Subject: Gaah! Odd sound card problems. Help?
To: None <port-i386@NetBSD.ORG>
From: Mason Loring Bliss <mason@acheron.middleboro.ma.us>
List: port-i386
Date: 05/14/1998 19:20:50
Hi, all.

I went out and got a $10 sound card today... It's behaving very strangely.
If I cat a test .au file to /dev/audio, it'll play, but here's what's odd:
It's like there's a buffer that holds maybe ten seconds or something of
sound - maybe less - and

cat food > /dev/audio

won't exit until the whole mess has played four times. If I play something
particularly long, and then play something short, when the short piece has
ended, whatever is left in the buffer from the long sound will play.

Here's what my kernel has to say, at startup time:

sb0 at isa0 port 0x220-0x22f irq 7 drq 1: dsp v2.01
audio0 at sb0

Does this behaviour make any sense to anyone? I'd love to get the sound card
working *slightly* better than this.

Incidentally, I installed rplay, and playing stuff through rplay generates
the same loopy behaviour.

If nothing I've said makes any sense or points to any knows problems, can
someone suggest stuff I might try to get information that's relevant?

Here's what autoctl -a has to say:

name=SoundBlaster
version=2.01
config=SB_2.x
encodings=ulinear:8,mulaw:8*,alaw:8*,slinear:8*
properties=mmap
full_duplex=0
blocksize=400
hiwat=163
lowat=1
monitor_gain=0
mode=
play.rate=8000
play.channels=1
play.precision=8
play.encoding=mulaw
play.gain=127
play.balance=32
play.port=0x0
play.avail_ports=0x0
play.seek=19200
play.samples=0
play.eof=0
play.pause=0
play.error=0
play.waiting=0
play.open=0
play.active=1
play.buffer_size=65536
record.rate=8000
record.channels=1
record.precision=8
record.encoding=mulaw
record.gain=127
record.balance=32
record.port=0x0
record.avail_ports=0x0
record.seek=0
record.samples=0
record.eof=0
record.pause=0
record.error=0
record.waiting=0
record.open=0
record.active=0
record.buffer_size=65536
record.errors=0

Thanks in advance for the help!

-- 
Mason Loring Bliss...mason@acheron.middleboro.ma.us...www.webtrek.com/mason
"In the drowsy dark cave of the mind dreams build their nest with fragments
 dropped from day's caravan."--Rabindranath Tagore...awake ? sleep : dream;