* Plea to help save me from Windows !!!
@ 2002-11-21 0:57 Bruce Paterson
2002-11-21 2:06 ` Daniel Haus
0 siblings, 1 reply; 13+ messages in thread
From: Bruce Paterson @ 2002-11-21 0:57 UTC (permalink / raw)
To: alsa development
I have a simple alsa application I have developed that isn't behaving
quite properly. I mentioned this before, but I have since upgraded to
alsa 0.9.0rc5. Similar problem !
Please let me know if I'm sending thist to the wrong place and where it
should go instead.
There are mutterings about the place about reverting to a Windows
development (but frankly it was far worse in other ways). Please help
save me ! I have run out of ideas how to proceed (gdb is not going to
help with a random problem like this).
My setup:
alsa 0.9.0rc5
mandrake 8.1
no realtime extensions (no xruns so not required)
ice1712 module with EWS88 sound card
direct hw:0,0 interface (no plugin)
output on 2 channels, input on 4 direct to/from memory
sample rate 96k, buffer size maximum EWS88, period size = buffersize/8
32 bits
interleaved to non-interleaved done by my code since plug-in didn't
behave originally (this may be historical now).
Behaviour:
The output sound is perfect for about 2 minutes. After that every now
and then I get "distortion" in the audio. No xruns or errors are
reported in the software. It sounds like only part of the output buffer
is correct (the general gist is right, but there's crap and warbles
there as well).
It makes no difference whether I stop the soundcard and restart or
whether I keep the soundcard going continueously (feed it 0's whilst
I'm restarting my user buffers), the distortion always starts
happeneing. Even restarting the application makes no difference which
leads me to suspect some ememory in the alsa driver.
Waiting about 1 minute before starting again fixes the problem for the
~2 minutes again.
Playing back to back WAV files with aplay doesn't result in the
distortion (it is something unique to my application...therefore I'm
using the API incorrectly somehow !)
Here is the main loop of my code:
/* Get one full width buffer, buffersize is in frames. */
outbuf = (char *)calloc(out_buffer_size * OUTCH,
snd_pcm_format_width(format) / 8);
/* calloc since we want silence initially on output */
inbuf = (char *)calloc(in_buffer_size * INCH,
snd_pcm_format_width(format) / 8);
/* Start the ball rolling */
snd_pcm_prepare(outhand);
snd_pcm_prepare(inhand);
snd_pcm_reset(outhand);
snd_pcm_reset(inhand);
snd_pcm_start(inhand);
/* This is the IO loop */
outp = soundoutput;
outl = lengthofoutput; /* output length */
samps = lengthofrecord; /* > than length of output*/
ocopy = 0;
/* inptrs already point to fmptrs */
for(;;)
{
if(outl)
{
if( ocopy == 0 )
{
ocopy = 1;
/* Copy from single channel full buffer to full width one */
sampl = (long *)outp;
sampm = (long *)outbuf;
for(x=0; x < out_buffer_size; x++)
{
*sampm++ = *sampl;
*sampm = -*sampl++;
/* Inverse for bridge drive */
sampm += OUTCH-1;
/* Skip over other output channels*/
if( x > outl )
break;
}
out = outl;
}
}
else
out = out_buffer_size; /* Silence after chirp */
/* See if ready for output data yet */
poll(outfds, ocount, -1);
snd_pcm_poll_descriptors_revents(outhand, outfds, ocount, &revents);
if (revents & POLLERR)
{
fprintf(stderr, "Tx Poll failed\n"); <---- this never occurs !!
err = -1;
break;
}
if (revents & POLLOUT)
{
err = snd_pcm_writei(outhand, (void *)outbuf, out > out_buffer_size
? out_buffer_size : out );
if( err < 0 ) <---- this never occurs !!
