Re: Switching to ALSA on Potato 2.2r4
Debian User, 2002-Jan-06 22:38 -0800:
> Jeff and all,
>
> My SuSE installation was hand compiled and installed. I have no
> problems with that part. My questions all concern Debian.
>
> Unfortunately ALSA installs at the low level (kernel). As I found
> out, one cannot merely remove the standard sound modules without
> precipitating the removal of a great many high level modules, like
> Gnome, Enlightenment, etc. At some point Debian users are going to
> want to use the standard package management tools. The custom
> compiled and installed ALSA sound drivers must integrate into the
> Potato install such that people can continue to use those tools
> without breaking their systems when they "apt-get -update", etc.
> The goal is to do this *without* moving to Unstable.
Understood, and I've found that the ALSA drivers compiled from
source integrate well with the Debian packages.
> Looking at my Potato DSELECT package list suggests the following
> replacements:
>
> Standard ALSA
> ---------- ----------------------------
> libesd --> libesd-alsa0 (0.2.17-7)
> libesd-dev --> libesd-alsa0-dev (0.2.17-7)
> esound --> esound-alsa (0.2.17.7)
Yeah, I've used all these with the compiled ALSA drivers on both
potato and woody without issues, including the regular
update/ugrades.
> Then, once ALSA is loaded I presume that all EsounD-based high level
> programs will continue to function. In other words,
> alsaplayer-esd
> mpg123 (compiled for EsounD)
> XMMS (with EsounD output plugin)
> will still work.
Yes, as per my experience. As long as the kernel modules are
loaded and the devices are accessible.
> Then, all I need to do is compile the drivers, recompile the kernel,
> and change the module configuration. (Does anybody have suggestions
> for the latter?)
Recompile, install and boot the new kernel first. Make sure
you've only enabled sound, no other modules. Then compile and
install the ALSA drivers, utilities and libs from source and make
the necessary changes to /etc/modules.conf. That is the process
I've used.
hope this helps,
jc
--
Jeff Coppock Systems Engineer
Diggin' Debian Admin and User
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