[PlanetCCRMA] Pd + PulseAudio?

[Peter Kirn]

Hi Fernando,

Thanks for the tips on ALSA vs. jack; of course, makes sense, ALSA is
still plugging into PulseAudio when not using JACK.

cat /proc/asound/devices: yep, just the Intel (and the AK1, if it's plugged in)

Here's where things get a little weird.

1. I start qjackctl
2. Set audio to hw:1 for the Intel card and start jack server
3. Start Ardour -- Ardour uses JACK and the Intel card, no issue --
sound through the computer's speakers
4. Start Pd, set to JACK, try testing audio (with the default
testtone) ... nothing. No error in Pd, but also no sound.

Looking at AlsaMixer as you suggest, I definitely see the HDA Intel
card. Master and PCM have volume levels; Headphone and Speaker show up
but do not have mixer values.

Anything else to check?

Now it seems the question is, why would Pd have an issue playing
through JACK with one card and not another, and why would it have that
issue with that card when Ardour does not?

Peter

On Tue, Mar 23, 2010 at 10:59 PM, Fernando Lopez-Lezcano
<nando at ccrma.stanford.edu> wrote:
> On Tue, 2010-03-23 at 22:02 -0400, Peter Kirn wrote:
>> Hi Fernando,
>>
>> Sorry; I've done some more testing. Here's the current state of affairs:
>>
>> FC12.
>>
>> pd-extended 0.41.4
>>
>> No error messages from JACK.
>>
>> Two audio interfaces for testing in this case, the internal Intel
>> audio (which I know has caused some issues for folks) and the Native
>> Instruments Audio Kontrol 1.
>>
>> AK1 + JACK: works fine, loading qjackctl first, then Pd in JACK mode.
>
> Then this one is fine.
>
>> AK1 + ALSA: causes glitched audio, then the app appears to hang, which
>> means I can't click the DIO errors button or close the dialogs; have
>> to force-quit.
>
> Hmmm, if you use alsa you are going through pulseaudio. I don't know
> what device will pd use if started in plain alsa mode. I personally
> would always go through jack, no reason to start in plain alsa mode.
> Your usage might be different.
>
>> Intel + JACK: JACK reports no issue opening the Intel card. Intel
>> audio shows up as hw:1, but for the heck of it, I did try hw:1,1
>> (though I'm fairly certain that's wrong -- that's the ALC660-VD on
>> this Asus laptop). JACK checks out, shows that it correctly creates
>> the ALSA driver and sets the correct settings, but pd doesn't make any
>> sound -- even though there's no error from pd, either.
>
> Ok then it is probably an alsamixer issue, ie: the mixer controls are
> not properly set for the card. Can you get sound from that card in any
> other way?
>
> Open up a terminal and start alsamixer:
>
>  alsamixer -c 1
>
> ("-c 1" so that it goes directly to the Intel card).
> Experiment with the level settings you will find there... (you can have
> jack + pd running with the test window and some noise enabled there).
>
> What do you see if you do:
>  cat /proc/asound/devices
> ... that should show any subdevices, if there are any.
> I presume that in cat /proc/asound/cards you only see the Intel and the
> AK, right?
>
> -- Fernando
>
>
>> The only thing I note could be unusual: it's defaulting on the Intel
>> card to 32bit integer little-endian
>>
>> Intel + ALSA (identified in Pd as "HDA Intel (hardware)": No sound. No
>> red DIO error light; tried clicking the DIO error button and I just
>> see "unknown", plus this message:
>> warning: tone-mon: multiply defined
>> warning: tone-osc: multiply defined
>>
>> Peter
>>
>> On Tue, Mar 23, 2010 at 8:31 PM, Fernando Lopez-Lezcano
>> <nando at ccrma.stanford.edu> wrote:
>> > On Tue, 2010-03-23 at 20:10 -0400, Peter Kirn wrote:
