Play more than one sound at the time?

[sebb]

I had Alsa 1.0.5, and now I have the latest CVS of it and I still have the same problem: "Just one application at the time is able to play sounds"

I use FC 2.

Can anybody help me with that?

[imdeemvp]

check you volume control center....

actual, you need to configure alsa this excellent tutorial worked for my cheap hardware.

[ghaefb]

What kind of sound card are you using? (onboard or pci)
I guess your sound card doesn't support hardware sound mixing...
Most of onboard sound cards have poorly supported drivers.
Usually only sound works... and nothing else(line-in, mic, sound mixing,...)

Sound cards like Creative SoundBlaster Live don't have problems with sound mixing in Linux.
You should ge one of those
This is one way..

The other way is: software sound mixing -> http://fedoranews.org/contributors/andre_costa/alsa/

[imdeemvp]

that is what i use a Creative SoundBlaster 16 pci and no problems what so ever

[Harryc]

Originally Posted by superbnerd

actual, you need to configure alsa this excellent tutorial worked for my cheap hardware.

Interesting article...I'd like to give it a try. One small problem, I do not have a ~/.asoundrc file on my system. FC2 2.6.7-1.494.2.2 , Is anyone else missing this file? My sound otherwise works fine.

[sebb]

I recently had an onboard sound card and I had this problem.

But now, I have a SB Audigy LS sound card with the same problem, so I think it's not a problem related to the sound card.

I'll read the article at http://fedoranews.org/contributors/andre_costa/alsa/, it seems intesresting.

[sebb]

I the instructions, when I try to play something with the aplay -Dplug:swmixer soundfile command, I get a bizarre and anoying noise of distortion.

[sebb]

Oups, I think it might be important for you to help me to have the content of my /home/sebb/.asoundrc:

pcm.!default {
type plug
slave.pcm "swmixer"
}

pcm.swmixer {
type dmix
ipc_key 1234
slave {
pcm "hw:0,0"
period_time 0
period_size 1024
buffer_size 4096
rate 44100
}
}

That's it, the only thing that comes to my mind is the permissions on that file. Do it have to be readable and writable by the user?

to make the changes system wide, as root, create the same file but save it as /etc/asound.conf

[sebb]

Yes, but like I said, the aplay -Dplug:swmixer soundfile command doesn't work properly because I get an anoying noise instead of the sound file I asked

it works for me. have you tried testing multiple instances xmms (you will have to enable that option) and playing different songs? if so, alsa is setup correctly and you just need to adjust your settings for aplay. If you read the man pages for aplay, they say you can specify the file to play:

aplay [flags] [filename [filename]]

[ogetbilo]

I did what it says in the article
and I too get that bizarre noise when I try the aplay.
(xmms doesn't work at all)

[nman64]

You may need to tinker in your config file to find the right rates. Sometimes, the default sound rates (or other values) will cause problems with cards. For example, I have two sound cards, and one of them works great with the typical settings, but one (my Extigy USB card) requires a higher sound rate, or it sounds very distorted. It requires 48000 hz. Adjusting the values in your setup may help you find the right combination for your card. Below is my two-card configuration.

pcm.!default {
type plug
slave.pcm "dmixer"
}

ctl.!default {
type hw
card 1
}

pcm.usb-audio {
type plug
slave.pcm "dmixer"
}

ctl.usb-audio {
type hw
card 1
}

pcm.dsp0 {
type plug
slave.pcm "dmixer"
}

ctl.mixer0 {
type hw
card 0
}

pcm.dmixer {
type dmix
ipc_key 1024
slave {
pcm "hw:0,0"
period_time 0
period_size 1024
buffer_size 4096
rate 44100
}
bindings {
0 0
1 1
}
}

pcm.emixer {
type dmix
ipc_key 1024
slave {
pcm "hw:1,0"
period_time 0
period_size 1024
buffer_size 4096
rate 48000
}
bindings {
0 0
1 1
}
}

[asun]

This webpage might be a bit clearer:

http://www.alsa-project.org/alsa-doc...odule=intel8x0

Note that this is specifically for nforce chipset which I use.

If you want to try out aplay, simply type :
> aplay <wav filename>
since you have already specified that the default is the dmix component.
For xmms, select the default should enable mixing for you.

With this .asoundrc, I can have rhythmbox, xmms, mplayer, gaim, amsn etc mix their sounds at the same time.

Hope this help.

Asun