USB DAC Support

mouseman · 2014-10-31 19:45:44

I recently got a new DAC with Mic/Line inputs to also record from analog sources. It's a Tascam UH-7000. My media-pc is mainly running Windows 8.1 but I can dual-boot to Arch.

Under Arch, the device is recognized as a USB device, its called TEAC (same company) with lsusb but with aplay -l or aplay -L there are no devices listed.

Does this simply mean the device is not supported on Linux or is there anything I can try to get it to work, at least as a DAC but input support would be grand too of course.

I would list more details but I'm unsure what else you'd need.

Thanks!

ewaller · 2014-10-31 21:41:22

It does not necessarily mean that it is not supported. It might be that the stock Arch kernel does not have a module for it. What is the output of lsusb ?

mouseman · 2014-11-01 10:14:32

Bus 001 Device 002: ID 8087:8000 Intel Corp. 
Bus 001 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub
Bus 003 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0003 Linux Foundation 3.0 root hub
Bus 002 Device 005: ID 1532:010e Razer USA, Ltd 
Bus 002 Device 004: ID 0644:8048 TEAC Corp. 
Bus 002 Device 003: ID 045e:00d1 Microsoft Corp. Optical Mouse with Tilt Wheel
Bus 002 Device 002: ID 090c:1000 Silicon Motion, Inc. - Taiwan (formerly Feiya Technology Corp.) Flash Drive
Bus 002 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub

Cheers!

ewaller · 2014-11-01 16:34:31

There is exactly one hit on Goggle for that VID:PID -- And it is your post. I looked in the kernel configuration and found nothing.
The next thing I would try is lsusb -d 0644: -v and look to see if there are any generic interfaces, like HID.

Also, when you connect the device, what gets added to the end of the output of dmesg

mich41 · 2014-11-01 16:43:23

They seem to offer custom OSX drivers and some firmwares, so this device probably isn't USB Audio Class compliant.

A quick glance at the (short) list of custom USB Audio drivers in Linux reveals nothing like UH-7000 so it seems that there is simply no driver for this device yet.

Alsa wiki doesn't mention it either.

Last edited by mich41 (2014-11-01 16:44:26)

mouseman · 2014-11-01 18:23:27

Dmesg when disconnecting/connecting the Tascam:

[Sat Nov  1 20:13:32 2014] usb 2-3: USB disconnect, device number 3
[Sat Nov  1 20:13:51 2014] usb 2-3: new high-speed USB device number 5 using xhci_hcd

The output of lsusb command is rather long so I posted it on tinypaste, here: http://tny.cz/ff03fad1

Thanks for the help, appreciate it!

mouseman · 2014-11-25 09:18:28

Is there any chance this device will work with Linux or am I simply out of luck?

Is there anything I can do to help getting this device supported?

89c51 · 2014-11-26 22:24:09

mich41 wrote:

They seem to offer custom OSX drivers and some firmwares, so this device probably isn't USB Audio Class compliant.
A quick glance at the (short) list of custom USB Audio drivers in Linux reveals nothing like UH-7000 so it seems that there is simply no driver for this device yet.
Alsa wiki doesn't mention it either.

Highjacking but i was always curious on this:

If a manufacturers says that the device doesn't require drivers in OSX does it mean that it will work also on linux without special drivers connected through USB???

mich41 · 2014-11-27 20:27:37

In theory there's nothing preventing Apple from shipping OSX with drivers for devices which are neither Audio Class compliant nor otherwise supported by Linux.

Even if such a rule was true, you could rely on it only until the next OSX release and then you would have to verify it again.

Last edited by mich41 (2014-11-27 20:28:02)

Perfect Gentleman · 2015-03-16 08:14:18

mouseman wrote:

Is there any chance this device will work with Linux or am I simply out of luck?
Is there anything I can do to help getting this device supported?

Have you made it work?

mouseman · 2015-03-21 13:25:08

Perfect Gentleman wrote:

mouseman wrote:
Is there any chance this device will work with Linux or am I simply out of luck?
Is there anything I can do to help getting this device supported?
Have you made it work?

No, I have no idea how.

Perfect Gentleman · 2015-03-21 13:56:32

there is bin-file in firmware-file for OSX. Maybe if build kernel with this firmware, the device can be detected properly.

Last edited by Perfect Gentleman (2015-03-21 14:01:14)

mouseman · 2015-03-21 14:04:04

I don't think that's possible. And even if it is, I don't know how.

Perfect Gentleman · 2015-03-21 14:27:14

it is needed to build custom kernel.
if you want to try, i could help you.

Last edited by Perfect Gentleman (2015-03-21 17:42:15)

mouseman · 2015-05-05 15:17:49

I have no idea if this can go anywhere, but I wrote an email to the driver developers asking whether they had plans to support linux. Here's my mail and their answer:

I own a Tascam UH-7000 USB device but unfortunately it doesn’t work under Linux. Seeing the driver and/or firmware carries your name (Ploytec) I was wondering if you could help me out.
Since the device also works on Mac OSX is there a chance this device can be supported on Linux too?
If the source code is available (or at least documented API or something) maybe the Linux community can pick up the development. There are so many nice tools on Linux for recording, editing audio and there are even distributions specifically for audio professionals. Not having Linux support is really a shame.

