[alsa-devel] Which project to choose?

Tue Jul 20 13:41:36 CEST 2010

2010/7/20 Chris <cpollock at embarqmail.com>

> On Tue, 2010-07-20 at 09:23 +0800, Raymond Yau wrote:
> > 2010/7/20 Chris <cpollock at embarqmail.com>
> >
> > > On Mon, 2010-07-19 at 08:53 +0100, Colin Guthrie wrote:
> > > > 'Twas brillig, and Raymond Yau at 19/07/10 07:35 did gyre and gimble:
> > > > > 2010/7/19 Chris <cpollock at embarqmail.com>
> > > > >
> > > > >> On Mon, 2010-07-19 at 09:44 +0800, Raymond Yau wrote:
> > > > >>
> > > > >>>>
> > > > >>> Refer to https://qa.mandriva.com/show_bug.cgi?id=56473#c10
> > > > >>>
> > > > >>> I have installed mandriva 2010 on virtual box
> > > > >>>
> > > > >>> when using xmms and libao output plugin to play system sound
> > > startup3.wav
> > > > >>>
> > > > >>> xmms hang at the end of the playback only when enable buffering
> in
> > > libao
> > > > >>> output plugin.(configure output plugin in xmms, unfortunately
> default
> > > is
> > > > >>> enable buffering buffer size 3000 chunk size 1000)  ,
> > > > >>>
> > > > >>> xmms does not hang when you disable the buffer or using
> > > liboss/libALSA
> > > > >>> output plugin
> > > > >>>
> > > > >>> The last message in the pulseaudio server is
> > > > >>> D: protocol-native.c  'underrun on libao[xmms] playback stream' ,
> 0
> > > bytes
> > > > >> in
> > > > >>> queue.
> > > > >>>
> > > > >>> The sound card seem running since hw_ptr and appl_ptr are
> increasing
> > > when
> > > > >>> cat /proc/asound/card0/pcm0p/sub0/status
> > > > >>>
> > > > >>> After a while , the following message appear
> > > > >>>
> > > > >>> E:alsa-sink.c : ALSA woke us up to write new data , but there was
> > > > >> actually
> > > > >>> nothing to write!
> > > > >> The above is exactly what I see periodically Raymond, so, what, if
> > > any,
> > > > >> is the fix?
> > > > >>
> > > > >> Chris
> > > > >>
> > > > >>
> > > > > Do you mean that you cannot reproduce the xmms hang bug on your
> ens1371
> > > or
> > > > > via8237 ?
> > > > >
> > > > > xmms always hang/freeze at 4 second as xmms display the total
> length of
> > > > > startup3.wav is 5 seconds
> > > > >
> > > > > you have to ask mandriva 's maintainer why enable buffering is the
> > > default
> > > > > option since xmms did not hang when I disable buffering in libao
> plugin
> > > > >
> > > > > For fefora 10 and 13 , they only provide liboss, libALSA and
> libpulse
> > > plugin
> > > > > for xmms
> > > > > I have no idea about the chunk size in libao plugin
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > With a clean user account, I could not reproduce either problem with
> the
> > > > default settings.
> > > >
> > > > FWIW, running PA under virtualbox is quite different to running it
> under
> > > > a real system. For example PA will enable the non-timer based mode
> > > > automatically when under a virtual machine.
> > > >
> > > > Col
> > > >
> > > >
> > >
> > > Colin, I've just re-enabled PA using the Ensoniq/Creative AudioPCI
> > > ES1371+ driver, this is according to the Mandriva Control Center sound
> > > setup. However, it also shows the VIA VT82xx audio driver when
> initially
> > > loaded, when I click on 'ok' it shows the Ensoniq driver. I've again
> run
> > > pulseaudio -k ; pulseaudio -vvvvv while playing a cd with mplayer. I've
> > > uploaded the output here:
> > >
> > > http://ez-files.net/953712
> > >
> > > Does this have any meaning?
> > >
> > > Thanks for any assistance.
> > >
> > > Chris
> > >
> > >
> >
> > Please note that alsaplayer is not aplay
> >
> > you can easily make underrun/overrun occur on pulse device by specify a
> > buffer size which is smaller than PA server used
> >
> > aplay -Dpulse -v --buffer-size=128 /usr/share/sounds/*.wav
> >
> > arecord -v -Dpulse -f cd -d 60 --buffer-size=128 test.wav
> >
> > can you provide pulseaudio log  for the underrun/overrun by aplay/arecord
> ?
> >
> > mandriva 2010 seem still support ALSA OSS emulation
> >
> > unless you have a hardware mixing sound card , you have to configure your
> > gmplayer to use alsa or pulse
> >
> > more .mplayer/gui.conf
> > ao_driver = "oss"   <--------pulse or alsa
> > ao_alsa_device = "hw:0,0"    <----- pulse or default
>
> Ok Raymond, the gui.conf now reads:
>
> ao_driver = "alsa"
> ao_alsa_device = "default"
>
> After setting this and again playing a cd mplayer was very choppy, there
> was an error window but I couldn't read it since it was flashing so
> fast. MPlayer eventually died though the process was still running. I
> had to manually kill it. Below is the link to the new log file:
>
> http://ez-files.net/135882
>
>
>
>
AFAIK , mplayer does not support CD playback ? ( seem only VCD or DVD )

most likely mandriva had patched the shortcut of gmplayer to use padsp and
that 's why you can see "OSS Emulation[mplayer]" in the pulseaudio log

How about using ALSA OSS emulation instead of padsp ?

mplayer -v -ao oss any.wav

Trying preferred audio driver 'oss', options '[none]'
ao2: 44100 Hz  2 chans  s16le
audio_setup: using '/dev/dsp' dsp device
audio_setup: using '/dev/mixer' mixer device
audio_setup: using 'pcm' mixer device
audio_setup: sample format: s16le (requested: s16le)
audio_setup: using 2 channels (requested: 2)
audio_setup: using 44100 Hz samplerate (requested: 44100)
audio_setup: frags:  16/16  (4096 bytes/frag)  free:  65536

This force mplayer to use power two period size (4096 bytes) and this may
meet the requirement of ens1371 if PCI data transfer are 8 Long bytes brust
transfer

5.5 PCI Data transfer

Only brust read/write transfers are allowed. All data transfer are 8 Long
Word brust transfers

As your PA server using period size 1102  which is not multiple of 8 ( 32
bytes )

It seem that you have customised the deamon.conf since PA server using
maximum buffer size

The sound quality seem ok when playing audio using mplayer inside the
virtualbox

The following messages sometime come up at the beginning of the playback
only when watching videos using mplayer -ao alsa:device=pulse

ao_alsa: write error: Broken pipe
ao_alsa: trying to *reset* *soundcard*
ao_alsa: write error: Broken pipe
ao_alsa: trying to *reset* *soundcard*

The sound quality is still fine when watching video using

mplayer -v -ao alsa:device=pulse
mplayer -v -ao alsa:device=hw=0
mplayer -v -ao pulse
mplayer -v ao oss