Re: alsa driver configuration

[Matthew Weier O'Phinney <matthew@weierophinney.net>]

-- Mark Whaite <mjwhaite@attbi.com> wrote
(on Monday, 27 January 2003, 10:02 AM -0800):
> I am trying to configure alsa drivers on an unstable box.  I compiled
> them with make-kpkg without a problem and the deb installed.
> Following instructions on the web I added a file alsa to
> /etc/modutils...  which debconf prompted and moved to
> /etc/alsa/modutils/0.9 and linked back.  I do not get any errors until
> I try to run alsamixer,  which causes a function snd_ctl_open failed
> for default: no such file or directory.  I was wondering just how to
> set this default?  Thank you in advance for any assistance.

But did you run '/etc/init.d/alsa start' as root? If so, and no errors
occurred, what does 'lsmod' (again, as root) return? -- do you see your
soundcard listed ("snd-cardname")?

Also, did you create the sound devices? I.e., do /dev/mixer* and
/dev/dsp*, etc., exist? If not, you may need to run
'/usr/share/doc/alsa-base/examples/snddevices', again as root, to create
them. Then run '/etc/init.d/alsa stop && /etc/init.d/alsa start' again
and see what happens.

Something else I had happen recently: I was using a stock kernel, but
needed to compile lirc and alsa drivers, which require full kernel
source. The problem was that I didn't give the kernel a revision name
matching the stock kernel, which meant that even once the modules
installed, they weren't in the appropriate place for the active kernel.
(I could have solved it using the appropriate kernel revision name, but
I did it instead by compiling and installing my own kernel using
make-kpkg, and then compiling and installing the modules.)

-- 
Matthew Weier O'Phinney
matthew@weierophinney.net