{
/* EAGAIN Shouldn't happen now since we're polling first */
if( err != -EAGAIN )
{
fprintf(stderr, "Write failed at %ld: %s\n",
lengthofoutput-outl, snd_strerror(err));
break;
}
}
else
{
if(outl)
{
outl -= err;
outp += err * snd_pcm_format_width(format)/8;
ocopy = 0;
if( outl == 0 )
{
/* Finished output. Now fill buffer with silence again */
sampm = (long *)outbuf;
for(x=0; x < out_buffer_size; x++)
{
*sampm++ = 0;
*sampm = 0;
sampm += OUTCH-1; /* Skip over other output channels */
}
}
}
}
}
/* See if data ready to be read yet... we started sampling earlier. */
poll(infds, icount, -1);
snd_pcm_poll_descriptors_revents(inhand, infds, icount, &revents);
if (revents & POLLERR)
{
fprintf(stderr, "Rx Poll failed\n"); <---- this never occurs !!
err = -1;
break;
}
if( !((revents & POLLIN) || (revents & POLLPRI)) )
continue;
/* Finally actually record some real stuff */
err = snd_pcm_readi(inhand, inbuf, samps > in_buffer_size ?
in_buffer_size : samps);
if(err < 0)
{
if( err != -EAGAIN )
{
/* No point in underrun recovery in this application so abort */
fprintf(stderr,"Read error at %ld: %s\n", N-samps,
snd_strerror(err));
break;
}
}
else
{
samps -= err;
/* Copy from full width buffer to channels */
for(y=0; y < channels; y++)
{
sampl = (long *)inbuf + y;
sampm = (long *)inptrs[y];
for(x=0; x < err; x++)
{
*sampm++ = *sampl;
sampl += INCH;
}
inptrs[y] += err * snd_pcm_format_width(format)/8;
}
if( samps <= 0 )
break;
}
}
fprintf(stderr,"Sampling Completed\n");
snd_pcm_unlink(outhand);
snd_pcm_drop(outhand);
snd_pcm_drop(inhand);
snd_pcm_hw_free(outhand);
snd_pcm_close(outhand);
snd_pcm_hw_free(inhand);
snd_pcm_close(inhand);
/* Free up temporary memory */
free(inbuf); free(outbuf);
--
Cheers,
Bruce
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/\\\/\\\/\\\ / / Bruce Paterson
/ \\\ \\\ \\\ / / Senior Design Engineer
/ /\\\/\\\/\\\/ / 87 Peters Ave, Mulgrave, Vic, 3170
/ / \\\ \\\ \\\ / PO Box 4112, Mulgrave, Vic, 3170, Australia
/ / \\\/\\\ \\\/ Ph: +61 3 8561 4232 Fax: +61 3 9560 9055
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^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 13+ messages in thread* Re: Plea to help save me from Windows !!!
2002-11-21 0:57 Plea to help save me from Windows !!! Bruce Paterson
@ 2002-11-21 2:06 ` Daniel Haus
2002-11-21 6:02 ` Bruce Paterson
0 siblings, 1 reply; 13+ messages in thread
From: Daniel Haus @ 2002-11-21 2:06 UTC (permalink / raw)
To: Bruce Paterson; +Cc: alsa development
> Behaviour:
> The output sound is perfect for about 2 minutes. After that every now
> and then I get "distortion" in the audio. No xruns or errors are
> reported in the software. It sounds like only part of the output buffer
> is correct (the general gist is right, but there's crap and warbles
> there as well).
this might not be caused by your app, this could be an alsa-problem.
i experienced such problems, too (i am using cs46xx). usually i am
runnigng xmms (with alsa-plugin) when it happens. i get a very "thin"
sound - very little bass, volume goes down and i get some distortion.
alltogether it sounds like my speakers would be broken (they aren't,
really!).
i did not do any more testing, but about 24 hours ago i upgraded to
0.9.0-rc6 and had no problems since then, but that might not mean
anything ...
regards,
daniel
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^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 13+ messages in thread
* Re: Plea to help save me from Windows !!!
2002-11-21 2:06 ` Daniel Haus
@ 2002-11-21 6:02 ` Bruce Paterson
2002-11-25 7:36 ` Half Speed on rc6 ? Bruce Paterson
0 siblings, 1 reply; 13+ messages in thread
From: Bruce Paterson @ 2002-11-21 6:02 UTC (permalink / raw)
To: Daniel Haus; +Cc: alsa development
Thanks for your reply Daniel.
Daniel Haus wrote:
>>Behaviour:
>>The output sound is perfect for about 2 minutes. After that every now
>>and then I get "distortion" in the audio. No xruns or errors are
>>reported in the software. It sounds like only part of the output buffer
>>is correct (the general gist is right, but there's crap and warbles
>>there as well).
