Arch Linux

CharBar

Member

Registered: 2011-05-27

Posts: 10

USB audio volume control Kmix- works with VLC, but nothing else

Hey all,

I have Kmix set up with my Edirol UA-5 as the default sound card. I want to be able to control the volume of the UA-5 with Kmix's master channel volume. This will work with VLC, but nothing else that I've tested (an audio editor in Wine and Firefox- admittedly not much, but I've only recently installed a minimal KDE Arch). When I try to change the volume in Wine or Firefox, the volume will simply remain at a fixed level regardless of where I set the Kmix master channel volume (though the sound is being properly played otherwise). Also, nothing happens when I try to play the test sounds in winecfg. 

About the setup: (1) UA-5 is set as the master channel in Kmix (2) UA-5 is set as the first listed item in all of Phonon's device preferences (3) UA-5 is on in the Phonon speaker setup, while the internal audio is set to 'off'
(4) I created an /etc/modprobe.d/alsa.conf file with the one line 'options snd slots=snd_usb_audio,snd_hda_intel'; this changed the order of the sound modules properly, as snd_usb_audio is listed as 0 when 'cat /proc/asound/modules' is typed into terminal. (5) I have pulseaudio installed (6) My backend is currently Xine, but I get all of the same problems with a VLC backend.

I have, to my mind, an identical setup in Linux Mint KDE and everything works as I'd like it to. One thing that is different is that Mint has an /etc/modprobe.d/alsa-base.conf file that was created by the system and Arch doesn't. This is only possibly important because this file has a section that reads:

# Prevent abnormal drivers from grabbing index 0
options bt87x index=-2
options cx88_alsa index=-2
options saa7134-alsa index=-2
options snd-atiixp-modem index=-2
options snd-intel8x0m index=-2
options snd-via82xx-modem index=-2
#options snd-usb-audio index=-2
options snd-usb-caiaq index=-2
options snd-usb-ua101 index=-2
options snd-usb-us122l index=-2
options snd-usb-usx2y index=-2
# Ubuntu #62691, enable MPU for snd-cmipci
options snd-cmipci mpu_port=0x330 fm_port=0x388
# Keep snd-pcsp from being loaded as first soundcard
options snd-pcsp index=-2
# Keep snd-usb-audio from beeing loaded as first soundcard
#options snd-usb-audio index=-2
options snd slots=snd-usb-audio,snd-hda-intel

I added the last line in the section above and also commented out the 2 lines that read 'options snd-usb-audio index=-2'.

I'm currently stumped- Any suggestions would be most appreciated. Thanks!

Last edited by CharBar (2011-05-27 05:10:26)

CharBar

Member

Registered: 2011-05-27

Posts: 10

Re: USB audio volume control Kmix- works with VLC, but nothing else

Some other observations that may be helpful (and, hopefully, get closer to the heart of the problem)...

(1) Whenever VLC is playing audio (as mentioned in previous post, it is only application that works in desired manner), it will show up in Kmix's "Playback Streams" tab. Whenever Wine and Firefox are playing, they do NOT show up in the "Playback Streams" tab.

(2) Kmix will not allow more than one open application to grab the UA-5 sound (e.g. If I open Firefox and play audio, stop playing audio (while leaving Firefox open), then open VLC and try to play audio, VLC will not play audio (unless Firefox is closed)). This is likely a related problem to the problem outlined in the previous post, but it might not be. If it isn't, I'll take advice on how to let KMIX grab multiple audio sources simultaneously on the same sound card.

Thanks for reading!