ALSA 1.0.24 Has Arrived, Bringing Better Linux Audio

[NomadDemon]

i have also xonar DX and alsa doesnt support hardware mixing, need to use pulseaudio :< can someone help me?

[deanjo]

i have also xonar DX and alsa doesnt support hardware mixing, need to use pulseaudio :< can someone help me?

Actually ALSA supports hardware mixing, it is your hardware that doesn't have hardware mixing. You shouldn't need pulseaudio as well. ALSA's dmix should suffice quite nicely. I have a Auzentech X-Meridian and it can play multiple streams at once with just base alsa and without any custom .alsarc foolery.

[Ragas]

Michael, I have a Creative X-Fi sound card and I haven't encountered a single problem with the driver. Why do you keep talking about the lack of changes in the ALSA Creative X-Fi driver? As far as I can tell, it does not need changes.

There are al lot of problems with this card just try to record some sound.

It has hardware mixing and that is about it.

I need to disagree there is no hardwaremixing for the xfi.

[NomadDemon]

ubuntu and ubuntu studio cant mix without software mixer on my xonar, need to try other distros if you say it works

with pulseaudio its ok, but latency sometimes is big..

[deanjo]

There are al lot of problems with this card just try to record some sound.

Works fine with my X-Meriidian. But ya on the X-Fi it doesn't work well.

I need to disagree there is no hardwaremixing for the xfi.

I thought that as well a while back however I was proven wrong.

http://www.spinics.net/lists/alsa-devel/msg30975.html

[Adriano ML]

I found the hardware mixing unreliable. Better just use dmix or pulse audio.

Also, even tough there is no hardware DSP support, doing it via software can lead way better results. Use the Alsa loop to Jack tutorial, some LV2/LADSPA plugins inside ingen and you can build your own high quality DSP. It may eat some processor cycles, but in this age of multi-core, multi-thread processors, it's money well spent!

You also shouldn't buy an X-fi card just to for digital outputs, thats exactly the same as your MB ones. You buy it for high quality analog outputs!

[deanjo]

I found the hardware mixing unreliable. Better just use dmix or pulse audio.

I may not like creative but I have to admit hardware mixing hasn't been a problem here with an x-fi titanium.

Also, even tough there is no hardware DSP support, doing it via software can lead way better results. Use the Alsa loop to Jack tutorial, some LV2/LADSPA plugins inside ingen and you can build your own high quality DSP. It may eat some processor cycles, but in this age of multi-core, multi-thread processors, it's money well spent!

Well there are two schools of thought on that. Audio purists tend to shun DSP and prefer bit-perfect reproduction of the original source. It is all a matter however of personal taste.

You also shouldn't buy an X-fi card just to for digital outputs, thats exactly the same as your MB ones. You buy it for high quality analog outputs!

This is true, however quite a few people pipe their output to a secondary device as well. Also many motherboard audio solutions do not have the capability of encoding audio streams to AC3/DTS to supply a digital surround sound receiver (this is more of a windows gaming use I admit).

[Adriano ML]

I may not like creative but I have to admit hardware mixing hasn't been a problem here with an x-fi titanium.

It does works well, but once you mix many sources with different sample rates, or some specific apps hard locks, it goes crazy. Might happen only with me, but it was certainly annoying

Well there are two schools of thought on that. Audio purists tend to shun DSP and prefer bit-perfect reproduction of the original source. It is all a matter however of personal taste.

Audio purists should have a very good sound system, invalidating the need for equalization or anything else. For consumer gear, a very good parametric equalizer (which you can set each frequency band and how much bandwith you want to adjust) can make a modest headphone sound really good. Also, some things like cross-feed or Bauer Stereophonic to Binaural will make headphone listening much more enjoyable.

Also, my speaker system has a particular frequency range (arround 125hz) that resonates and sounds way louder than anything else. Using some filters you can shape it and tone it down. This is the kind of thing I think about DSP. Not just some cosmetic effects.

This is true, however quite a few people pipe their output to a secondary device as well. Also many motherboard audio solutions do not have the capability of encoding audio streams to AC3/DTS to supply a digital surround sound receiver (this is more of a windows gaming use I admit).

Unfortynally my first-gen X-fi only decodes these streams (in windows). And since most software already decodes any ACT/DTS stuff, I never bothered with it. However, the hardware encoders are really interesting. But bear in mind that these streams are lossy, just like MP3. Only HDMI can pump lossless DTS Master or Dolby something streams.

[deanjo]

However, the hardware encoders are really interesting. But bear in mind that these streams are lossy, just like MP3. Only HDMI can pump lossless DTS Master or Dolby something streams.

True, but the places I usually use it are for gaming on the big screen where the lossy compression is out weighed by the positional audio and the convenience of only having to run a HDMI and toslink cable to the setup. Without it I would have to hook up the analogue outs as well to the receiver thus using another input instead of one cable for all uses.

[djdoo]

Xonar DX guys definately supports hardware mixing but the important point here I d' like to mention is that most of the XONAR cards are working via the snd-virtuoso driver and NOT the snd-oxygen!!
Xonar DX is one of them so be careful not to load the snd-oxygen with a DX card and always read the Matrix at the alsa website to find out which driver drives your card.
I am making this note cause at openSUSE 11.3 distro still the Xonar DX card is connected with the snd-oxygen driver when you try to auto setup it through YaST and as a result it will never work.
So please when you mention the CMI-8788 driver mention both its modules not only the snd-oxygen cause users might be confused.

Now about Creative labs I must say that they have dissapointed me since the Audigy 1 era with their policies... No need to buy any product from them.