Arch Linux

Dagreat1

Member

Registered: 2004-07-27

Posts: 16

Unclear sound.

Hello.
My speakers emmit a certain sound when playing songs on xmms. It's nothing noticable unless you really pay attention to it, or if there's no noise in the room. And it gets annoying.
The sound is a *low* continuous hum. It's not there untill I click the ``play`` button on xmms.
I have an Intel 82801BA/BAM Ac' 97 card and I here's my lsmod output:

Module                  Size  Used by
snd_seq_oss            33664  0
snd_seq_midi_event      6784  1 snd_seq_oss
snd_seq                55184  4 snd_seq_oss,snd_seq_midi_event
snd_pcm_oss            50468  0
snd_mixer_oss          18176  1 snd_pcm_oss
snd_intel8x0           31272  0
snd_ac97_codec         61444  1 snd_intel8x0
snd_pcm                92192  2 snd_pcm_oss,snd_intel8x0
snd_timer              23428  2 snd_seq,snd_pcm
gameport                4224  1 snd_intel8x0
snd_page_alloc          9860  2 snd_intel8x0,snd_pcm
snd_mpu401_uart         7040  1 snd_intel8x0
snd_rawmidi            21280  1 snd_mpu401_uart
snd_seq_device          6920  3 snd_seq_oss,snd_seq,snd_rawmidi
snd                    49124  12 snd_seq_oss,snd_seq_midi_event,snd_seq,snd_pcm_oss,snd_mixer_oss,snd_intel8x0,snd_ac97_codec,snd_pcm,snd_timer,snd_mpu401_uart,snd_rawmidi,snd_seq_device
soundcore               8160  1 snd
3c59x                  36136  0
intel_agp              16540  1

I am curious as to if this is mandatory with xmms. When I incrase the volume, there's a sufficient decrease in quality. The windows sound is so much better. Any ideas?
Arch: 0.6

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aCoder

Member

From: Medina, OH

Registered: 2004-03-07

Posts: 359

Website

Re: Unclear sound.

You have to play with your mixer settings.  Neither PCM or Master should be 100, and 1 should be significantly lower than the other.  At least, that's how it is on my box with intel sound, (i810e).  I only use the volume on the speakers and it works great.

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If you develop an ear for sounds that are musical it is like developing an ego. You begin to refuse sounds that are not musical and that way cut yourself off from a good deal of experience.
  - John Cage

dp

Member

From: Zürich, Switzerland

Registered: 2003-05-27

Posts: 3,378

Website

Re: Unclear sound.

i have the same humming, if either:

- master or PCM or both are 100% [ok is all <85%]

- "3d control" (all 3 of them) is not muted (0%) [ok is muted]

- mic is more than 50% [ok is 30%]

- mic booster is not muted (0%) [ok is muted]

i have the same chipset like you - sound on board on a thinkpad a31p

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The impossible missions are the only ones which succeed.