After a reboot and logging in as root I have the speaker test and MPlayer with sound working but not Xine or Flash on Firefox. By an ‘rcalsasound restart’ I get all working for root. I can live with this. I have 2 users, one of which has the sound working on everything and the other only works for the speaker test and MPlayer - Xine and Flash have no sound. I suspect that I have screwed up a setting somewhere but I don’t know where to look. Both users are members of the audio group.
Note, depending on the order in which users access the sound, and dependant on what output audio model is selected, one may have the audio device locked so the 2nd can not access …
Thanks to oldcpu for your suggestions, and to platinum and hcw for their concern for my security.
Unfortunately the suggestions have not changed the situation. I have one user with all sound OK and the other with Xine and Flash not working. This is still the case after a reboot and logging in to the problem user first.
I tried copying the config file from the .Xine directory of the working user to the non working user without success. I noticed that this directory in the working user has a socket called session.1 and the other user does not. (I don’t know what a socket is so I have no idea if this is relevant!)
Please advise what output audio module the applications of each user is using, that causes them not to share the sound. ie list application with output module. List that for EACH application that uses the audio. Without that its not easy to make any sort of informed assessment.
Please also confirm, that when booting the PC, that it makes no differnce as to what user you go to first, ie does the sound always work with the First user and not the second, or does the problem always occur with user Joe but never with user Bob ? (using the names Joe/Bob as arbitrary examples).
Please pardon my ignorance but how do I find the output audio module for the applications?
Regarding users, I can confirm that the problem is always with user J and not D, regardless of the order that I visit first. I should add, perhaps, that I did have sound working on both users until a few weeks ago but it stopped for most programs on just one user. It may have followed some recent security updates but I can’t be sure. MPlayer seems to be the only working sound program on J.
In case it helps here is some more info:
cat /proc/asound/version
Advanced Linux Sound Architecture Driver Version 1.0.17.
I noticed that this directory in the working user has a socket called session.1 and the other user does not. (I don’t know what a socket is so I have no idea if this is relevant!)
This could well be relevant. From your working user directory, post the output of the following
ls -l ~/.xine
Maybe this session file is the problem.
You could try renaming .xine directory to .xine.old then see if other users have sound. (I’m not sure whether you will need to restart desktop or not). In fact, you could rename (or delete) the .xine directories in all /home/<user> directories and see if correct operation is restored.
BTW, I wanted to know if you’re using KDE 4 or Gnome desktop? If the former, do you have it configured for each user to start with an empty session? (Configure Desktop > Advanced > Session Manager)
Here is the output requested from the working user (d):
>ls -l ~/.xine
total 64
-rw-r–r-- 1 d users 23859 2009-09-11 21:01 catalog.cache
-rw-r–r-- 1 d users 20291 2009-09-11 21:02 config
-rw-r–r-- 1 d users 12535 2009-09-11 21:02 keymap
srwxr-xr-x 1 d users 0 2009-09-02 20:16 session.1
-rw-r–r-- 1 d users 131 2009-09-11 21:02 xine-ui_old_playlist.tox
I have tried renameing the .xine directories for both users as suggested and still have the same symptoms after a reboot.
I am using Suse 11.1 and KDE 3.5.10. I had both users set to restore previous setting but have changed them to start with an empty session with no change.
I can’t help thinking that the fact that MPlayer works on user j when all other sound using programs that I have tried are silent should give a clue. There is no sound from Xine, Kaffeine, Amarok, SMPlayer or Flash on Firefox or Konqueror
I can’t help thinking that the fact that MPlayer works on user j when all other sound using programs that I have tried are silent should give a clue.
It does, but it could be helpful if you can provide this info for each user account:
Please advise what output audio module the applications of each user is using, that causes them not to share the sound. ie list application with output module. List that for EACH application that uses the audio. Without that its not easy to make any sort of informed assessment.
Sorry, but I still don’t know how to provide this:
Please advise what output audio module the applications of each user is using, that causes them not to share the sound. ie list application with output module. List that for EACH application that uses the audio.
As I said before:
Please pardon my ignorance but how do I find the output audio module for the applications?
Please treat me as a beginner and tell me how to find the information needed.
I logged on to the problem user j and found that SMPlayer’s audio output driver options gave:
oss
alsa
alsa (0.0 Audigy 1 [SB0090])
alsa (0.2 Audigy 1 [SB0090])
alsa (0.3 Audigy 1 [SB0090])
alsa (1.0 VIA 8235)
alsa (1.1 VIA 8235)
and 9 other possibilities.
By the way: cat /proc/asound/cards
0 [Audigy ]: Audigy - Audigy 1 [SB0090]
Audigy 1 [SB0090] (rev.3, serial:0x531102) at 0xb800, irq 18
1 [V8235 ]: VIA8233 - VIA 8235
VIA 8235 with ALC650E at 0xe000, irq 22
Of the options with SMPlayer, oss and alsa (0.0 Audigy 1 [SB0090]) gave a sound output but none of the others did.
