I''m running GNOME 2.16.2.
Playing sound from the Sound Recorder, or using aplay at the command line works just fine - and all the tests make the right noises in the device tab of Sound Preferences. Yet, for some reason, the System Sounds (in the Sounds tab) remain stubbornly silent. I've got ALSA installed as a kernel module, and ESD as the playback device for sound events.
Anyone have any clues as to why
(FWIW it's a Gentoo system running in a VMware Player).
Ta,
Greg
"Greg Thomas" Greg@TheThomasHome.co.uk wrote:
Sounds (in the Sounds tab) remain stubbornly silent. I've got ALSA installed as a kernel module, and ESD as the playback device for sound events.
Why use both ESD and ALSA? ALSA can mix sounds (in hardware if supported, software if not).
Anyway, check whether esdplay works to see if it's an ESD setup problem.
Hope that helps,
On 12/03/07, MJ Ray mjr@phonecoop.coop wrote:
"Greg Thomas" Greg@TheThomasHome.co.uk wrote:
Sounds (in the Sounds tab) remain stubbornly silent. I've got ALSA installed as a kernel module, and ESD as the playback device for sound events.
Why use both ESD and ALSA? ALSA can mix sounds (in hardware if supported, software if not).
Whilst Googling for an answer, I found a site that suggested that GNOME system sounds used ESD - http://gnomesupport.org/forums/viewtopic.php?t=12404 No idea it's it true or not, mind you.
Anyway, check whether esdplay works to see if it's an ESD setup problem.
Thanks, but esdplay works fine.
Greg (coming back to this after a while without email)
Actually I think you might be right in that Gnome assumes that if you disable ESD that you have lost the ability to do sound mixing and therefore disables all the system sounds.
Certainly on my system if I uncheck the Enable Software sound mixing (ESD) all the system sounds selections in the Gnome Sound Preferences Panel become greyed out. This doesn't really affect me as although I don't use ESD, I don't want the Gnome Sounds enabled either
I can't remember reading your original post but have you checked that the default sounds are actually present in /usr/share/sounds and/or have you tried loading a sound file that you know plays with esdplay. Do the previews work ?
An interesting side effect on my system is that although ESD is not enabled and or functional as far as I can tell, If I check the use ESD option in sound preferences then the sound chooser applet will allow me to preview event sounds but they won't actually work for events. Except the login and logout sounds.
I can't remember reading your original post but have you checked that the default sounds are actually present in /usr/share/sounds and/or have you tried loading a sound file that you know plays with esdplay. Do the previews work ?
I don't think I explicitly said, but selecting a file (e.g. /usr/share/sounds/login.wav) and using the Preview button results in no sound, whilst "esdplay /usr/share/sounds/login.wav" does give something (though not particularly tuneful!).
I presume the 'named' sounds (Login, Logout, etc) are built-in in some way instead of having a file associated with them; but I'll settle for the file based sounds, first!
Greg
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Greg Thomas -
Greg Thomas -
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Wayne Stallwood