On Wed, November 1, 2006 6:44 am, Chris Forzetting wrote:

Hi all ~

My volume control (and the full kmix program) does not seem to affect the volume of many applications, including realplayer and other media players.

Welcome to the wacky world of Linux multimedia driver conflicts. In this corner, we have ARTS trying to control your soundboard for certian apps. In this corner, we have various other sound driver apps trying to take control. Unfortunately, due to the OSS policies of Linux/SUSE we get screwed with conflicting sound drivers stomping over each other in order to be The One. This comes due to the fact there is no one body stating how Linux must implement sound. That can be a good or a bad thing, depending on your perspective. My guess is that multimedia will come under some standards group like the Linux Standards Base folks and hopefully this issue will be resolved some time. Here's what I've found (using KDE, of course): AmaroK doesn't at all like to be harrased by KMix. Flash and/or MPlayer in Firefox don't allow KMix to be used while playing, but will be changed when relaunched. Most other multimedia apps seem to 'play nice' with KMix. Firefox doens't like the OSD and multimedia keys to control KMix. Many older C apps don't like sound to be controlled at all by outside sources. Go figure! It is one more reason I use the slogan, "Linux - it sucks less than the alternative." Trust me, however, it is a far cry better these days from when I first started using Red Hat 4.2 or Mandrake 6.0 and I could barely get half my apps to play rudimentary sounds. I remember working for hours under Manrake 6.0 to get my .mp3 files to play successfully. But then I'm a newbie... -- Kai Ponte www.perfectreign.com || www.4thedadz.com remember - a turn signal is a statement, not a request