>
>
> this might not be caused by your app, this could be an alsa-problem.
The reason I thought it was my app was playing wave files over & over
using aplay didn't result in the problem. It's possible aplay is using
the interface in a different way (for instance I'd imagine it uses the
plughw interface).
It's a scientific application that cannot allow distortion, or even
xruns to occur at all (every sample is critical).
> i experienced such problems, too (i am using cs46xx). usually i am
> runnigng xmms (with alsa-plugin) when it happens. i get a very "thin"
> sound - very little bass, volume goes down and i get some distortion.
> alltogether it sounds like my speakers would be broken (they aren't,
> really!).
> i did not do any more testing, but about 24 hours ago i upgraded to
> 0.9.0-rc6 and had no problems since then, but that might not mean
> anything ...
I didn't even know there was an rc6 ! Normally they get announced on
the list. Must have missed it.
Can anyone in the know shed some light as to whether rc6 changes are
likely to help ?
--
Cheers,
Bruce
-------------------------------------------------------------------
This email and any files transmitted with it are confidential and
intended solely for the use of the individual or entity to whom
they are addressed. If you have received this email in error please
notify the system manager.
/\\\/\\\/\\\ / / Bruce Paterson
/ \\\ \\\ \\\ / / Senior Design Engineer
/ /\\\/\\\/\\\/ / 87 Peters Ave, Mulgrave, Vic, 3170
/ / \\\ \\\ \\\ / PO Box 4112, Mulgrave, Vic, 3170, Australia
/ / \\\/\\\ \\\/ Ph: +61 3 8561 4232 Fax: +61 3 9560 9055
Tele-IP Ltd. Email: bruce@tele-ip.com Icq: #32015991
WWW: http://www.tele-ip.com VK3TJN
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^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 13+ messages in thread* Half Speed on rc6 ?
2002-11-21 6:02 ` Bruce Paterson
@ 2002-11-25 7:36 ` Bruce Paterson
2002-11-25 12:02 ` Jaroslav Kysela
0 siblings, 1 reply; 13+ messages in thread
From: Bruce Paterson @ 2002-11-25 7:36 UTC (permalink / raw)
To: alsa development
Bruce Paterson wrote:
> Thanks for your reply Daniel.
>
> Daniel Haus wrote:
>
>>> Behaviour:
>>> The output sound is perfect for about 2 minutes. After that every now
>>> and then I get "distortion" in the audio. No xruns or errors are
>>> reported in the software. It sounds like only part of the output
>>> buffer is correct (the general gist is right, but there's crap and
>>> warbles there as well).
>>
>>
>>
>> this might not be caused by your app, this could be an alsa-problem.
>> i did not do any more testing, but about 24 hours ago i upgraded to
>> 0.9.0-rc6 and had no problems since then, but that might not mean
>> anything ...
I have now tried 0.9.0rc6 and something VERY weird has happened.
Suddenly the sample rate appears to have halved. A previous 600Hz tone
now is 300Hz and everything takes twices the time to output.
Surely this is a bug that has crept in.
Has anyone else at all used rc6 on the EWS88 and had it work ok ?
Distortion still appears on subsequent runs, but seems to have changed
its nature a bit. It now sounds like "sand sprinkled on the speaker"
coming & going. It never happens during the 1st run.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Message History:
I have a simple alsa application I have developed that isn't behaving
quite properly. I mentioned this before, but I have since upgraded to
alsa 0.9.0rc5. Similar problem !
Please let me know if I'm sending thist to the wrong place and where it
should go instead.
There are mutterings about the place about reverting to a Windows
development (but frankly it was far worse in other ways). Please help
save me ! I have run out of ideas how to proceed (gdb is not going to
help with a random problem like this).
My setup:
alsa 0.9.0rc6
mandrake 8.1
no realtime extensions (no xruns so not required)
ice1712 module with EWS88 sound card
direct hw:0,0 interface (no plugin)
output on 2 channels, input on 4 direct to/from memory
sample rate 96k, buffer size maximum EWS88, period size = buffersize/8
32 bits
interleaved to non-interleaved done by my code since plug-in didn't
behave originally (this may be historical now).
