share sound in ubuntu

[newtech]

I tried searching this first on google but I don't think I worded it right. I have a problem with a program holding the sound until I close it in Ubuntu 8.04. for example.If I open Firefox, and watch a video on you tube, I can not just put a DVD in and watch a movie and hear it, unless I close Firefox first and visa versa. has anyone ran across this and found a fix for it. I don't mind reading so if it has already been posted somewhere that I missed, you can post the link and I will be grateful for that. Thanks in advance.

also if you are wondering why I am using ubuntu 8.04 it is because my hardware works best with it. I tried 7.10, and 9.04 but having multiple monitors was a pain with the hardware I am using.

[D-cat]

8.04 is a LTS, so I'd think nobody here would find that odd.

The sound issue happens when programs go through ALSA directly and bypass the sound server (PulseAudio by default). Pulse on 8 is know buggy, it was supposed to replace esound but clearly wasn't ready. I haven't heard as many complaints about 9. It may also have something to do with your sound card or other hardware resources. Some sound cards (especially older or cheap) can only handle one sound stream at a time, and ALSA will queue up the streams for access as available. It's the sound server's job to accept and mix sound from multiple sources if necessary, but it can be undermined if bypassed. I'll start with the hardware as a process of elimination.

Can you please open a terminal window and post the output of lspci ? That'll let us know what's in your machine. Also if you could tell us what you have for a processor and RAM, we can get a base line on your computer's capability. Thank you.
---
(That's LSPCI in lower case)

[newtech]

Can you please open a terminal window and post the output of lspci ? That'll let us know what's in your machine.

00:00.0 Host bridge: ATI Technologies Inc RS690 Host Bridge
00:01.0 PCI bridge: ATI Technologies Inc RS690 PCI to PCI Bridge (Internal gfx)
00:02.0 PCI bridge: ATI Technologies Inc RS690 PCI to PCI Bridge (PCI Express Graphics Port 0)
00:07.0 PCI bridge: ATI Technologies Inc RS690 PCI to PCI Bridge (PCI Express Port 3)
00:12.0 SATA controller: ATI Technologies Inc SB600 Non-Raid-5 SATA
00:13.0 USB Controller: ATI Technologies Inc SB600 USB (OHCI0)
00:13.1 USB Controller: ATI Technologies Inc SB600 USB (OHCI1)
00:13.2 USB Controller: ATI Technologies Inc SB600 USB (OHCI2)
00:13.3 USB Controller: ATI Technologies Inc SB600 USB (OHCI3)
00:13.4 USB Controller: ATI Technologies Inc SB600 USB (OHCI4)
00:13.5 USB Controller: ATI Technologies Inc SB600 USB Controller (EHCI)
00:14.0 SMBus: ATI Technologies Inc SBx00 SMBus Controller (rev 14)
00:14.1 IDE interface: ATI Technologies Inc SB600 IDE
00:14.2 Audio device: ATI Technologies Inc SBx00 Azalia
00:14.3 ISA bridge: ATI Technologies Inc SB600 PCI to LPC Bridge
00:14.4 PCI bridge: ATI Technologies Inc SBx00 PCI to PCI Bridge
00:18.0 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] K8 [Athlon64/Opteron] HyperTransport Technology Configuration
00:18.1 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] K8 [Athlon64/Opteron] Address Map
00:18.2 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] K8 [Athlon64/Opteron] DRAM Controller
00:18.3 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] K8 [Athlon64/Opteron] Miscellaneous Control
01:05.0 Display controller: ATI Technologies Inc RS690 [Radeon X1200 Series]
02:00.0 VGA compatible controller: ATI Technologies Inc RV370 [Sapphire X550 Silent]
02:00.1 Display controller: ATI Technologies Inc RV370 secondary [Sapphire X550 Silent]
03:00.0 Ethernet controller: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTL8111/8168B PCI Express Gigabit Ethernet controller (rev 01)

Also if you could tell us what you have for a processor and RAM

I have an AMD 64 Athlon X2 and 4 GB of ram.

Also thanks for your help on this. I will check to see if I have another video card. Do you know if sound blaster cards are pretty good. I have onboard sound that I am using now. my motherboard is a asus M2A-VM if that helps.

[D-cat]

00:14.2 Audio device: ATI Technologies Inc SBx00 Azalia

This is one of those Intel chipsets in its many incarnations. Alsa hasn't supported this card until relatively recently, so I suppose it's good that it even works. (Just about every google hit I can find is about getting sound period.)

You could also try removing PulseAudio and replacing it with the tried and true esound.
Howto solve all PulseAudio-related issues in Ubuntu|Ubuntu Geek

Creative (Sound Blaster) has for over a decade been the standard for sound cards. I have an early SB-Live in my system which only has one glitch- the audio channels are backwards (and thus then are my speakers ). It performs well and I can play things like Stepmania (which makes heavy use of audio mixing) with no trouble at all.

[newtech]

D-cat you are awesome. That worked perfectly. once I installed the esound and rebooted my pc, I was able to play both youtube videos and moves from off my server at the same time. Thanks for all your help.

Just a personal question: How did you learn so much about Linux? I see you offer help on a lot of the post. Also I do have one other thing that I need help with if you dont mind.

I watch some of the tech videos on revision3.com. I can see the commercial on my ubuntu machine but when the video starts, I dont have a picture; all I here is sound. What is your thoughts on that. I did what the message said and downloaded the latest flashplayer 10. It downloads as a .deb so all I usually do is double click to install it. that has not worked for me. Thanks again for your help.

[D-cat]

Short answer: experience.
See my "Getting Started in Linux" post for a longer answer:
http://www.linuxforums.org/forum/cof...tml#post666119


As far as the flash issue, open a FF window or tab, and in the address box, type: about:plugins

Look down for the flash player plugin in use, show me the file name and version (it can cut-n-paste).

[newtech]

when I typed aboutlugins I see Shock wave player.

File name: libflashplayer.so
Shockwave Flash 9.0 r246

MIME Type Description Suffixes Enabled
application/x-shockwave-flash Shockwave Flash swf Yes
application/futuresplash FutureSplash Player spl Yes

That is it. Also Thanks for the link.

[newtech]

After you had me go to aboutlugins I was able to see the adobe plug in was not installed. I then tried to install flashplayer 10 again and it worked. I went back to the site that I was watch the tech tv shows, and I still could not see the video. Then I realized that the site had a low, high, and HD display settings. Mines was set to high, and I set it to low. It worked. That was my mistake. user error. Thanks for your help, and I believe that completes my questions for this post.