SUSE 10.0 sound card issues? (No mic, no streaming radio)

[Jessie19]

Hi everyone. First a little background to my situation: I've got a laptop running SUSE 10.0, but I'm not quite computer savvy enough to be using Linux on my own. With Linux "not yet ready for the big time" as they say, I guess I'm a great borderline user to test that, since I'm not afraid to poke around in a terminal window if someone gives me some help, but am otherwise a more basic level user. It was sort of an experiment between me and my dad (a computer programmer), since I do like Linux a lot, and he could help me sort through problems when they came up.

Then, however, I decided to move to Japan for a while to teach English, and my personal tech support can't step in so easily when I screw things up! Fortunately I've been able to solve most problems on my own, but now I've made a real mess. If any of you can give me any suggestions as to what to try, I'd be really grateful!

Here's what happened:

I wanted to try to get streaming video from myp2p.eu to watch the Stanley Cup Finals. I started here:

MyP2P.eu :: Sopcast Guide, your best guide for Sopcast

I extracted the files and pased the libstdc++.so.5 libstdc++.so.5.0.1
to /usr/local/lib as the directions I followed told me to do. Then I found an RPM that worked (the site above provided a broken link for the GUI version) and installed that through YaST.

I got it to the point where the qsopcast gui program was running, but couldn't get it to play the video because (I think) I don't have the VLC player, and installing it looked like it would be a headache, so I gave up. I decided I should be content with just listening to the game at Detroit's 97.1 The Ticket - Homepage.


I then tried to use Skype. It had been working immediately before I tried to install Sopcast, but now it does not work. I can hear the other user, but all they hear from me (and all I hear on the Skype test call) is the whine of the microphone, which gets louder when I adjust the mic volume in KMix, but my voice doesn't come through at all.

I called my dad; he suggested uninstalling Skype and reinstalling it. I didn't have the RPM for the same version, so I installed 1.2.0.18, because the newest RPM out there wanted a bunch of lib files I didn't have.

This did not fix the problem. Now Skype tells me there is a problem with the audio device when I try to make a call.


And, to make matters worse...now when I go to Detroit's 97.1 The Ticket - Homepage to listen to the streaming radio, it no longer works! I believe this happened after I uninstalled/reinstalled Skype, because it worked immediately after I used Sopcast. Now, when I click "listen now," the ad that plays at first comes through just fine, but even though it says it's playing the streaming audio after that, I hear nothing.

I have removed qsopcast with YaST. In the SUSE Control Center, under Sound and Multimedia / Sound System / Hardware, I have it set to autodetect, and full duplex is switched off, though from what I read regarding Skype help, these were things worth checking. Changing them did not seem to help me.



It's awful being over here in Japan and not having Skype, and missing out on my Red Wings in the Stanley Cup Finals! I'm a huge fan and it's painful! (Maybe this is Linux's way of supporting its fellow PENGUINS! Hah.) Any suggestions of what might be wrong and what I could try to fix it would be greatly appreciated! Thanks in advance.

[gogalthorp]

Try Skype 1.3.0.53

If I remember 1.2 still used the old OSS which is easily blocked by other sound using processes. You want to use alsa not OSS. Alsa allows multiple processes to attach to the sound system at the same time.

Note it worked for me in both 10.1 and 10.2 if a bit flaky in 64 bit OS

Also are you running 32 bit or 64 bit Suse? Skype in general works better in a 32 bit environment.

You might want to consider upgrading to 10.3. Then you can use the latest Skype. Also consider that 11.0 is in beta and the final is due in not to much time.

I'd also unistall the SOpcast thing because it is not working any way.

[Jessie19]

I have just replaced 1.2 with the version of 1.3 you mentioned, which is what I was using before. So it had always worked up until I installed Sopcast yesterday, but I still can not figure out how to get the microphone to work again.

I've got ALSA / full duplex selected in my SuSE Control Panel.

I have thought of upgrading to 10.3, but my system was totally stable and did everything I wanted it to do, and I have had some headaches when trying to upgrade before (from 9.1, I believe it was, to 10.0) and I did not want to risk problems with an upgrade when I'm here in Japan without any more knowledgable users to help me out in case there are problems. However, given that I seem to have caused the problems I was afraid of anyway, I am considering this more now.

I'm still hoping to figure out how to get it working without a major reinstall. Thank you for your help.

[gogalthorp]

Did you uninstall Sopcast?

[Jessie19]

I thought I did, but I had only uninstalled the GUI version using YaST. I now need to figure out how to uninstall the command line version, but I'm not entirely sure how to do that.

[gogalthorp]

How did you install it?? via RPM or did you compile it?

[Jessie19]

Sorry to disappear and then come back to this old problem. Sadly it's still not fixed and I still don't know what to do to try.

Hmm, that's a good question. I didn't compile anything but I also did something that wasn't an RPM. I pasted some files somewhere, and I'm trying to backtrack and find the directions I followed out there on the Internet somewhere to see just what I did. Here is the readme that came with the file, anyway:


SopCast client version 1.0.2 library dependency
If you don't have stdc++ 5 in your system, please download the libstdcpp5.tgz from
SopCast - Free P2P internet TV | live football, NBA, cricket, and copy the
libstdc++.so.5
libstdc++.so.5.0.1
to /usr/lib/

The copy command must be:
cp -a libstdc++.so.5* /usr/lib
With '-a' parameter, and you must login as root.

A simple example of sp-sc command line.
./sp-sc sop://broker.sopcast.com:3912/6098 3908 8908 > /dev/null &
Start to transfer channel 6098, and you can play it on 8908 with VLC or mplayer
by open the url: http://localhost:8908/tv.asf

Thanks and enjoy it.


I'm now trying to see if I can set up a remote desktop to get my dad on the other side of the Pacific to take a look at it for me, since he's my Linux teacher.