Behaviour:
The output sound is perfect for about 2 minutes. After that every now
and then I get "distortion" in the audio. No xruns or errors are
reported in the software. It sounds like only part of the output buffer
is correct (the general gist is right, but there's crap and warbles
there as well).
It makes no difference whether I stop the soundcard and restart or
whether I keep the soundcard going continueously (feed it 0's whilst
I'm restarting my user buffers), the distortion always starts
happeneing. Even restarting the application makes no difference which
leads me to suspect some ememory in the alsa driver.
Waiting about 1 minute before starting again fixes the problem for the
~2 minutes again.
Playing back to back WAV files with aplay doesn't result in the
distortion (it is something unique to my application...therefore I'm
using the API incorrectly somehow !)
[Source code snippet in original email]
--
Cheers,
Bruce
-------------------------------------------------------------------
This email and any files transmitted with it are confidential and
intended solely for the use of the individual or entity to whom
they are addressed. If you have received this email in error please
notify the system manager.
/\\\/\\\/\\\ / / Bruce Paterson
/ \\\ \\\ \\\ / / Senior Design Engineer
/ /\\\/\\\/\\\/ / 87 Peters Ave, Mulgrave, Vic, 3170
/ / \\\ \\\ \\\ / PO Box 4112, Mulgrave, Vic, 3170, Australia
/ / \\\/\\\ \\\/ Ph: +61 3 8561 4232 Fax: +61 3 9560 9055
Tele-IP Ltd. Email: bruce@tele-ip.com Icq: #32015991
WWW: http://www.tele-ip.com VK3TJN
-------------------------------------------------------------------
-------------------------------------------------------
This sf.net email is sponsored by:ThinkGeek
Welcome to geek heaven.
http://thinkgeek.com/sf
^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 13+ messages in thread* Re: Half Speed on rc6 ?
2002-11-25 7:36 ` Half Speed on rc6 ? Bruce Paterson
@ 2002-11-25 12:02 ` Jaroslav Kysela
2002-11-26 0:41 ` Bruce Paterson
2002-11-27 7:48 ` James Courtier-Dutton
0 siblings, 2 replies; 13+ messages in thread
From: Jaroslav Kysela @ 2002-11-25 12:02 UTC (permalink / raw)
To: Bruce Paterson; +Cc: alsa development
On Mon, 25 Nov 2002, Bruce Paterson wrote:
> Bruce Paterson wrote:
> > Thanks for your reply Daniel.
> >
> > Daniel Haus wrote:
> >
> >>> Behaviour:
> >>> The output sound is perfect for about 2 minutes. After that every now
> >>> and then I get "distortion" in the audio. No xruns or errors are
> >>> reported in the software. It sounds like only part of the output
> >>> buffer is correct (the general gist is right, but there's crap and
> >>> warbles there as well).
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> this might not be caused by your app, this could be an alsa-problem.
> >> i did not do any more testing, but about 24 hours ago i upgraded to
> >> 0.9.0-rc6 and had no problems since then, but that might not mean
> >> anything ...
>
> I have now tried 0.9.0rc6 and something VERY weird has happened.
> Suddenly the sample rate appears to have halved. A previous 600Hz tone
> now is 300Hz and everything takes twices the time to output.
> Surely this is a bug that has crept in.
>
> Has anyone else at all used rc6 on the EWS88 and had it work ok ?
This problem is fixed in CVS. Try the latest CVS snapshot or wait for rc7.
Jaroslav
-----
Jaroslav Kysela <perex@suse.cz>
Linux Kernel Sound Maintainer
ALSA Project, SuSE Labs
-------------------------------------------------------
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^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 13+ messages in thread
* Re: Half Speed on rc6 ?
2002-11-25 12:02 ` Jaroslav Kysela
@ 2002-11-26 0:41 ` Bruce Paterson
2002-11-27 7:23 ` Am I asking the right people ? Bruce Paterson
2002-11-27 7:48 ` James Courtier-Dutton
1 sibling, 1 reply; 13+ messages in thread
From: Bruce Paterson @ 2002-11-26 0:41 UTC (permalink / raw)
To: Jaroslav Kysela; +Cc: alsa development
Jaroslav Kysela wrote:
> On Mon, 25 Nov 2002, Bruce Paterson wrote:
>
>>>>>Behaviour:
>>>>>The output sound is perfect for about 2 minutes. After that every now
>>>>>and then I get "distortion" in the audio. No xruns or errors are
>>>>>reported in the software. It sounds like only part of the output
>>>>>buffer is correct (the general gist is right, but there's crap and
>>>>>warbles there as well).
