[GoLugTech] How I solved my audio problem

[Steve Litt]

Hi all,

I was having the oft-reported problem of only one sound producing
program being able to use the sound system at once. Even if something
isn't currently playing, the fact that it's running and *has* made
sound prevents anything else from using the sound card.

Alsa's dmix plugin is supposed to fix that, but no dmix addition I made
to ~/.asoundrc would change it.

So I installed PulseAudio, and the problem just went away. I'm not
pleased with the added complication, and have had horrible ghost mute
problems with PulseAudio in the past, but so far, so good.

SteveT

Steve Litt
October 2015 featured book: Thriving in Tough Times
http://www.troubleshooters.com/thrive

[Shawn McMahon]

Post by Steve Litt
Hi all,
I was having the oft-reported problem of only one sound producing
program being able to use the sound system at once. Even if something
isn't currently playing, the fact that it's running and *has* made
sound prevents anything else from using the sound card.
Alsa's dmix plugin is supposed to fix that, but no dmix addition I made
to ~/.asoundrc would change it.
So I installed PulseAudio, and the problem just went away. I'm not
pleased with the added complication, and have had horrible ghost mute
problems with PulseAudio in the past, but so far, so good.

Because some problems are best solved by having a single process be their
gatekeeper. If only someone could have suggested this to you years ago,
they could have saved you this trouble.

[Steve Litt]

On Sat, 31 Oct 2015 16:25:18 -0400

On Sat, Oct 31, 2015 at 3:24 PM, Steve Litt

Post by Steve Litt
Hi all,
I was having the oft-reported problem of only one sound producing
program being able to use the sound system at once. Even if
something isn't currently playing, the fact that it's running and
*has* made sound prevents anything else from using the sound card.
Alsa's dmix plugin is supposed to fix that, but no dmix addition I
made to ~/.asoundrc would change it.
So I installed PulseAudio, and the problem just went away. I'm not
pleased with the added complication, and have had horrible ghost
mute problems with PulseAudio in the past, but so far, so good.

Because some problems are best solved by having a single process be
their gatekeeper. If only someone could have suggested this to you
years ago, they could have saved you this trouble.

I don't understand the preceding two sentences.

SteveT

Steve Litt
October 2015 featured book: Thriving in Tough Times
http://www.troubleshooters.com/thrive

[Richard F. Ostrow Jr.]

Post by Steve Litt
On Sat, 31 Oct 2015 16:25:18 -0400

On Sat, Oct 31, 2015 at 3:24 PM, Steve Litt

Post by Steve Litt
Hi all,
I was having the oft-reported problem of only one sound producing
program being able to use the sound system at once. Even if
something isn't currently playing, the fact that it's running and
*has* made sound prevents anything else from using the sound card.
Alsa's dmix plugin is supposed to fix that, but no dmix addition I
made to ~/.asoundrc would change it.
So I installed PulseAudio, and the problem just went away. I'm not
pleased with the added complication, and have had horrible ghost
mute problems with PulseAudio in the past, but so far, so good.

Because some problems are best solved by having a single process be
their gatekeeper. If only someone could have suggested this to you
years ago, they could have saved you this trouble.

I don't understand the preceding two sentences.

He means that's why people started using pulse audio to begin with -
this problem was solved years ago by pulse, and was a driving reason for
pulse to even exist. Pulse is a single process that handles all audio -
it grabs the audio device and does software multiplexing with all your
other applications - hence it is the gatekeeper that all audio must pass
through. Much better than the hit-and-miss audio support from various
audio card vendors, some of which supported hardware multiplexing, and
many of which did not.

[Bryan J Smith]

Post by Steve Litt
I was having the oft-reported problem of only one sound producing
program being able to use the sound system at once. Even if something
isn't currently playing, the fact that it's running and *has* made
sound prevents anything else from using the sound card.
Alsa's dmix plugin is supposed to fix that, but no dmix addition I made
to ~/.asoundrc would change it.

A sound Daemon is required on the backend.

Post by Steve Litt
So I installed PulseAudio, and the problem just went away. I'm not
pleased with the added complication, and have had horrible ghost mute
problems with PulseAudio in the past, but so far, so good.

PulseAudio is fairly well supported by even the most staunchly anti-LP
maintainers these days. It can emulate interfaces and support for most
existing sound Daemons.

You once asked about remote audio for VNC, and I laughed back then. But
that is a major feature PulseAusio supports.

Virtually all issues I've ever had with it have been on Ubuntu and, worse
yet, the desktop environments not in stock Ubuntu. Both Kubuntu and Lubuntu
were notorious for having issues in the past, even after the Ubuntu
maintainers finally got the base distro with Unity correct.

But it's usually not an issue these days with most distros at all. And for
VDI, which everyone is pushing, it's really the only option.

