm gonna go check it out....

So, theputer, I would make sure that Hotplug is running on boot and make sure your kernel has all the appropriate PNP options as well as ISA support....

I don't have the original slackware kernel config file anymore so I can't see what Pat likes to enable and what he leaves out....

jong357 · 07-20-2004, 12:16 AM

Well, Fred Langua is a shmuck.... Plain and simple.

I'm tired of reading his biased crap.... I'm movin on....

thputer, I installed Slack 10 in MSVPC2004..... I don't see what all the fuss is about.

http://www.informationweek.com/forum...&tid=176500000