>>I have now tried 0.9.0rc6 and something VERY weird has happened.
>>Suddenly the sample rate appears to have halved. A previous 600Hz tone
>>now is 300Hz and everything takes twices the time to output.
>>Surely this is a bug that has crept in.
> This problem is fixed in CVS. Try the latest CVS snapshot or wait for rc7.
Thanks Jaroslav ! Any ideas about when rc7 might be released ?
(determines if I go for CVS or not). Also, any ideas about my "sand"
distortion problem ? It's still happening after a period of time (seems
to change in nature a bit with each release).
>
> Jaroslav
--
Cheers,
Bruce
-------------------------------------------------------------------
This email and any files transmitted with it are confidential and
intended solely for the use of the individual or entity to whom
they are addressed. If you have received this email in error please
notify the system manager.
/\\\/\\\/\\\ / / Bruce Paterson
/ \\\ \\\ \\\ / / Senior Design Engineer
/ /\\\/\\\/\\\/ / 87 Peters Ave, Mulgrave, Vic, 3170
/ / \\\ \\\ \\\ / PO Box 4112, Mulgrave, Vic, 3170, Australia
/ / \\\/\\\ \\\/ Ph: +61 3 8561 4232 Fax: +61 3 9560 9055
Tele-IP Ltd. Email: bruce@tele-ip.com Icq: #32015991
WWW: http://www.tele-ip.com VK3TJN
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^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 13+ messages in thread* Am I asking the right people ?
2002-11-26 0:41 ` Bruce Paterson
@ 2002-11-27 7:23 ` Bruce Paterson
2002-11-27 9:46 ` Jaroslav Kysela
2002-11-27 13:24 ` Paul Davis
0 siblings, 2 replies; 13+ messages in thread
From: Bruce Paterson @ 2002-11-27 7:23 UTC (permalink / raw)
To: alsa development
Am I sending these queries about the operation of alsa through the API
to the right place ? I'm trying to use alsa for a real scientific
application and I'm starting to worry it simply isn't ready yet.
I don't pretend to be a developer of alsa drivers themselves, and I'd
hoped I didn't need to become one. I understand alsa needs many people
debugging it and finding problems to make it bulletproof (afterall there
would be a myriad of different possible configurations people can use).
However, the silence I get in reply to queries is golden (unlike the
distortion I'm getting from the soundcard) !
It's possible I'm not using the alsa API in the way intended and
bringing the problems upon myself, but please, somebody tell me !
It would be a real blow to the progress of linux in this company if all
the alsa work had to be scrapped.
Apologies for the frustrated tone.
Bruce Paterson wrote:
>>>>>> Behaviour:
>>>>>> The output sound is perfect for about 2 minutes. After that every
>>>>>> now and then I get "distortion" in the audio. No xruns or errors
>>>>>> are reported in the software. It sounds like only part of the
>>>>>> output buffer is correct (the general gist is right, but there's
>>>>>> crap and warbles there as well).
--
Cheers,
Bruce
-------------------------------------------------------------------
This email and any files transmitted with it are confidential and
intended solely for the use of the individual or entity to whom
they are addressed. If you have received this email in error please
notify the system manager.
/\\\/\\\/\\\ / / Bruce Paterson
/ \\\ \\\ \\\ / / Senior Design Engineer
/ /\\\/\\\/\\\/ / 87 Peters Ave, Mulgrave, Vic, 3170
/ / \\\ \\\ \\\ / PO Box 4112, Mulgrave, Vic, 3170, Australia
/ / \\\/\\\ \\\/ Ph: +61 3 8561 4232 Fax: +61 3 9560 9055
Tele-IP Ltd. Email: bruce@tele-ip.com Icq: #32015991
WWW: http://www.tele-ip.com VK3TJN
-------------------------------------------------------------------
-------------------------------------------------------
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^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 13+ messages in thread* Re: Am I asking the right people ?
