In article <393662D6.A068FDA5@neuronet.pitt.edu>, Rafael E. Herrera writes

I use the same kind of card. I think you copied the wrong entries in your email, from your lspci output you should be using the es1371 driver. In any case, I have modules.conf look like this:

#alias char-major-14 off #alias sound off #alias midi off

alias char-major-14 es1371 options es1371 joystick=0x200

these entries match my /etc/modules.conf - I think I confused the issue by quoting Jon who was referring to the (similar) treatment of es1370.

run depmod afterwards and everything is ready to go. After the next boot if you run 'modprobe es1371' it should load all the necessary drivers (soundcore, sound, etc.), that is what depmod should setup. If they don't load then something is not working right, although I never had problems with that setup.

'modprobe es1371' loads 'soundcore' but not 'sound' and 'soundlow', even after I added them to /sbin/init.d/boot.local which makes me think I should track back through the boot sequence more carefully. This install was the standard SuSE install inasmuch as nothing 'extra' was compiled in and the soundcard configuration was done using the installer (although as I said I am new to SuSE and yast, and a bit too limited keyboard wise to try anything 'non standard' at the first run of a new distribution <g>). However the sound configuration did seem to add in extra drivers which I wouldn't have normally expected but assumed they were a part of the standard SuSE build (in fact the whole kernel seems big to me). I haven't taken them out - maybe I should - although I have edited /etc/modules.conf in the recommended way? If I do an lsmod immediately after boot I get this lot:

Module Size Used by snd-pcm-oss 16680 0 (autoclean) snd-pcm-plugin 12840 0 (autoclean) [snd-pcm-oss] snd-mixer-oss 4244 0 (autoclean) [snd-pcm-oss] snd-card-ens1371 2016 0 snd-ens1371 9404 0 [snd-card-ens1371] snd-pcm 28504 0 [snd-pcm-oss snd-pcm-plugin snd- ens1371] snd-timer 8032 0 [snd-pcm] snd-rawmidi 9432 0 [snd-ens1371] snd-seq-device 3360 0 [snd-rawmidi] snd-ac97-codec 23904 0 [snd-ens1371] snd-mixer 22576 0 [snd-mixer-oss snd-ens1371 snd- ac97-codec] snd 31852 1 [snd-pcm-oss snd-pcm-plugin snd-mixer- oss snd-card-ens1371 snd-ens1371 snd-pcm snd-timer snd-rawmidi snd-seq- device snd-ac97-codec snd-mixer] soundcore 2564 5 [snd] usb-uhci 17000 0 (unused) serial 42612 0 (autoclean) memstat 1476 0 (unused) usbcore 42344 1 [usb-uhci] which seems like rather a lot to me... And I still have to add the others manually.

This driver does not support .au files. That may be why your attempts to record using the /dev/audio device failed. /dev/audio is for .au files only, you should use /dev/dsp instead. I mostly play sounds, don't record much and I'm not familiar with your voice recognition software. You may need first to load the right drivers, set your software with the right devices and try again.

I definitely can create sound files using /dev/audio, and poor quality files using /dev/dsp by using the following method from console (using console to eliminate wm/desktop factors): dd bs=8k count=4 /tmp/test.au (or .wav) cat /tmp/test.au (or .wav) > /dev/audio (or dsp). but the volume is poor. If the es1371 drivers do not support .au maybe other drivers loaded are conflicting/impacting? Like you sound was just for music for me until I hit the world of VR software - now I realise how little I know about it <wry grin> I definitely need to find out more about the underlying files within ViaVoice for Linux.

You may want to try the ALSA drivers, a replacement to the above. Install the alsa package, comment all the above, remove the modules if loaded and run 'alsaconf'. It should detect your sound card and add the necessary entries to modules.conf. The package has a mixer controller, so you will have more control of the input/output levels, etc.

By the way, the ALSA drivers from the SuSE CDs are for version 2.2.14 of the kernel. If you upgrade to 2.2.15 or 2.2.16 you will have to recompile the package from sources.

