Dear all,
I would like to ask if there will be any better support of usb speakers in the future?
If I am right , right now of course the usb speakers are supported but not in the ad-hoc fashion.
If for example you have one sound card configured and you plug in some external usb speakers the sound will not be redirected to the speakers but for that usually you have to do alsasound restart.
The same problem there is for the opposite direction when you unplug your usb speakers the sound is not redirected to the other sound card.
If the above are correct.
Do you know if there might be any change in that in the near future?
I would like to thank you in advance for you help
Best Regards
Alex
Dear all,
I would like to ask if there will be any better support of usb speakers in the future?
If I am right , right now of course the usb speakers are supported but not in the ad-hoc fashion.
If for example you have one sound card configured and you plug in some external usb speakers the sound will not be redirected to the speakers but for that usually you have to do alsasound restart.
The same problem there is for the opposite direction when you unplug your usb speakers the sound is not redirected to the other sound card.
If the above are correct.
Do you know if there might be any change in that in the near future?
I would like to thank you in advance for you help
Best Regards
Alex
Alex in openSUSE and in Windows, there is the concept of default sound device. I would guess that most programs are written to use the default sound device. The default in openSUSE seems to be the first one detected or 0. There are exceptions such as for X-Fi sound cards. If they show up in the YaST / Hardware / Sound card setup, card 0 is considered to be the default. If your preferred card is 1, you can delete 0, causing 1 to change to 0 and then re-edit the new 1, to allow its usage. If you use an X-Fi card, which is not shown and a different card is 0, you may need to delete card 0 to allow the usage of the X-Fi card that is not shown. In KDE, you can then use the multimedia section to change the default sound output for KDE programs that look at this setting.
Now, neither Linux or Windows really knows what you want to use and applications could be written to use a specific sound device, but you would have to configure that for each different system and if that device was not plugged in, then there would be no sound at all. Perhaps you want to use the USB if you just plugged it in, but what about on a reboot, when it finds it there? Always use it instead of the built-in one? I would suggest that there is no way to know what you want, but there sure could be a configurable setup to tell your OS what to do i? a new sound device shows up. I don’t see this specific issue being addressed any time soon.
I would like to thank you for your reply. I am a laptop user and I always want to use my external usb speakers. Of course as you said I can always configure them to be the default device but this does not support well the ad-hoc action. For example I move my laptop from my working room to the living room and I forget to take with me the usb speakers. Linux boots up and uses the on board sound card as the external usb speakers were not detected. So far goes fine. Then my wfe suggests me to watch a movie then I have to bring and plug in my external speakers as then I have louder and clearer sound. I plug external speakers back but … oups sound doesnot redirect to them. If I do alsasound restart then everything works fine… buth this is something that does not work well with any program that was using the sound device. For example flash videos inside firefox crash…
Then after I am watching my movie I would like to take the laptop on the couch which means that I can not have the external speakers still plugged in and I have to work with the on board sound card … so I unplug the external … but oups no sound again. I have again to restart alsasound service (not to mention –> open console–>become root–>restart service).
This is why in windows things are more straightforward… when you plugin something 90% of the time you want to use it (i.e there was no good sound time for my usb speakers… plugged them and enjoy music).
I am not sure if my example makes more clear why I do believe that such a feature is important? Might be also good when I connect a usb sound device to get a prompt from the os ‘New Sound device detected. Do you want to use it as default?’
or
‘External usb speakers were removed. Do you want to fall back to the on-board sound card?’
I can see merit in what you’re saying. (I can imagine this behaviour being able to be configured in KDE4 via system settings in the future for example). For this idea to become reality however, you need to submit the idea here:
> There are exceptions such as for X-Fi sound cards. If
> they show up in the YaST / Hardware / Sound card setup, card 0 is
> considered to be the default. If your preferred card is 1, you can
> delete 0, causing 1 to change to 0 and then re-edit the new 1, to allow
> its usage
In the yast soundcard setup window there is a dropdown menu in the lower
right corner where you have the option to set a soundcard as the primary
one.
