Subject: Re: ALSA problems with 2.6.18-rc3
From: Lee Revell <rlrevell@joe-job.com>
To: Alistair John Strachan <s0348365@sms.ed.ac.uk>
Cc: Gene Heskett <gene.heskett@verizon.net>, linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org,
       Andrew Benton <b3nt@ukonline.co.uk>, Takashi Iwai <tiwai@suse.de>,
       alsa-devel <alsa-devel@lists.sourceforge.net>
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Date: Wed, 09 Aug 2006 17:34:37 -0400
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On Wed, 2006-08-09 at 22:22 +0100, Alistair John Strachan wrote:
> On Wednesday 09 August 2006 21:57, Lee Revell wrote:
> > On Wed, 2006-08-09 at 16:51 -0400, Gene Heskett wrote:
> [snip]
> > > I already have the 'alsactl restore' in my rc.local.  Would there be any
> > > harm in just adding the -F to that invocation, or will that just restore
> > > it to a 'default' condition always.  Seems like it would, canceling
> > > anything you have done & then did an 'alsactl store' to save..
> >
> > That's what I was suggesting - just add -F to the alsactl restore in
> > your init script.  It won't restore it to a default state - the only
> > difference is that it will do a better job restoring your mixer state if
> > new controls are added by a driver update.
> >
> > alsactl --help:
> >
> >   -F,--force      try to restore the matching controls as much as
> > possible
> 
> I assume there are drawbacks to such an option, since whatever method is used 
> to "force" the control may make a mistake if similarly named controls are 
> renamed.
> 
> Personally, I think the correct approach would be to have more sensible 
> default values. Having the External Amplifier default off when it cripples 
> analogue output on emu10k1, and has no effect on digital output, seems rather 
> weird.

It's impossible to predict the effect of some mixer controls across the
wide range of hardware that ALSA supports.  What makes sound work on one
machine is likely to break it on another.

>  Also, I never really understood the rationale for the "all zeros" 
> mixer default. Why not 50%?
> 

This is policy and policy belongs in userspace.  Distros are free to
ship with any default mixer settings they choose.

Lee

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