2002-11-27 7:23 ` Am I asking the right people ? Bruce Paterson
@ 2002-11-27 9:46 ` Jaroslav Kysela
2002-11-28 15:51 ` Takashi Iwai
2002-11-27 13:24 ` Paul Davis
1 sibling, 1 reply; 13+ messages in thread
From: Jaroslav Kysela @ 2002-11-27 9:46 UTC (permalink / raw)
To: Bruce Paterson; +Cc: alsa development
On Wed, 27 Nov 2002, Bruce Paterson wrote:
> Am I sending these queries about the operation of alsa through the API
> to the right place ? I'm trying to use alsa for a real scientific
> application and I'm starting to worry it simply isn't ready yet.
>
> I don't pretend to be a developer of alsa drivers themselves, and I'd
> hoped I didn't need to become one. I understand alsa needs many people
> debugging it and finding problems to make it bulletproof (afterall there
> would be a myriad of different possible configurations people can use).
>
> However, the silence I get in reply to queries is golden (unlike the
> distortion I'm getting from the soundcard) !
>
> It's possible I'm not using the alsa API in the way intended and
> bringing the problems upon myself, but please, somebody tell me !
>
> It would be a real blow to the progress of linux in this company if all
> the alsa work had to be scrapped.
>
> Apologies for the frustrated tone.
Sorry, I haven't EWS88 on my table. It seems that the problem is with the
DAC initialization, but it's difficult to debug these things without
hardware. Perphaps, if you can gather information about wiring of
electrical components on this soundcard, I can look to datasheets what can
be wrong.
> Bruce Paterson wrote:
> >>>>>> Behaviour:
> >>>>>> The output sound is perfect for about 2 minutes. After that every
> >>>>>> now and then I get "distortion" in the audio. No xruns or errors
> >>>>>> are reported in the software. It sounds like only part of the
> >>>>>> output buffer is correct (the general gist is right, but there's
> >>>>>> crap and warbles there as well).
>
> --
> Cheers,
> Bruce
Jaroslav
-----
Jaroslav Kysela <perex@suse.cz>
Linux Kernel Sound Maintainer
ALSA Project, SuSE Labs
-------------------------------------------------------
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^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 13+ messages in thread
* Re: Am I asking the right people ?
2002-11-27 9:46 ` Jaroslav Kysela
@ 2002-11-28 15:51 ` Takashi Iwai
2002-12-02 14:57 ` Takashi Iwai
0 siblings, 1 reply; 13+ messages in thread
From: Takashi Iwai @ 2002-11-28 15:51 UTC (permalink / raw)
To: Jaroslav Kysela; +Cc: Bruce Paterson, alsa development
At Wed, 27 Nov 2002 10:46:53 +0100 (CET),
Jaroslav wrote:
>
> On Wed, 27 Nov 2002, Bruce Paterson wrote:
>
> > Am I sending these queries about the operation of alsa through the API
> > to the right place ? I'm trying to use alsa for a real scientific
> > application and I'm starting to worry it simply isn't ready yet.
> >
> > I don't pretend to be a developer of alsa drivers themselves, and I'd
> > hoped I didn't need to become one. I understand alsa needs many people
> > debugging it and finding problems to make it bulletproof (afterall there
> > would be a myriad of different possible configurations people can use).
> >
> > However, the silence I get in reply to queries is golden (unlike the
> > distortion I'm getting from the soundcard) !
> >
> > It's possible I'm not using the alsa API in the way intended and
> > bringing the problems upon myself, but please, somebody tell me !
> >
> > It would be a real blow to the progress of linux in this company if all
> > the alsa work had to be scrapped.
> >
> > Apologies for the frustrated tone.
>
> Sorry, I haven't EWS88 on my table. It seems that the problem is with the
> DAC initialization, but it's difficult to debug these things without
> hardware. Perphaps, if you can gather information about wiring of
> electrical components on this soundcard, I can look to datasheets what can
> be wrong.
this hardware is out of my box atm, but i can check it tomorrow.
ciao,
Takashi
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^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 13+ messages in thread
* Re: Am I asking the right people ?