>> >> Okay... I may have spoken too soon. I think Neils may be right and,
>> >> despite the Fedora distro advice (and even what I had heard from Paul
>> >> Davis), disabling PulseAudio may be the only sure-fire solution
>> >>
>> >> I just can't get Pd-extended to properly talk to audio. Sometimes it
>> >> works, more often it doesn't.
>> >
>> > Is this using pd + jack?
>> >
>> >> Sometimes quitting applications that use
>> >> PulseAudio works, sometimes it doesn't.
>> >>
>> >> Most notably, starting qjackctl first and setting JACK as the audio
>> >> system often doesn't work.
>> >
>> > What distro do you have installed? (fc11? fc12?)
>> >
>> > What error message do you get from jack? (press the "Messages" button to
>> > see what jack is saying).
>> >
>> > Which jack are you running? ("rpm -q jack-audio-connection-kit" to
>> > know).
>> >
>> > If you are using fc11 or fc12 and the Planet CCRMA jack you should be
>> > able to use jack without problems. In both cases jack negotiates with
>> > pulseaudio the release of the soundcard. Are you setting the proper
>> > "Interface" value for the card in the "Setup" panel of qjackctl? (it
>> > should _not_ be "(default)").
>> >
>> >> I either get a sync error / cannot open audio interface, or ...
>> >> nothing. (No error, just no sound, literally.)
>> >
>> > Could you paste here the complete error messages you get from jack? It
>> > is very difficult to know what is happening without the verbatim error
>> > messages.
>> >
>> > A good start would be to check what soundcards the system sees by doing
>> > a "cat /proc/asound/cards". Is the first card the one you want to use?
>> > If so, you could try, from a command line, to do this:
>> >
>> > jackd -d alsa -d hw:0
>> >
>> > That is the simplest invocation and it should work. You should see
>> > something printed out that tells you jack is getting the card from
>> > pulseaudio (it is best to use the name of the card instead of "0", the
>> > name is between "[]" in the output of the cat above, say "hw:M66" for a
>> > Delta 66 card). If it does not work please copy the exact errors you
>> > see.
>> >
>> > -- Fernando
>> >
>> >
>> >> I definitely suspect PulseAudio, as I see this behavior consistently
>> >> on PA systems.
>> >>
>> >> Thoughts?
>> >>
>> >> A good way to temporarily disable PulseAudio to ensure that's the
>> >> issue before I remove it completely, just to test this?
>> >>
>> >> Peter
>> >>
>> >> On Fri, Mar 5, 2010 at 8:29 PM, Niels Mayer <nielsmayer at gmail.com> wrote:
>> >> > Forgot to mention gnome-volume-control -- don't use it as it expects
>> >> > pulseaudio.
>> >> > Instead, create a custom launcher on the panel that runs alsamixer with the
>> >> > chosen device e.g.
>> >> > "xterm -geometry 160x24 +sb -e alsamixer -c SB" or "envy24control"
>> >> > "echomixer" "hdspmixer" "cspctl" etc from package 'alsa-tools'.
>> >> > Niels
>> >> > http://nielsmayer.com
>> >> >
>> >> > On Wed, Mar 3, 2010 at 7:27 PM, sonictwin <ruhtranayr at gmail.com> wrote:
>> >> >>
>> >> >> Everything worked perfectly and now I can play music while jackd is
>> >> >> running.
>> >> >>
>> >> >> However,
>> >> >>
>> >> >> gnome-volume-control is not to be found in gnome-panel,
>> >> >>
>> >> >> running 'gnome-volume-control' via alt+f2 i get the popup "Waiting for
>> >> >> sound
>> >> >> system to respond"
>> >> >>
>> >> >> and via terminal:
>> >> >>
>> >> >> $ gnome-volume-control
>> >> >>
>> >> >> ** (gnome-volume-control:15392): WARNING **: Connection failed,
>> >> >> reconnecting...
>> >> >>
>> >> >> Time to search the web for a different volume-control app
>> >> >>
>> >> >> Cheers!
>
>
>