a sound problem solution?

Back in the day, I was something of an audiophile and was interested in
expensive sound systems. But that interest ended quite some time ago when
I realized how fettering sinking alot of money (and the time it takes to
earn it) into such things is. Nowadays, we have this notion of getting
sound from our computers, which otherwise would be limited to producing
for us various calculations, text compositions and graphical renderings.
It's a bit odd to me that someone would want to get quality sound out of
their computer: it's kind of like expecting your washing machine to double
as a sports car. Can't one machine just do one job, and a separate machine
another? Why this quest for the renaissance machine that does it all?

But, I wax philosophical. I finally decided to give in and listen to some
music through my computer. Mainly a satellite radio I've gotten to run
through it. I'm satisfied with the barest semblance of audio reproduction
these days: it sounds a little better than an old mono phonograph playing
45's, which is fine. If I want better sound I'll visit a friend with a
real stereo or go to a live performance. So, all would be fine if I could
just keep my computer from suddenly ceasing to output sound for unknown
reasons. I'm not really interested in troubleshooting the sound server so
much as I am in a way of possibly resetting it short of rebooting the
machine. Is there a way to do this, i.e., to shutdown, then restart the
sound server to see if I can get the sound back without a reboot?

A few details, in case it's helpful. This is Ubuntu, a Debian variant.
Sound hardware uses the snd_via82xx module--auto-detected and set up by
the OS on installation. Things I've noted that cause sound output to
cease: plugging/unplugging the speakers while the computer is running;
plugging a usb device into a hub mounted on top of the computer case; and
today I can't say that anything in particular caused this. The symptom is
an end to all sounds: no music will play, nor will system sounds. Only the
PC speaker remains operational. Sound comes back after a reboot. I'm
hoping there's a way to stop, then restart the sound server and that this
might resolve the problem when it occurs. I think this distro must use the
ALSA sound server, if I've understood correctly these technical details.

Any advice? Go back to using a stereo-type device for sound and just use
my computer for computing, perhaps?

James
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Re: a sound problem solution?

James Miller wrote:

>...So, all would be fine if I could
>just keep my computer from suddenly ceasing to output sound for unknown
>reasons. I'm not really interested in troubleshooting the sound server so
>much as I am in a way of possibly resetting it short of rebooting the
>machine. Is there a way to do this, i.e., to shutdown, then restart the
>sound server to see if I can get the sound back without a reboot?
>
>A few details, in case it's helpful. This is Ubuntu, a Debian variant.
>Sound hardware uses the snd_via82xx module--auto-detected and set up by
>the OS on installation. Things I've noted that cause sound output to
>cease: plugging/unplugging the speakers while the computer is running;
>plugging a usb device into a hub mounted on top of the computer case; and
>today I can't say that anything in particular caused this. The symptom is
>an end to all sounds: no music will play, nor will system sounds. Only the
>PC speaker remains operational. Sound comes back after a reboot. I'm
>hoping there's a way to stop, then restart the sound server and that this
>might resolve the problem when it occurs. I think this distro must use the
>ALSA sound server, if I've understood correctly these technical details.
>
>Any advice? Go back to using a stereo-type device for sound and just use
>my computer for computing, perhaps?
>

On my distro (Gentoo), when I wish to restart a daemon, I type:

/etc/init.d/ restart

or

/etc/init.d/ stop
/etc/init.d/ start

NOTICE: Do not include the < or the> on either side of the name.

I've not used any Debian varients, so I hope this helps.

Jeremy Abbott
jkbullfrog@comcast.net
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Re: a sound problem solution?

At 11:33 PM 1/10/2005 -0600, James Miller wrote:
[...]
So, all would be fine if I could
>just keep my computer from suddenly ceasing to output sound for unknown
>reasons. I'm not really interested in troubleshooting the sound server so
>much as I am in a way of possibly resetting it short of rebooting the
>machine. Is there a way to do this, i.e., to shutdown, then restart the
>sound server to see if I can get the sound back without a reboot?
>
>A few details, in case it's helpful. This is Ubuntu, a Debian variant.
>Sound hardware uses the snd_via82xx module--auto-detected and set up by
>the OS on installation. Things I've noted that cause sound output to
>cease: plugging/unplugging the speakers while the computer is running;
>plugging a usb device into a hub mounted on top of the computer case; and
>today I can't say that anything in particular caused this. The symptom is
>an end to all sounds: no music will play, nor will system sounds. Only the
>PC speaker remains operational. Sound comes back after a reboot. I'm
>hoping there's a way to stop, then restart the sound server and that this
>might resolve the problem when it occurs. I think this distro must use the
>ALSA sound server, if I've understood correctly these technical details.
>
>Any advice? Go back to using a stereo-type device for sound and just use
>my computer for computing, perhaps?


The sound "server"? It's not completely clear what you are referring to.

If you mean the kernel module, the usual way to "restart" it is to rmmod
it, then modprobe it. If you want more specific advice here, then please
provide the output of lsmod, as well as identification of the kernel
involved (uname -a usually provides this).

If you mean whatever app you use to play things ... xmms, as an example ...
please tell us what you are playing (music? sound accompanying video?) and
what you are playing it with (xmms? mpg123? xine? mplayer?).