2002-11-28 15:51 ` Takashi Iwai
@ 2002-12-02 14:57 ` Takashi Iwai
0 siblings, 0 replies; 13+ messages in thread
From: Takashi Iwai @ 2002-12-02 14:57 UTC (permalink / raw)
To: Jaroslav Kysela; +Cc: Bruce Paterson, alsa development
At Thu, 28 Nov 2002 16:51:56 +0100,
I wrote:
>
> At Wed, 27 Nov 2002 10:46:53 +0100 (CET),
> Jaroslav wrote:
> >
> > On Wed, 27 Nov 2002, Bruce Paterson wrote:
> >
> > > Am I sending these queries about the operation of alsa through the API
> > > to the right place ? I'm trying to use alsa for a real scientific
> > > application and I'm starting to worry it simply isn't ready yet.
> > >
> > > I don't pretend to be a developer of alsa drivers themselves, and I'd
> > > hoped I didn't need to become one. I understand alsa needs many people
> > > debugging it and finding problems to make it bulletproof (afterall there
> > > would be a myriad of different possible configurations people can use).
> > >
> > > However, the silence I get in reply to queries is golden (unlike the
> > > distortion I'm getting from the soundcard) !
> > >
> > > It's possible I'm not using the alsa API in the way intended and
> > > bringing the problems upon myself, but please, somebody tell me !
> > >
> > > It would be a real blow to the progress of linux in this company if all
> > > the alsa work had to be scrapped.
> > >
> > > Apologies for the frustrated tone.
> >
> > Sorry, I haven't EWS88 on my table. It seems that the problem is with the
> > DAC initialization, but it's difficult to debug these things without
> > hardware. Perphaps, if you can gather information about wiring of
> > electrical components on this soundcard, I can look to datasheets what can
> > be wrong.
>
> this hardware is out of my box atm, but i can check it tomorrow.
as far as i've tested, my ews88mt works fine with the current cvs
release. 32bit/96kHz playback seems for 10min.
except for the distortion problem about two minutes with your app,
what kind of problem are you having? i'd been on vacation so i
couldn't keep tracking the thread.
i'll be able to test the same program on my machine.
Takashi
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^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 13+ messages in thread
* Re: Am I asking the right people ?
2002-11-27 7:23 ` Am I asking the right people ? Bruce Paterson
2002-11-27 9:46 ` Jaroslav Kysela
@ 2002-11-27 13:24 ` Paul Davis
1 sibling, 0 replies; 13+ messages in thread
From: Paul Davis @ 2002-11-27 13:24 UTC (permalink / raw)
To: Bruce Paterson; +Cc: alsa development
>Am I sending these queries about the operation of alsa through the API
>to the right place ? I'm trying to use alsa for a real scientific
>application and I'm starting to worry it simply isn't ready yet.
the API is ready. the documentation is not. some of us have been using
ALSA to develop serious audio applications for several years. there
are no substantive issues with the API at this time.
>However, the silence I get in reply to queries is golden (unlike the
>distortion I'm getting from the soundcard) !
the problem with your question is that there's no way to know whether
its a software issue or hardware issue without getting your code and
running it ourselves. there are actually very few developers in the
ALSA team, and all of them are extremely busy. the lack of response to
your question has nothing to do with the state of the API and
everything to do with people's workloads and their interest in solving
yet another common problem with audio software (the problem you're
describing has happened to me often, and can be caused by several
different things in your code).
>It's possible I'm not using the alsa API in the way intended and
>bringing the problems upon myself, but please, somebody tell me !
>
>It would be a real blow to the progress of linux in this company if all
>the alsa work had to be scrapped.
i would point out that "scrapping ALSA" would be pretty stupid when
its the standard audio API in the 2.5/2.6 kernel.
--p
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^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 13+ messages in thread
* Re: Am I asking the right people ?
2002-11-25 12:02 ` Jaroslav Kysela
2002-11-26 0:41 ` Bruce Paterson
@ 2002-11-27 7:48 ` James Courtier-Dutton
1 sibling, 0 replies; 13+ messages in thread
From: James Courtier-Dutton @ 2002-11-27 7:48 UTC (permalink / raw)
To: Bruce Paterson; +Cc: alsa development
Bruce Paterson wrote:
> Am I sending these queries about the operation of alsa through the API
> to the right place ? I'm trying to use alsa for a real scientific
> application and I'm starting to worry it simply isn't ready yet.
>
> I don't pretend to be a developer of alsa drivers themselves, and I'd
> hoped I didn't need to become one. I understand alsa needs many people
> debugging it and finding problems to make it bulletproof (afterall
> there would be a myriad of different possible configurations people
> can use).