Thanks for that - I was intending to upgrade the kernel once sound was under control. It may well be worth trying the ALSA drivers but it is just frustrating to me that I did have it working briefly with the currently loaded drivers plus a modprobe to get 'sound' and 'soundlow' and now cannot get it back. I must have change something without realising it. I just can't get away from that nagging feeling that I have missed/overlooked/done something obvious here and that maybe I just am not seeing the wood for the trees. Many thanks for your feedback, regards, -- Karen Hunter-Jones karen@lspace.org -- To unsubscribe send e-mail to suse-linux-e-unsubscribe@suse.com For additional commands send e-mail to suse-linux-e-help@suse.com Also check the FAQ at http://www.suse.com/Support/Doku/FAQ/

"Rafael E. Herrera" wrote:

Each module has dependencies that are resolved when you run 'depmod'. So, when you run 'modprobe', it will load the modules it depends on. If it doesn't load 'sound', then it doesn't need it.

Or it doesn't know that it needs it, because the modules don't use it explicitly. In other words, when you load es1370 or es1371 with modprobe, having set up the dependency file correctly, you still don't get the sound because there's an implicit, unrecorded dependency. That's what my experience suggests. With alsa, the situation might be different. Paul Abrahams -- To unsubscribe send e-mail to suse-linux-e-unsubscribe@suse.com For additional commands send e-mail to suse-linux-e-help@suse.com Also check the FAQ at http://www.suse.com/Support/Doku/FAQ/

Karen wrote:

Either way modprobe'd modules are lost on reboot even though I thought I had compensated for that by coding the relevant lines in the boot file, as per Jon's recommendation. This bothers me because I am unfamiliar with the SuSE system and suspect I am misunderstanding or simply missing something about the way in which SuSE is handling the boot sequence/system.

I suspect that's the heart of your problem. I recommend doing what I did: edit the file /sbin/init.d/boot.local to include: /sbin/modprobe es1371 [es1370 in my case] /sbin/modprobe sound A good way to check what commands you need there is to issue them as root from the command line and see if sound gets turned on. And if you ever do get your sound working again, do an lsmod to see what modules are around. Paul Abrahams -- To unsubscribe send e-mail to suse-linux-e-unsubscribe@suse.com For additional commands send e-mail to suse-linux-e-help@suse.com Also check the FAQ at http://www.suse.com/Support/Doku/FAQ/

In article , Karen writes

In article <39368071.3317E649@neuronet.pitt.edu>, Rafael E. Herrera writes

...

"Paul W. Abrahams" wrote:

following myself up here in the hopes it may be of use elsewhere. [..]

...

Each module has dependencies that are resolved when you run 'depmod'. So, when you run 'modprobe', it will load the modules it depends on. If it doesn't load 'sound', then it doesn't need it. You can just load a module with 'insmod', this will just load the module if it can.

My systems definitely do need at least two modules which are not picked up as dependencies - I have now coded them into the boot files - 'soundlow' and 'sound'.

Despite having the untouched SuSE 2.2.14 kernel.

...

Right now I'm using the ALSA drivers, and these are what it loads:

[list]

...

From karen's email, it seems that that is what she is using, because when your con't use ALSA, then oinly es1371 and soundcore are loaded.

I haven't run any form of ALSA configuration as part of the install - do you mean I may have some sort of conflict going on?

...

I have now configured the ALSA drivers for es1371, I have coded the extra modules into the boot files and I have also used the mixer to whack the volume up to max all round instead of partial. I now have sound and the and the ViaVoice engine does now accept the microphone input for set up purposes.

But *each* of these things were necessary - I did test and any one change missing meant being unable to set up a voice engine input.

...

Using dd and piping doesn't give good results, that may be the reason her recordings are bad quality.

[..]

I'll try them and see what happens, although it is really the voice engine I need to get the microphone working with. If they work with current set up perhaps I need to revisit the voice engine itself but that is one thing which hasn't been touched since install. So if the problem is a change there, I am mystified as to why.