Thanks in advance!

A reply came from one of their managing directors:

There’s nothing special about audio on the UH7000, simple isocronous streaming.
The intense part would be doing the control panel, if there’s somebody having
a couple of months free time for that, I’m sure we can arrange the databooks.

Now, I'm not a developer myself and I know most open source developers are volunteers doing their thing in their free time, for free . Still, the reply gives me a glimpse of hope that maybe one day we can have Linux support for this device.

How do things like this go? I have a company possibly willing to work with a developer to support the device in Linux. Where of how would I find a developer who can work with them?

Last edited by mouseman (2015-05-05 15:40:53)

R00KIE · 2015-05-05 20:52:51

Unless they require the developer to sign an NDA before getting access to the datasheets/databooks they might as well just make the documentation freely available, if nothing else it would earn them some good will and make life easier for anyone trying to get those DACs supported.

mouseman · 2015-05-06 05:35:40

I asked whtether that's possible.

He said that making the device work with ALSA would be simple. The control panel (which I don't think is required for basic in- and output operations) is the hard part.

mouseman · 2015-05-06 11:34:31

Actually he just said the device is a standard class 2 audio device and it should be a simple matter of making the kernel "see it" as such, from what I understand this should be trivial.

Does this change the situation and is this something I should be able to with some help?

Last edited by mouseman (2015-05-06 11:36:47)

R00KIE · 2015-05-06 14:24:08

It might be as easy as adding the vid:pid to the list of supported devices.

You might want to try the vid and pid options of the snd_usb_audio driver and see if it accepts it and if things work. If it doesn't work then I don't know, you would have to research a bit and ask around the general process of how to do it.

mouseman · 2015-05-06 14:37:50

Thanks for the suggestion.

Unfortunately I have no idea what list you're talking about and how to go about that.

Would that involve compiling snd_usb_audio from source?

Edit:
I'm reading this now btw:
http://alsa.opensrc.org/MultipleUSBAudioDevices

So I created /etc/modprobe.d/alsa-base.conf containing:

alias snd-card-0 snd-usb-audio

options snd-usb-audio index=0 vid=0x0644 pid=0x8048

Reboot, but nothing shows with aplay -l or aplay -L. This is all new territory for me, am I doing it wrong? Dmesg doesn't show anything new, just what it showed above already. With journalctl I don't see anything specific being logged so I'm not sure where (if any) ALSA would log any errors?

Last edited by mouseman (2015-05-06 15:18:51)

R00KIE · 2015-05-06 19:37:43

The only thing I would do differently is not use the alias line and try only 'options snd-usb-audio vid=0x0644 pid=0x8048' to keep it simple until something shows up.

You might also want to try vid=0644 pid=8048, but if it doesn't work I suspect it might require some coding to get to work. You may also try asking about this in the alsa mailing list, maybe someone there can give you more pointers or get interested if you can point then to the hardware documentation (if asked).

Perfect Gentleman · 2015-07-25 08:06:15

mouseman, any progress?

mouseman · 2015-07-25 08:32:24

I gave up after the above failed. I've had contact with the manufacturer as stated above and while he said it should simply work I couldn't get to.

Awebb · 2015-07-25 09:25:03

That's the magic moment to boot a distro with a non-vanilla kernel, see if it works there and then grep the patch sources for your vendor/device ID.

mouseman · 2015-07-25 13:59:13

Which distro would you suggest?

Arch Linux

#1 2014-10-31 19:45:44

USB DAC Support

#2 2014-10-31 21:41:22

Re: USB DAC Support

#3 2014-11-01 10:14:32

Re: USB DAC Support

#4 2014-11-01 16:34:31

Re: USB DAC Support

#5 2014-11-01 16:43:23

Re: USB DAC Support

#6 2014-11-01 18:23:27

Re: USB DAC Support

#7 2014-11-25 09:18:28

Re: USB DAC Support

#8 2014-11-26 22:24:09

Re: USB DAC Support

#9 2014-11-27 20:27:37

Re: USB DAC Support

#10 2015-03-16 08:14:18

Re: USB DAC Support

#11 2015-03-21 13:25:08

Re: USB DAC Support

#12 2015-03-21 13:56:32

Re: USB DAC Support

#13 2015-03-21 14:04:04

Re: USB DAC Support

#14 2015-03-21 14:27:14

Re: USB DAC Support

#15 2015-05-05 15:17:49

Re: USB DAC Support

#16 2015-05-05 20:52:51

Re: USB DAC Support

#17 2015-05-06 05:35:40

Re: USB DAC Support

#18 2015-05-06 11:34:31

Re: USB DAC Support

#19 2015-05-06 14:24:08

Re: USB DAC Support

#20 2015-05-06 14:37:50

Re: USB DAC Support

#21 2015-05-06 19:37:43

Re: USB DAC Support

#22 2015-07-25 08:06:15

Re: USB DAC Support

#23 2015-07-25 08:32:24

Re: USB DAC Support

#24 2015-07-25 09:25:03

Re: USB DAC Support

#25 2015-07-25 13:59:13

Re: USB DAC Support

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