-- bjs

DISCLAIMER: Sent from phone, please excuse any typos

[Steve Litt]

On Sat, 31 Oct 2015 19:19:55 -0400

Post by Bryan J Smith

Post by Steve Litt
I was having the oft-reported problem of only one sound producing
program being able to use the sound system at once. Even if
something isn't currently playing, the fact that it's running and
*has* made sound prevents anything else from using the sound card.
Alsa's dmix plugin is supposed to fix that, but no dmix addition I
made to ~/.asoundrc would change it.

A sound Daemon is required on the backend.

My problem occurred whether or not I ran the alsa daemon in the
background:

===================================
#!/bin/sh
set -e
alsactl restore
exec chpst -b alsa pause
===================================

Post by Bryan J Smith

Post by Steve Litt
So I installed PulseAudio, and the problem just went away. I'm not
pleased with the added complication, and have had horrible ghost
mute problems with PulseAudio in the past, but so far, so good.

PulseAudio is fairly well supported by even the most staunchly anti-LP
maintainers these days. It can emulate interfaces and support for most
existing sound Daemons.

Yes, it certainly seemed to work flawlessly on Void.

Well, except that pavucontrol tells me that the connection to
Pulseaudio failed. I'm not sure I even want to fix that, because right
now everything works well with alsacontrol and I never have mutes I
can't find.

Post by Bryan J Smith
You once asked about remote audio for VNC, and I laughed back then.
But that is a major feature PulseAusio supports.
Virtually all issues I've ever had with it have been on Ubuntu and,
worse yet, the desktop environments not in stock Ubuntu. Both Kubuntu
and Lubuntu were notorious for having issues in the past, even after
the Ubuntu maintainers finally got the base distro with Unity correct.

Yes, my gripes with hidden mutes that go away when you uninstall
Pulesaudio were with Ubuntu and Debian.

SteveT

Steve Litt
October 2015 featured book: Thriving in Tough Times
http://www.troubleshooters.com/thrive

[Bryan J Smith]

Post by Steve Litt
My problem occurred whether or not I ran the alsa daemon in the
===================================
#!/bin/sh
set -e
alsactl restore
exec chpst -b alsa pause
===================================

Correct. ;)

"Just use ALSA" has been the defacto-standard Ubuntu "workaround" for
PulseAudio thrown about blindly and without asterisks. In reality,
one has to ensure ALSA also loads its sound daemon
solutions/emulations, including its various emulations. But some
distros don't ship those by default any more, now that PulseAudio is
defacto-standard.

Although if your ALSA drivers don't work, or work correctly for one's
sound card, then it doesn't matter what one uses.

Post by Steve Litt
Yes, it certainly seemed to work flawlessly on Void.

It works pretty good on Ubuntu these days as well, as the maintainers
have shipped the appropriate sound daemons and enable them by default.
Although most distros usually get PulseAudio correct. Most of
PulseAudio's negative perception comes from the mass of Ubuntu users.
Hence the circular reference.

Post by Steve Litt
Well, except that pavucontrol tells me that the connection to
Pulseaudio failed. I'm not sure I even want to fix that, because right
now everything works well with alsacontrol and I never have mutes I
can't find.

It all depends on what interfaces are being provided, and the related
sound daemons. That's pretty much always what it is ... whether ALSA
or PulseAudio. PulseAudio just has features that no other solution
has. Otherwise PulseAudio wouldn't have been invented. E.g., remote,
streaming audio, including package order/synchronization and other
things.

Post by Steve Litt
Yes, my gripes with hidden mutes that go away when you uninstall
Pulesaudio were with Ubuntu and Debian.

And LP had a lot of gripes with how they did PulseAudio, when not only
Fedora got it right (which is easy given the direct maintainership),
but OpenSuSE and many others. But that's almost all
water-under-the-bridge now. It did take a good 3 years though, hence
why LP's name is negative in the eyes of Ubuntu users.

[Steve Litt]

On Sat, 31 Oct 2015 15:24:28 -0400

Post by Steve Litt
Hi all,
I was having the oft-reported problem of only one sound producing
program being able to use the sound system at once. Even if something
isn't currently playing, the fact that it's running and *has* made
sound prevents anything else from using the sound card.
Alsa's dmix plugin is supposed to fix that, but no dmix addition I
made to ~/.asoundrc would change it.
So I installed PulseAudio, and the problem just went away. I'm not
pleased with the added complication, and have had horrible ghost mute
problems with PulseAudio in the past, but so far, so good.
SteveT

UPDATE:

It turned out that I was able to uninstall PulseAudio, and still have
complete sharing of the sound card, once I put the right stuff in
~/.asoundrc. So now I have ALSA's dmix doing what PulseAudio was doing,
and everything's fine.

SteveT

Steve Litt
October 2015 featured book: Thriving in Tough Times
http://www.troubleshooters.com/thrive