I then looked at Xine and there was an alsa option but no alsa (0.0 Audigy 1 [SB0090]) and alsa gave no sound. Oss worked!
So now I can get sound from Mplayer, SMPlayer, Xine and Kaffeine but not Amarok or Firefox. I could not find any audio output driver options for either of these programs. I can live without Amarok - it isn’t a program that I normally use, but I would like to get sound on Firefox.
I tried setting up a new user to see how the defaults might work but after a reboot and logging in to the new user I had the same sound problems as user j. User d still works without all the hassle, including Flash etc, and I find it rather strange.
I would be grateful if anyone could tell me how to get Firefox to use oss or alsa (0.0 Audigy 1 [SB0090]) as the audio output driver.
Firefox uses various plugins to provide sound. In the past I have used mplayerplug-in together with flash-player. However mplayerplug-in is being depreciated in favour of gecko-mediaplayer. Try installing either (but NOT both) mplayerplug-in or gecko-mediaplayer and also install flash-player. If that gives video but no audio, try removing libflashsupport (but keep flash-player).
Reference your audio, I recommend you install packman packaged versions (and not videolan packaged versions) of the multimedia. If you install the packman packaged libxine1, libxine1-codecs, xine-ui, amarok, amarok-packman, amarok-xine, you should be able to select the xine engine to get sound in amarok. I also recommend you install the packman packaged versions of libffmpeg0, w32codec-all, and libxvidcore4 to pickup some codecs, either supplied by those packages, or by their dependencies.
With the exception of libdvdcss, I recommend you replace any videolan packaged versions with packman packaged versions of your apps. You can tell a version is packman packaged by the “pm” in the version number.
I have followed your suggestions and, where necessary, changed the package versions to Packman. This has been successful in getting Amarok to work.
The Firefox problem remains however. I have installed gecko-mediaplayer. Gnome MPlayer works with sound and vision on both my users but Firefox still only has sound on one user (they both have vision). I haven’t got libflashsupport installed.
Are there some settings that I could find on the working user that I could then copy to the non-working one?
You say firefox has sound on one user. Then sound works in firefox. IMHO the problem is somewhere else …
How confident are you that firefox has let go the sound device when you switched users?
When sound does not work in firefox, what does the following show you:
lsof /dev/dsp* /dev/audio* /dev/mixer* /dev/snd/*
Does it show the 1st user’s firefox did not let go the audio?
In my experience, firefox will not share the audio device between multiple users. ie the 1st user must shut down firefox before loging out to let the second user’s firefox to have access to sound
The sound on user j’s Firefox doesn’t work even after a reboot and not running anything else. On user d it seems to be OK all the time.
This is what I get on the 2 users:
lsof /dev/dsp* /dev/audio* /dev/mixer* /dev/snd/*
COMMAND PID USER FD TYPE DEVICE SIZE/OFF NODE NAME
pulseaudi 4250 j mem CHR 116,15 3891 /dev/snd/pcmC1D0p
pulseaudi 4250 j 18u CHR 116,17 0t0 3914 /dev/snd/controlC1
pulseaudi 4250 j 24u CHR 116,17 0t0 3914 /dev/snd/controlC1
pulseaudi 4250 j 25u CHR 116,15 0t0 3891 /dev/snd/pcmC1D0p
pulseaudi 4250 j 32u CHR 116,12 0t0 3561 /dev/snd/controlC0
pulseaudi 4250 j 37u CHR 116,12 0t0 3561 /dev/snd/controlC0
lsof /dev/dsp* /dev/audio* /dev/mixer* /dev/snd/*
COMMAND PID USER FD TYPE DEVICE SIZE/OFF NODE NAME
pulseaudi 14566 d mem CHR 116,10 3547 /dev/snd/pcmC0D0p
pulseaudi 14566 d 18u CHR 116,17 0t0 3914 /dev/snd/controlC1
pulseaudi 14566 d 19u CHR 116,12 0t0 3561 /dev/snd/controlC0
pulseaudi 14566 d 24u CHR 116,17 0t0 3914 /dev/snd/controlC1
pulseaudi 14566 d 25u CHR 116,10 0t0 3547 /dev/snd/pcmC0D0p
pulseaudi 14566 d 32u CHR 116,12 0t0 3561 /dev/snd/controlC0
pulseaudi 14566 d 37u CHR 116,12 0t0 3561 /dev/snd/controlC0
The first query was done after failing to get sound from Firefox on user j, and the second was done after getting sound from Firefox on user d (performed in that order).
I suspect /dev/snd/pcmC1D0p and /dev/snd/pcmC0D0p! Does it mean that it is sending the sound to the wrong place?
When I first installed 11.1 I tried KDE 4 but I didn’t like it as much as KDE 3 so I use that. Could KDE 4 interfere in some way even if it isn’t being used?
