Blair Armeau

16 – Sound

Please note… This information no longer exists at the referenced locations.  This is only a copy of what was available in 2003.

Basic Linux Training™

Sound

Chris Palmer

Table of Contents

• Introduction
• Installation
• Assignments

Introduction

The Linux kernel has numerous sound device drivers support for most popular sound cards. The device drivers can either be built as part of the kernel or as loadable modular devices.

Typically, all Linux distributions use a GENERIC installation kernel that has all the sound device drivers built as loadable modular devices. This keeps the Linux kernel to a managable size, but affords a wide range of sound card support.

Some major Linux distributions as part of the initial installation routine will: auto-detect the installed sound card and edit the system start-up configuration files to load the appropriate sound device driver at boot-time.

The newer Linux kernel 2.4.x series now have reliable ISA slot card plug-n-play support. Some of the more popular sound drivers are supported for automatic detection and configuration. If you have an ISA slot sound card, your milage may vary as to if your card will be auto-detected and the proper system configuration files edited. See the The Linux Sound-HOWTO for assistance with ISA slot sound cards.

Installation

The following two examples are my experience with a Sound Blaster 16 PCI slot sound card using Caldera OpenLinux Workstation 3.1 and Slackware 8.0:

• Caldera – Since Sound Blaster sound cards are common, Caldera properly auto-detected and edited the start-up configuration files with the appropriate sound device driver without user input during the installation routine. The installation routine added the entry es1371 in the file /etc/modules/default (Caldera uses this file to load any modular device drives at boot-time).
• Slackware – Sound card detection and configuration is not part of the installation routine. Instead, Slackware has a modular device driver start-up configuration file /etc/rc.d/rc.modules that lists numerous common devices which the user can manually edit to specify what modular device drivers to load at boot-time (this is not as complicated as is sounds, Slackware has heavily commented the file for ease of use). I simply edited the file to have the entry /sbin/modprobe es1371 load at boot-time.

Documentation excerpts from other Linux distributions:

• Mandrake – This information is taken from the Mandrake 8.2 “User Guide: Installation with DrakX” and “User Guide: Mandrake Control Center”.If a sound card has been detected on your system, it is displayed at the “Summary” prompt screen. No modification possible at installation time. To configure or modify the sound card after installation use the HardDrake utility.
• Red Hat – This information is taken from the Red Hat 7.2 “Getting Started Guide: Audio, Video, and General Amusement”.Sound capability is included Red Hat Linux. If, for some reason, you do not hear sound and know that you do have a sound card installed, you can run the sndconfig utility. … The sndconfig utility probes your system for sound cards. If the utility detects a plug and play sound card, it will automatically try to configure the correct settings by playing sound samples. If you can hear the samples, just select Ok when instructed and your sound card configuration is complete.

Assignments

Online:

• http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/Sound-HOWTO.html – The Linux Sound HOWTO
• http://www.alsa-project.org/ – Advanced Linux Sound Architecture
• http://www.xdt.com/ar/linux-snd/ The Linux Midi + Sound Pages – Main Page
• http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/mini/Alsa-sound.html – The Linux Alsa-Sound mini-HOWTO
• http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/mini/Soundblaster-AWE.html – Sounblaster AWE-
• http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/MP3-HOWTO.html – The Linux MP3 HOWTO
• http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/MP3-Box-HOWTO.html – The Linux MP3-Box HOWTO
• http://www.crowcastle.net/preston/linux-av/ – Linux Sound and Video
• http://www.4front-tech.com/linux.html – OSS/Linux