It may be that driver quality is the issue and this is where some of teh confusing results with this chip arise (and certainly looking at mail lists and archives there seems to be varied experience with this chip). If I were solely wanting to listen to cd's through the system whilst working probably just some changes would be sufficient but the volume going through is very low by comparison to the same machine running windows and my needs are not typical. The sound quality needed for input by a voice engine may just be higher than for regular use and show up weaknesses in drivers. It could still be worth looking at the Opensound drivers if they are better quality but for now I will see how I go with ALSA, and be grateful for emacs running under Windows and Cygwin tools:) many thanks for the suggestions, regards -- Karen Hunter-Jones karen@lspace.org -- To unsubscribe send e-mail to suse-linux-e-unsubscribe@suse.com For additional commands send e-mail to suse-linux-e-help@suse.com Also check the FAQ at http://www.suse.com/Support/Doku/FAQ/

In article <20000604183019.B2721@Jeffreys.suse.de>, Philipp Thomas writes

* Karen (karen@lspace.org) [20000604 16:23]:

...

I have now configured the ALSA drivers for es1371, I have coded the extra modules into the boot files and I have also used the mixer to whack the volume up to max all round instead of partial. But *each* of these things were necessary - I did test and any one change missing meant being unable to set up a voice engine input.

If you use either yast2 or alsaconf to configure the ALSA drivers, there is only *one* additional step necessary, and that's setting up the channels, i.e. unmute the needed ones and set their volume, and then afterwards store the settings with 'alsactl store'. Prior to using either YaST2 or alsaconf, please remove the additions to /etc/modules.conf you made for ALSA.

The loading of the modules at boot time is done automatically by the init scripts /sbin/init.d/rc2.d/S21alsasound, which is a link to /sbin/init.d/alsasound. You may also manually start/stop/restart ALSA by calling rcalsasound.

OK I have retested some of this now and I still find that those extra modules need adding. My system was set up using yast1 and no frills (I like to start with a base and add the bits individually - I find it makes life easier :). I subsequently used alsaconf to configure the ALSA drivers having had problems with sound. As part of the ALSA set-up I turned up the volume via the mixer - full volume seemed necessary for me to get a voice engine functioning ok. I have retried to run the system without the extra sound modules and I get problems again which disappear as soon as I put the modules back. To be honest putting in soundlow was a desperate guess on my part because the name fitted the problem I was having - I couldn't tell you what it does officially, just found it as I was looking through the modules and I had no better ideas to try at the time. My kids installed their own systems using yast2 (they loved the moving penguin by the way...) and had identical problems to mine (different cards and systems but still the es1371 chip). They were resolved in the same way. I honestly can't say *why* the modules should be needed other than the fact that whatever I do, I get very low sound output and especially poor input if they are not active. If there is a reason I'd like to know myself. Or if they are needed because of something I have set wrong elsewhere it would be useful to know also. It isn't impossible by any means - SuSE was new to me, and 6.4 an significant upgrade.

#define NINODE 50 /* number of in core inodes */ #define NPROC 30 /* max number of processes */ -- Version 7 UNIX fuer PDP 11, /usr/include/sys/param.h

And Cyber 70's by any chance?? <g> regards, -- Karen Hunter-Jones karen@lspace.org -- To unsubscribe send e-mail to suse-linux-e-unsubscribe@suse.com For additional commands send e-mail to suse-linux-e-help@suse.com Also check the FAQ at http://www.suse.com/Support/Doku/FAQ/

"Rafael E. Herrera" wrote:

After the next boot if you run 'modprobe es1371' it should load all the necessary drivers (soundcore, sound, etc.), that is what depmod should setup. If they don't load then something is not working right, although I never had problems with that setup.

My experience is that "modprobe es1371" doesn't cause "sound" to be loaded, although executing certain programs that refer to the sound module will cause it to be loaded. You can check: use rmmod to remove all the sound-related modules and then try "modprobe es1371". See if lsmod now shows "sound" to be loaded. For me, it isn't. So I load it explicitly. Paul Abrahams -- To unsubscribe send e-mail to suse-linux-e-unsubscribe@suse.com For additional commands send e-mail to suse-linux-e-help@suse.com Also check the FAQ at http://www.suse.com/Support/Doku/FAQ/