>
> However, the silence I get in reply to queries is golden (unlike the
> distortion I'm getting from the soundcard) !
>
> It's possible I'm not using the alsa API in the way intended and
> bringing the problems upon myself, but please, somebody tell me !
>
> It would be a real blow to the progress of linux in this company if
> all the alsa work had to be scrapped.
>
> Apologies for the frustrated tone.
>
> Bruce Paterson wrote:
>
>>>>>>> Behaviour:
>>>>>>> The output sound is perfect for about 2 minutes. After that
>>>>>>> every now and then I get "distortion" in the audio. No xruns or
>>>>>>> errors are reported in the software. It sounds like only part of
>>>>>>> the output buffer is correct (the general gist is right, but
>>>>>>> there's crap and warbles there as well).
>>>>>>
>
You could try using a different linux application, and thus narrow down
the problem to your app or alsa.
I helped with the xine (xine.sf.net) media player, and it has native
alsa support, and detects xruns well. You might want to try that.
Alsa also emulates oss, so any application that uses oss can also be
used to do the test.
It might be that your software is not detecting xruns correctly.
The problems that you are getting, sound to me that you are getting XRUNs.
It might be worth trying your application with a different sound card.
If that fixes the problem, it might point to a bug in the alsa driver
for your particular sound card.
Cheers
James
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^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 13+ messages in thread
[parent not found: <20021127133237.71BFE33E8C@mail.tele-ip.com>]
* Re: Am I asking the right people ?
[not found] <20021127133237.71BFE33E8C@mail.tele-ip.com>
@ 2002-11-28 2:00 ` Bruce Paterson
0 siblings, 0 replies; 13+ messages in thread
From: Bruce Paterson @ 2002-11-28 2:00 UTC (permalink / raw)
To: alsa development
Paul Davis wrote:
>>Am I sending these queries about the operation of alsa through the API
>>to the right place ? I'm trying to use alsa for a real scientific
>>application and I'm starting to worry it simply isn't ready yet.
>
>
> the API is ready. the documentation is not. some of us have been using
> ALSA to develop serious audio applications for several years. there
> are no substantive issues with the API at this time.
In that case it should be a simple issue with the way I'm using the API
then. Since I can't reproduce the problem using aplay I've suspected
this. I did send the main part of code loop earlier in the thread, but
if you like I can send the whole application to you or to another
willing API guru to just run and see if you get the same problem.
Essentially it's a very basic alsa application.
> your question has nothing to do with the state of the API and
> everything to do with people's workloads and their interest in solving
> yet another common problem with audio software (the problem you're
> describing has happened to me often, and can be caused by several
> different things in your code).
I understand. I'm looking for any help I can get since I have already
tried everything I can think of.
However, it is possible you will get many more annoying questions very
like mine with the lack of documentation, especially with alsa now being
included in the latest kernel.
> i would point out that "scrapping ALSA" would be pretty stupid when
> its the standard audio API in the 2.5/2.6 kernel.
ooh no scrapping means far worse than that! It means Windoze.....
(OSS can't do what we need anyway.)
--
Cheers,
Bruce
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^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 13+ messages in thread
end of thread, other threads:[~2002-12-02 14:57 UTC | newest]
Thread overview: 13+ messages (download: mbox.gz follow: Atom feed
-- links below jump to the message on this page --
2002-11-21 0:57 Plea to help save me from Windows !!! Bruce Paterson
2002-11-21 2:06 ` Daniel Haus
2002-11-21 6:02 ` Bruce Paterson
2002-11-25 7:36 ` Half Speed on rc6 ? Bruce Paterson
2002-11-25 12:02 ` Jaroslav Kysela
2002-11-26 0:41 ` Bruce Paterson
2002-11-27 7:23 ` Am I asking the right people ? Bruce Paterson
2002-11-27 9:46 ` Jaroslav Kysela
2002-11-28 15:51 ` Takashi Iwai
2002-12-02 14:57 ` Takashi Iwai
2002-11-27 13:24 ` Paul Davis
2002-11-27 7:48 ` James Courtier-Dutton
[not found] <20021127133237.71BFE33E8C@mail.tele-ip.com>
2002-11-28 2:00 ` Bruce Paterson
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