volume sliders again

[Jean]

I'm not getting much replies on this one, so I'm gonna try again.

Since I installed ubuntu som 3 months ago every audio player I have seen on ubuntu has it's volume sliders at 0 and moving them does nothing whatsoever, except the alsamixer. Being an old hippy addicted to my music I really would like them to work as they should.

I have a plain soundblaster.

Additional info:
I don't know if it is related also don't get no system sounds.

When I start wine (or some other programs) I often get errors like:
err:alsa:ALSA_CheckSetVolume Could not find 'PCM Playback Volume' element
err:alsa:ALSA_CheckSetVolume Could not find 'PCM Playback Volume' element
fixme:mixer:ALSA_MixerInit No master control found on CA0106, disabling mixer
fixme:mixer:ALSA_MixerInit No master control found on USB Device 0x46d:0x8da, disabling mixer

Searching forums told me to get rid of pulseaudio. I did but the problems remain.

Who can shed any light here?
Thanks, Jean.

[randcoop]

Re: volume sliders again

Did you run alsaconf? If you did, did alsa correctly identify your soundcard? If you didn't, start there.

[Jean]

Re: volume sliders again

He thanks.

Well, alsaconf is not on my system, command not found.
I couldn't find it in the synaptic package manager either.

What I have is alsa-base, alsamixergui, alsa-oss and alsa utils and then the libasound* stuff.

I googled a bit around on alsaconf and there are discussions about it not being included in older versions of ubuntu because it would break stuff. There is advise against installing it.

I'm not sure what to do.

[randcoop]

Re: volume sliders again

Okay. When you run alsamixer, in the upper left corner, it shows the sound card. Is it right?

[randcoop]

Re: volume sliders again

One more thing (though you've probably checked this, I just want to make sure). If the sound card is right in alsamixer, did you make sure that the volumes are unmuted? In alsamixer, muted volumes have mm instead of 00 at the bottom of the slider. If they're muted, then the volume setting won't matter. To unmute, select the slider and press the letter m. It will toggle between mm and 00.

If all your volumes are unmuted and turned up and the sound card is right, then...well we'll cross that bridge if we come to it.

[Jean]

Re: volume sliders again

Really appreciated randcoop.

I don't know if this was clear but I do have sound. Else I would have screamed hell long time ago. Only the damn sliders refuse everywhere except in alsamixer.
I'm only 3 months into ubuntu but later on I would like to get working with software like rosegarden like I did with cubase on windoze, but if I cannot even have decent volume sliders that's gonne be something..

Ok, your question, no nothing is muted, all sliders have 0<>0, except analog F which has 80<>80.
But all volume sliders on players, audacious, amarok, xmms, they are all at 0.
As Card alsamixer displays CA0106.

I found this:
jean@main:~$ asoundconf list
Names of available sound cards:
CA0106
U0x46d0x8da

The second one is the built in microphone from the webcam. I tried booting without the webcam, then I had no sound at all. I then tried to change System Settings - Sound - Hardware but could not get any sound from my mp3's anymore. So I booted back with the webcam and put back that setting to autodectect, because that is the only one which gives me sound.
Also a bit strange, if I put back that setting to autodetect in stead of OSS or ALSA, audacious refuses to recognize it, I have to first play something with XMMS, then after that audacious plays sound again.

pf what a mess

Edit: I got something working. Started up kmix and clicked 'select master channel' and noticed that Line In was selected as 'the channel representing the master volume'. Changing this to Analog Front lets me change the volume in Kmix, but not in audacious or xmms.

Thanks again.

[randcoop]

Re: volume sliders again

Did you try other settings for the Master (in particular PCM)? I did misunderstand a bit about the problem. I actually don't use XMMS (I've never liked it and didn't even install it on my current system) or Audacious. But if your sound is working and you can control your volume, then you may have the answer by changing the Master Channel to PCM (or PC Speaker).

Edit: Have you tried Amarok? It's a great program and the preferred (by KDE) choice for KDE.

Edit: From what I can gather, Audacious does want to use the PCM volume control.

Edit: I'm also seeing that Audacious permits you to set an option for Software Volume Control, which would allow you to control the volume from withing the program instead of using the master. You should check to see if that option is enabled.

[Jean]

Re: volume sliders again

Hi randcoop,

I only have xmms as a kind of backup. I had amarok yes. I choose audacious as my player because it has the nicest skins (big pioneer winamp skin) and displays correctly the current playing song in amsn. And it lets me query the current song in my own app (to manage my collection . So I'm quite satisfied with it.

Ok, there's no Pcm listed in the master channel list here. There's line in, mic phone, aux, 4 entries IEC958 (center front rear unknown), same 4 entries Analog, and a capture feedback.
Also I noticed kmix does not remember master channel settings between boots.

Now you mention a software volume control option in audacious but for the life of me, I can't find it.

From what I have seen on topics on linux sound it is something rather tricky to get right.

Thanks for the help.
Greets Jean.