Pulse audio / ALSA

[herve49]

Dear all

For a fews weeks, i had asked why i haven't sound in Firefox and have sound in other applications (amarock, Kaffeine, ...).

I was advised to enable pulse audio in PCC and now i have sound in all applications and firefox.
However, I find that the sound quality is less.

I use the sound card XONAR D2 and his sound driver is SNDVIRTUOSO, but it's ALSA (not pulse).
On my KDE desktop, as user, in pulse control volume, it's written : "CMI8788 oxygen hd audio. No possibility to change to SNDVIRTUOSO where sound is in best quality and has more force.

So with pulse audio enabled, the trimming of the sound in the volume control is 100% and with the driver SNDVIRTUOSO (ALSA) at 50% for the same trimming.
And i haven't the same pleasure to use my sound card: more with SNDVIRTUOSO ans very less with Pulseaudio.

So, i have the choice to return to ALSA (no sound i Firefox, but best sound quality with music or movies) or not enjoy the sound quality of my card, but have sound in Firefox.

Moreover, KDE has removed all sound devices but kept only the pulseaudio server !

Has anyone the same problems ?

Thanks for your advice and assistance.

Herve49

[Just17]

Pulse Audio does not replace Alsa.

It uses Alsa.

Essentially it is a GUI front end to Alsa.


Are you using Pulse Audio Volume Control to adjust the settings in PulseAudio?

[herve49]

Just17

Thanks for you reply.

Yes, i'm using the Pulse Audio Control Volum.

So, if Pulse does not replace Alsa and is a GUI front end to Alsa, with does it not use the SNDVIRTUOSO (Alsa) driver ?
Why do it replace it with "CMI8788 oxygen hd audio" ?

Herve49

[Just17]

Just17

Thanks for you reply.

Yes, i'm using the Pulse Audio Control Volum.

So, if Pulse does not replace Alsa and is a GUI front end to Alsa, with does it not use the SNDVIRTUOSO (Alsa) driver ?
Why do it replace it with "CMI8788 oxygen hd audio" ?

Herve49

Possibly because it sees it as the chipset that the Xonar D2 uses ..... ?

What choices are available in the drop-down menu for the Xonar on the Config tab of PA Vol Ctrl?  A pic if you can ....

[Just17]

Are you using the 3.2.18 kernel?

In a console do

uname -r

which should tell you which kernel is in use.

It seems that the virtuoso driver is available for the 2.6.38.8, 3.2.18 and 3.4.11  kernels ..... 

[herve49]

Hello Just,

I'm using kernel 3.2.18-pclos2.pae.bfs.
System is up to date at this time.

XONAR don't exist, no options : only CMI8788

Sorry, i can't insert images (png filef from snapshot)

Herve49

[Just17]

In a terminal

locate modules | grep -i virtuoso

should show you that you have virtuoso sound modules for you kernel.

lsmod | grep -i virtuoso

will either return you to the command prompt if the module is not loaded, or will give output indicating that it is.

Assuming that you get no response, su to root, and issue this command

modprobe snd-virtuoso

Now check again if the module is loaded

lsmod | grep -i virtuoso

You should get a response indicating that the module is available.

Can you please do the above and copy & paste the command & output for each in sequence.

BTW .....  to display a pic in the post, upload your pic to a service like tinypic.com and insert the link to your pic in the post.