SUSE 10.0, problems installing soundcard from scratch

[jdkoola 0]

Hi,

 

I'm running SUSE 10.0 on an old Pentium III (coppermine) computer (Dell Dimension 4100). I don't know what the mobo is (don't know if it's important). I have a SoundBlaster PCI128.

 

The soundcard was recognized when I first installed SUSE; however, I somehow ended up deleting the soundcard from YaST. Now, I can't reinstall it.

 

When I try to get YaST to autodetect the soundcard, it can't find it. I try to manually add it, and it gives me the error:

 

The kernel module snd-ens1371 for sound support could n ot be loaded. This can be caused by incorrect module parameters, including invalid IO or IRQ parameters.

 

I should mention that I'm not entirely certain of the soundcard model. The only reason I think it's a PCI128 is that's what YaST called it when it first autodetected it (when I originally installed SUSE 10.0).

 

I appreciate any assistance.

 

JD

[danleff 0]

What's important to know, is if the soundcard is built in, or if you added a card to the system.

 

According to Dell, the onboard sound is ADI SoundMAX 2.0 Integrated Audio Driver (ADI 1885 chip set).

 

If it is not onboard, it could be one of a number of cards added to the system. These cards are legacy cards built for Dell and can give Linux a real headache.

 

If it is a soundblaster card, there ar dozens of models that it could be. many, as I mentioned are legacy cards that Dell used that were configured for Windows.

 

Look in Yast, under hardware-->Hardware Information.

 

Look under the sound tree.

 

Does Yast note what it thinks the soundcard is?

 

Also, from the command line, you could do;

 

lspci -v -v

 

Look for the soundcard entry and note what the output is for the card.

[jdkoola 0]

Thanks for the quick reply. It is not the onboard soundcard. It is a separate soundcard that is in a PCI slot. The problem is that the soundcard does not show up in the Hardware Information dialog (there is no "Sound" tree at all). It also does not show up with lspci.

 

As I mentioned, SUSE did autodetect the card when I first installed SUSE. At that time there was a "Sound" tree and the card did show up in it, and it described the card as a SoundBlaster PCI64/128.

 

Thanks for any insight,

 

JD

[danleff 0]

I looked this up, you are correct, it should be the ES1371 module.

 

Sound configuration is not one of my strong points. But, how did you delete your soundcard? Did you update alsa or the default kernel, by chance?

 

Let's try something first. Get to a terminal window, as root user. try typing in the following;

 

modinfo soundcore

 

Does this give you any output?

 

If so, then try;

 

modprobe snd-card-ens1371

 

Do you get any errors, or just a return to the command line, without any errors? If no errors, look and see if loading the sound mixer shows the card. Or, if Yast let's you configure the sound card automatically.

[jdkoola 0]

Hi,

 

I'm not sure what was going on, but I purchased a new SoundBlaster Audigy SE card, which works great on Suse 10.0 out of the box. Thanks for your insights anyway, and I'm sure I'll use your info in the future.

 

JD

[jdkoola 0]

 

I am, however, having a new problem with this card. All the sounds come out as static. I have tried turning up the sound levels in KMix and the master sound level through the Sound Hardware Configuration area in YaST all the way. I have also tried moving the sound levels to about midway. Regardless, whatever I try to play comes out as static.

 

YaST recognizes it as SoundBlaster Audigy LS. Are the Audigy SE and the LS the same model?

 

The settings are just the default that YaST chose for the soundcard, which as far as I can tell are:

 

Driver: snd-ca0106

Audio device: ALSA

 

I tried turning off the "Auto suspend if idle after" option. Did not help.

 

JD

[danleff 0]

According to the Alsa sound card matrix, the SoundBlaster Audigy LS uses the snd-emu10k1 module, whereas the Audigy SE uses the snd-ca0106 module.

 

Also notice that the version of Alsa that comes with SuSE 10 (version 1.0.9) is known to have the distortion problem that you describe.

 

What happens when you configure the card with the emu10k1 module, per Yast?

[jdkoola 0]

Hi,

 

I don't know how to change the default driver. Here's what I tried:

 

1. I went into "Sound" from YaST, and I selected the existing configuration for the SoundBlaster card. I clicked on "Delete". It did not remove it from the list, just changed the status to "Not configured"

2. I then clicked on the "Add" button and selected Creative Labs from the manufacturer list and Audigy LS from the card list. However, this did not allow me to specify a driver, it looks like it just used the ca0106 driver.

 

Do I need to go into /etc/modprobe.d/sound and manually edit the line that says:

 

alias snd-card-0 snd-ca0106

 

to:

 

alias snd-card-0 snd-emu...

 

annd if I do, do I also need to add a line:

 

options snd-emu... enable=1 index=0

 

Thanks for your help.

 

JD