Hi,

I've installed LINUX SUSE 9.3.
If I try to play any MP3 songs, Sound is not coming.
But, In the RealPlayer, shows as playing.
It seems, sound driver is not configured properly.
If my understanding is correct, what should i need to do?
Please, can anyone help me out this problem?

-Sathis

Let me see if I can sear you in the right direction.

You have not supplied much about your sound problem. In order to help you out, we need to know the sound card, or chip set ( on your system board ) you are trying to get working. In order to find out what the card may be, open a terminal, and type 'lspci' ( without the quotes ). You should see something like this:

lspci
00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corporation 440BX/ZX/DX - 82443BX/ZX/DX Host bridge (rev 03)
00:01.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 440BX/ZX/DX - 82443BX/ZX/DX AGP bridge (rev 03)
00:0d.0 Ethernet controller: Intel Corporation 82557/8/9 [Ethernet Pro 100] (rev 08)
00:14.0 ISA bridge: Intel Corporation 82371AB/EB/MB PIIX4 ISA (rev 02)
00:14.1 IDE interface: Intel Corporation 82371AB/EB/MB PIIX4 IDE (rev 01)
00:14.2 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82371AB/EB/MB PIIX4 USB (rev 01)
00:14.3 Bridge: Intel Corporation 82371AB/EB/MB PIIX4 ACPI (rev 02)
01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: ATI Technologies Inc 3D Rage Pro AGP 1X/2X (rev 5c)

If you have a sound card on the PCI bus, then it will show up here. On my machine, I have a chip set on the system board, and it does not show up. I have a multi boot system, and I booted to windoze and looked in the control panel to find out what windoze sees.

Next thing is to determine what sound drivers are available for your sound card, ( or chip set ). There are two major sound systems available in linux. OSS Open Sound System ( older one ) and ALSA, ( Advanced Linux Sound Architecture ). Each has drivers available for a variety of cards and sound chips. Is one better than the other ? You will have to decide that for your system. What really matters is getting a driver to work with your card.

Each sound system has a web site. Here are the links.

http://www.opensound.com/oss.html

http://www.alsa-project.org/

On each site you will find information on supported cards and chip sets. Also information on how to load the drivers. Like everything in linux, there is more than one way to do things. Most distros allow you to insert a kernel loadable module. You could also re-compile your kernel with the correct support in it. Inserting the correct module is easier for a newbie.

You can confirm what modules you have inserted with the lsmod command. Here is hat I see on my system.

/sbin/lsmod
Module Size Used by
nfsd 216736 9
exportfs 4608 1 nfsd
lockd 58536 2 nfsd
nfs_acl 2752 1 nfsd
sunrpc 128004 13 nfsd,lockd,nfs_acl
mach64 53344 1
drm 60404 2 mach64
snd_seq_dummy 2532 0
snd_seq_oss 31136 0
snd_seq_midi_event 5696 1 snd_seq_oss
snd_seq 46960 5 snd_seq_dummy,snd_seq_oss,snd_seq_midi_event
snd_pcm_oss 48960 0
snd_mixer_oss 16896 1 snd_pcm_oss
snd_es18xx 27208 3
snd_pcm 79784 3 snd_pcm_oss,snd_es18xx
snd_page_alloc 8392 1 snd_pcm
snd_opl3_lib 8672 1 snd_es18xx
snd_timer 20548 3 snd_seq,snd_pcm,snd_opl3_lib
snd_hwdep 6848 1 snd_opl3_lib
snd_mpu401_uart 5664 1 snd_es18xx
snd_rawmidi 19616 1 snd_mpu401_uart
snd_seq_device 6828 5 snd_seq_dummy,snd_seq_oss,snd_seq,snd_opl3_lib,snd_rawmidi
snd 46116 17 snd_seq_oss,snd_seq,snd_pcm_oss,snd_mixer_oss,snd_es18xx,snd_pcm,snd_opl3_lib,snd_timer,snd_hwdep,sn d_mpu401_uart,snd_rawmidi,snd_seq_device
soundcore 7008 1 snd

This is only a partial listing, and I'm showing you the sound section. Note the module called soundcore. That needs to be there for any sound card. The module called snd is the alsa sound system. The way to tell what a module does is to use the command modinfo. Here is a sample.

/sbin/modinfo snd
filename: /lib/modules/2.6.12-12mdk/kernel/sound/core/snd.ko.gz
author: Jaroslav Kysela <perex@suse.cz>
description: Advanced Linux Sound Architecture driver for soundcards.
license: GPL
alias: char-major-116-*
vermagic: 2.6.12-12mdk 686 gcc-4.0
depends: soundcore
parm: device_modeevice file permission mask for devfs. (int)
parm: cards_limit:Count of auto-loadable soundcards. (int)
parm: major:Major # for sound driver. (int)

I did all these commands as a user, not root. I had to provide the path to the binary 'modinfo' in order for it to work. The command I typed was /sbin/modinfo snd.

There is a lot to understand. So, in summary, find out what card or chip set you have. Go to the sites I posted. Find out which sound system supports your card. I have given you some commands to help you out.

Post back as much information as you can find, include the card or chip set. If you have a choice between using Alsa or OSS I would suggest Alsa, it is the newer system. The approach to getting it configured is different than OSS.

Hope this gets you going in the right direction.

Dude. SuSE takes out mp3 support in XMMS or any other player it packages. MP3 is a commerical codec or something. Realplayer can use it cause the did the proper legal work to.... Nothing is wrong with your card if you can play sound. You have some options to get mp3 google packman it is a common package repository for SuSE, download xmms and the xmms plugin, or compile xmms from source. Beep media is the same way. Hoever if you use amarok, you may need to get a xine-lib package that has mp3 support in it. you cant play encrypted dvd's either without downloading libdvdcss...

Dave

SuSE mutes most sound channels on install. Use kmix to see where the volumes are set and if any sources are muted. MP3 would use the pcm source which is on the mixer display of kmix.

As mentioned already, Suse 9.3 does not come with mp3 support. You need to start an online update (via the Suse watcher your system tray) and then select multimedia packs 1,2,3 - there may be a fourth. Download and reboot.

If you are using xmms to play mp3s then you will need some additional plugins which, of memory, I think are:

xmms-mad
xmms-lib-mad

To check your volume is up and to configure sound then do the following as root:

alsaconf
alsamixer
alsactl store

alsaconf configures; almixer is where you adjust volumes and alsactl store saves your settings.

Good luck!

Well yeah online update if you are patient enough to wait... I dont have hispeed, so it was quicker to download xmms and make a rpm of it. It uses the mpg123 plugin not mad, but who cares I can play mp3...

Dave

Suse 10.0 enables MP3 by default, why not you try to install Suse 10.0 instead of 9.3 ?

It is my understanding one must pay for SuSE 10. So why do that when linux is free?
Dave

Follow the "Download Linux" link on this site, looks free to me.

Indeed Linux is free to download at SuSE from their opensuse site. Novell also provides a commercially packaged version with CDs, DVDs, additional non-GPL licensed software, Manual and installation support at a fee. Distribution makers like Novell/SuSE and Red Hat can and do charge for their services as a completely acceptable policy. There are sites on the web that sell all the distros on CDs for various prices without support. This is also perfectly appropriate because they aren't selling Linux. The revenue companies like SuSE make are in part used to support the open source movement and development.