You mention "system sounds". What system sounds does the host generate when
sound is working? (I ask because my own Linux systems here do not use the
sound card for anything other than audio playback, including the audio
associated with video.)

More fundamentally, if the problem is generated by unplugging, then
replugging a speaker connection to the sound card (or on-mobo sound
interface), then that suggests a hardware problem ... the connection to
external speakers is one way only, and the kernel really has no way to
detect the presense or absence of speakers. What kind of "reboot" restores
sound (one caused by entering the "reboot" command or an equivalent, or a
power-cycle reboot)? What hardware is involved?




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Checked by AVG Anti-Virus.
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Re: a sound problem solution?

James Miller wrote:
> But, I wax philosophical. I finally decided to give in and listen to some
> music through my computer. Mainly a satellite radio I've gotten to run
> through it. I'm satisfied with the barest semblance of audio reproduction
> these days: it sounds a little better than an old mono phonograph playing
> 45's, which is fine. If I want better sound I'll visit a friend with a
> real stereo or go to a live performance. So, all would be fine if I could
> just keep my computer from suddenly ceasing to output sound for unknown
> reasons. I'm not really interested in troubleshooting the sound server so
> much as I am in a way of possibly resetting it short of rebooting the
> machine. Is there a way to do this, i.e., to shutdown, then restart the
> sound server to see if I can get the sound back without a reboot?
>
> A few details, in case it's helpful. This is Ubuntu, a Debian variant.
> Sound hardware uses the snd_via82xx module--auto-detected and set up by
> the OS on installation. Things I've noted that cause sound output to
> cease: plugging/unplugging the speakers while the computer is running;
> plugging a usb device into a hub mounted on top of the computer case; and
> today I can't say that anything in particular caused this. The symptom is
> an end to all sounds: no music will play, nor will system sounds. Only the
> PC speaker remains operational. Sound comes back after a reboot. I'm
> hoping there's a way to stop, then restart the sound server and that this
> might resolve the problem when it occurs. I think this distro must use the
> ALSA sound server, if I've understood correctly these technical details.
>

Everything these days uses ALSA - the old OSS system is deprecated (and for good
reasons). You can rmmod/modprobe the driver, and that will work sometimes, but
on-motherboard sound systems are notoriously crappy.

> Any advice? Go back to using a stereo-type device for sound and just use
> my computer for computing, perhaps?
>

Try Fedora. I'm using Fedora Core 2, with a custom-compiled kernel and a Sound
Blaster Live, running the emu10k1 driver compiled in. The only problem I've ever
had with it is when I went from a kernel module to a compiled-in driver - had to
use the system-config-soundcard utility to reset everything.

Once my brother gets his Mac, I'll be grabbing the E-MU 0404 he has in his Windows
box - now *that's* a sound card...

> James
> -
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Can"t locate module memory_cs

Howdy, Everyone:

I am trying to use any pcmcia cards on my new laptop.
Slackware v10.0, bareacpi.i, kernel-2.4.26
HP Pavilion, zv5410, AMD64, 512M RAM, 60G HD

....
kernel: cs: warning: no high memory space
....
kernel: cs: unable to map card memory!
....
cardmgr[76]: + modprobe: Can't locate module memory_cs
....

Any/all my pc-cards fail with similar report in /var/log/messages:
(I noticed that when it probes for high memory,
it excludes exactly what it probes! :-| )
....
Jan 12 14:03:11 gelmce-3 cardmgr[76]: socket 0: Anonymous Memory
Jan 12 14:03:11 gelmce-3 kernel: cs: memory probe 0xa0000000-0xa0ffffff:
excluding 0xa0000000-0xa0ffffff
Jan 12 14:03:11 gelmce-3 kernel: cs: memory probe 0x60000000-0x60ffffff:
excluding 0x60000000-0x60ffffff
Jan 12 14:03:11 gelmce-3 kernel: cs: warning: no high memory space
available!
Jan 12 14:03:11 gelmce-3 kernel: cs: memory probe 0x0d0000-0x0dffff:
excluding 0xd0000-0xdffff
Jan 12 14:03:11 gelmce-3 kernel: cs: memory probe 0x0e0000-0x0effff:
excluding 0xe0000-0xeffff
Jan 12 14:03:11 gelmce-3 kernel: cs: memory probe 0x0c0000-0x0cffff:
excluding 0xc0000-0xcffff
Jan 12 14:03:11 gelmce-3 kernel: cs: memory probe 0x0f0000-0x0fffff:
excluding 0xf0000-0xfffff
Jan 12 14:03:11 gelmce-3 kernel: cs: unable to map card memory!
Jan 12 14:03:11 gelmce-3 last message repeated 5 times
Jan 12 14:03:11 gelmce-3 cardmgr[76]: executing: 'modprobe memory_cs 2>&1'
Jan 12 14:03:11 gelmce-3 cardmgr[76]: + modprobe: Can't locate module
memory_cs
Jan 12 14:03:11 gelmce-3 cardmgr[76]: modprobe exited with status 255
Jan 12 14:03:11 gelmce-3 cardmgr[76]: module
/lib/modules/2.4.26/pcmcia/memory_cs.o not available
....

Where do I go for help?

Regards, Chuck


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