Arch Linux

Locri

Member

From: Ontario, Canada

Registered: 2005-02-22

Posts: 55

Sound Issues on StepMania Startup [Solved]

I recently downloaded and installed the StepMania package from AUR.  The install went just fine, but now I'm having issues running StepMania.  Every time I try to start it, it gives me the following error:

ALSA: Advanced Linux Sound Architecture Driver Version 1.0.13 (Tue Nov 28 14:07:24 2006 UTC).
ALSA Driver: 0: HDA NVidia [NVidia], device 0: ALC882 Analog [ALC882 Analog], 0/1 subdevices avail
ALSA Driver: 0: HDA NVidia [NVidia], device 1: ALC882 Digital [ALC882 Digital], 1/1 subdevices avail
Couldn't load driver ALSA: dsnd_pcm_open(hw:0): Device or resource busy
Mixing 0.000000 ahead in 0 Mix() calls
Couldn't load driver ALSA-sw: dsnd_pcm_open(hw:0): Device or resource busy
Mixing 0.000000 ahead in 0 Mix() calls
Couldn't load driver OSS: RageSound_OSS: Couldn't open /dev/dsp: Device or resource busy
Language: english
Theme: default
Error: Couldn't find a sound driver that works

There was another post here about the same issue almost a year ago but it was never resolved.

ALSA and OSS both work perfectly fine in every other app I've used so far.  Any ideas?

Edit:  I should note that I'm using StepMania 3.9 compiled version

Last edited by Locri (2007-04-13 00:33:12)

Locri

Member

From: Ontario, Canada

Registered: 2005-02-22

Posts: 55

Re: Sound Issues on StepMania Startup [Solved]

Just adding some more information on the off chance that someone has any ideas what might be causing this:

I've also tried 3.9a and CVS from AUR.  3.9a gives me the exact same error message as 3.9 and 4.0 CVS will start and run, but I get no sound from it at all.  I think it might be having a similar error, but just ignoring it unlike 3.9

Again... does anyone have any ideas?

Cilyan

Member

From: Toulouse (FR)

Registered: 2006-08-27

Posts: 97

Website

Re: Sound Issues on StepMania Startup [Solved]

In general, this message does just mean that there is another program using /dev/dsp. You may stop every program that display sound, like music players, and pay attention to programs like skype, flashplugins, etc. that uses directly the sound device without going through a mixer. Remember that a paused music player doesn't release the sound device. aRts, the KDE sound mixer may also be a problem. You can make aRts release the device when not using it in the kcontrol panel. I don't think so, but you can check whether esd locks you or not. If so, just do /etc/rc.d/esd stop.

Cilyan

Locri

Member

From: Ontario, Canada

Registered: 2005-02-22

Posts: 55

Re: Sound Issues on StepMania Startup [Solved]

Ok, that was in fact the issue (other programs trying to use the sound system).  Apparently Amarok was holding onto the audio driver.  I thought it wasn't the problem earlier because I had tried to run StepMania off of a clean reboot, but now it works just fine as long as Amarok and other apps are completely stopped.

Thanks!