No need to delete a card anymore en setup the other up again as number 2
Anyway, i’m using pulseaudio in KDE4 wich makes switching cards a breeze.
Per application if you want to.
n the yast soundcard setup window there is a dropdown menu in the lower
right corner where you have the option to set a soundcard as the primary
one.
No need to delete a card anymore en setup the other up again as number 2
Anyway, i’m using pulseaudio in KDE4 wich makes switching cards a breeze.
Per application if you want to.
–
Chris Maaskant
So there is. Thanks so much for the information Chris. If you were using a standard openSUSE login, I would have punched your lucky star today. I seldom go into the sound selection and so I just missed that function.
>> Anyway, i’m using pulseaudio in KDE4 wich makes switching cards a
>> breeze.
>> Per application if you want to.
>>
>> –
>> Chris Maaskant
>
> Could you please h elp me understand what pulseaudio is and how this
> will help me support the ad-hoc function of my usb speakers?
Using it is very simple.
You need some packages to be installed.
All i needed to install was pulseaudio and pavucontrol with their
dependencies, wich will be installed automagicly.
If you’re using gnome it is most likely allready installed.
I’m using KDE so i needed to add it myself.
I rebooted to make sure the new soundsystem is running.
You’re soundcards should be automatic be configured to make use of
pulseaudio.
If not.
Goto yast > hardware > sound
There in the lower right corner you’ll see a dropdown menu with an option
for pulseaudio configuration.
Click on it and make sure your cards have support for pulseaudio enabled.
Now whenever you’re using an soundapplication. amarok, mplayer or whatever
you can choose where you want the sound to go with pavucontrol.
I made an icon for it on my taskbar so i can get to it fast.
I made a screenshot of it: http://tinyurl.com/6j43rpk
You see 2 programs using 2 different soundcards.
Click on the name of the card and you’ll get a menu to select another one.
Pavucontrol remember these settings, even after a reboot.
I hope i didn’t overcomplicated things and it helped you a bit.
Thanks a lot for your answer.
After I installing everything I found here: SDB:Pulseaudio - openSUSE
I tried to start pulse audio in console
myuser@mylinux:~> pulseaudio
E: core-util.c: Failed to create secure directory: Permission denied
> After I installing everything I found here:
> ‘SDB:Pulseaudio - openSUSE’
> (http://en.opensuse.org/SDB:Pulseaudio#Configuration)
> I tried to start pulse audio in console
> myuser@mylinux:~> pulseaudio
> E: core-util.c: Failed to create secure directory: Permission denied
>
> What should I try now?
The article says pulseaudio should start when an application tries to use
pulsaudio.
What system are you using?
Opensuse version? GNOME or KDE?
For KDE there are extra steps to be taken care of as said in the article.
Anyway, if everything is installed and setup correctly you shouldn’t need to
launch pulseaudio yourself.
What happens if you use mplayer for a movie or soundfile and you run
pavucontrol?
Can you see mplayer like in my screenshot?
Have you also made sure in the sound module of yast that pulseaudio is
enabled for your soundcards?
Yea did all these.
I configured sound devices from Yast to support pulse audio (or pulse audio to support them).
I also selected vlc to have as output the pulseaudio (good thing) sound did stop (I can still hear music)
then I tried in console
pavucontrol
Failed to create secure directory: Permission denied
gui starts and I receive connection refused/ fail message.
alaios, I might suggest that you look at the S.T.A.R.T. - SuSE Terminal Audio Reporting Tool bash scripting file for testing out your audio. You could report back with anything that it finds. When I wrote this, test 8, which starts/stops audio only tries to reload kmix which does not work if you use GNOME, but other wise it works on either setup. In particular, it permits enabling pulse, which even when loaded, is not the default in openSUSE 11.3, so give the bash script file a try.
