[GLLUG] Creative Labs SoundBlaster 16 PCI sequencer problems

[Charles Ulrich]

On Fri, Jun 24, 2011 at 10:11 AM, Scott Webster Wood <treii28 at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> I have an older box that I've been toying around with as a means to play a
> new
> M-Audio Axiom 49 I just picked up.  With some tinkering I was able to get
> timidity installed as server and used jack to get the thing playing sounds
> but
> still noticed an ever so slight bit of latency on this old beast of a
> machine.

Low-latency audio on Linux is still something of an art. Expect to
spend a lot of time tweaking. :) That said, have you looked at the
JACK message output to be sure it's running in low-latency mode? JACK
needs sufficient permissions to run with low latency but will still
work if it can't get them. Generally, it will warn quite loudly if it
can't get the permissions it needs. I'm not sure if it reports
anything special when all is working fine.

> So the other day I saw the local second-hand store selling a PCI 16
> soundblaster
> card and I picked it up for $5.  I have it working now for audio, but still
> seem
> to have trouble getting anything to come out the sequencer.

[snip]

> # aplaymidi -l
> Port    Client name                      Port name
> 14:0    Midi Through                    Midi Through Port-0
> 16:0    Ensoniq AudioPCI                ES1371
> 20:0    USB Axiom 49                    USB Axiom 49 MIDI 1
> 128:0    TiMidity                        TiMidity port 0
> 128:1    TiMidity                        TiMidity port 1
> 128:2    TiMidity                        TiMidity port 2
> 128:3    TiMidity                        TiMidity port 3
>
> # aplaymidi -p 128:0 sample.mid  # this works
> # aplaymidi -p 16:0 sample.mid  # this acts like it's doing something
>                                 #  but no sound comes out
> Does anyone have any suggestions to help me get this thing working?  The
> reason
> I bought this thing (besides the fact it was only $5) was because of the
> latency
> running the timidity soft-synth with my Axiom.  I was hoping that since it
> had a
> hardware-based wavetable that it would have less latency.  I'd love to get
> it
> working!  Thanks for any help in advance.

Two things:

1) Wavetable MIDI cards often require samples ("sound fonts") to be
loaded onto them before you'll hear anything. There are free sample
packs out there and utilities to create/convert your own. I can't
suggest anything specific because I don't know how much an ES1371
differs from the cards I've owned.

2) According to this:
http://ubuntuforums.org/archive/index.php/t-8736.html (scroll down),
the ES1371 MIDI sequencer may not even be supported by ALSA. Although
if that's truly the case, I'm not sure why ALSA would even bother list
it on your machine.

Anywho, if you want a good free MIDI-capable sound card, I'm trying to
find a home for a SoundBlaster Live (emu10k1) card. If you can make it
to a GLLUG meeting in the near future, it's yours.

Charles
-- 
http://bityard.net