Jacob Meuser <jakemsr@sdf.lonestar.org> wrote:

quoted text
> you're saying the volume made a difference in how often there were
> underruns?  that is quite odd.  hmmm.

Well I'm saying that I had less underruns while being at 150/255 volume. It
might be a coincidence.

quoted text
> > At the moment of volume switching I also hear the drops (as far as I can get,
> > the drops of a higher of switching volumes either on gettting volume lower or
> > higher).
>
> that is strange too.  I have, somewhere, a program that twiddles every
> control on the mixer as fast as possible, several thousand mixer set/get
> cycles a second, and it hassn't caused dropouts on machines I've run
> it on.

Well, that's what I'm quite sure about. The drops accure on every volume
switch I performed.

quoted text
> do you have clock issues?  are you running ntpd?

I'm running ntpd and it is quite active in switching time.

Well, after pkilling ntpd I got 13 drops (with 8 of them long enough to
distinguish start and end speaker "cklicks") during 3 minutes with actually
close output:

% ./audrops 
pre=16 ch=2 bpf=4 block_size=4096 rate=48000 block_usec=21333
early return at 1279713267.091162: 399 < 21333
early return at 1279713267.091246: 84 < 21333
late return at 1279713267.968778: 558599 > 21333
late return at 1279713276.422734: 564385 > 21333
late return at 1279713283.216141: 573650 > 21333
early return at 1279713283.219052: 2911 < 21333
late return at 1279713293.508187: 561489 > 21333
late return at 1279713313.472366: 578602 > 21333
late return at 1279713330.094540: 560445 > 21333
early return at 1279713330.094700: 160 < 21333
early return at 1279713330.094787: 87 < 21333
early return at 1279713330.094890: 103 < 21333
early return at 1279713330.095015: 125 < 21333
early return at 1279713330.095142: 127 < 21333
early return at 1279713330.095211: 69 < 21333
early return at 1279713330.095286: 75 < 21333
early return at 1279713330.095353: 67 < 21333
early return at 1279713330.095422: 69 < 21333
early return at 1279713330.095490: 68 < 21333
early return at 1279713330.095558: 68 < 21333
early return at 1279713330.095626: 68 < 21333
early return at 1279713330.095694: 68 < 21333
early return at 1279713330.095760: 66 < 21333
early return at 1279713330.095828: 68 < 21333
early return at 1279713330.095895: 67 < 21333
early return at 1279713330.095963: 68 < 21333
early return at 1279713330.096030: 67 < 21333
early return at 1279713330.096097: 67 < 21333
early return at 1279713330.096165: 68 < 21333
early return at 1279713330.096233: 68 < 21333
early return at 1279713330.096301: 68 < 21333
early return at 1279713330.096368: 67 < 21333
early return at 1279713330.096436: 68 < 21333
early return at 1279713330.096503: 67 < 21333
late return at 1279713353.314772: 569539 > 21333
early return at 1279713353.321255: 6483 < 21333
late return at 1279713355.167678: 566406 > 21333
early return at 1279713355.177299: 9621 < 21333
late return at 1279713372.491682: 567395 > 21333
early return at 1279713372.500329: 8647 < 21333
late return at 1279713400.362901: 555313 > 21333
late return at 1279713412.040398: 563321 > 21333
early return at 1279713412.040537: 139 < 21333
early return at 1279713412.040624: 87 < 21333
early return at 1279713412.040693: 69 < 21333
early return at 1279713412.040763: 70 < 21333
early return at 1279713412.040830: 67 < 21333
early return at 1279713412.040904: 74 < 21333
early return at 1279713412.041010: 106 < 21333
early return at 1279713412.041079: 69 < 21333
early return at 1279713412.041155: 76 < 21333
early return at 1279713412.041221: 66 < 21333
early return at 1279713412.041289: 68 < 21333
early return at 1279713412.041357: 68 < 21333
early return at 1279713412.041425: 68 < 21333
early return at 1279713412.041491: 66 < 21333
early return at 1279713412.041560: 69 < 21333
early return at 1279713412.041628: 68 < 21333
early return at 1279713412.041696: 68 < 21333
early return at 1279713412.041764: 68 < 21333
early return at 1279713412.041832: 68 < 21333
early return at 1279713412.041899: 67 < 21333
early return at 1279713412.041966: 67 < 21333
early return at 1279713412.042034: 68 < 21333
early return at 1279713412.042101: 67 < 21333
early return at 1279713412.042169: 68 < 21333
early return at 1279713412.042237: 68 < 21333
early return at 1279713424.960047: 7609 < 21333
late return at 1279713427.759535: 559467 > 21333
late return at 1279713440.156372: 561392 > 21333
^Cpre=16 ch=2 bpf=4 block_size=4096 rate=48000 block_usec=21333
bytes written = 34062336
bytes processed = 33849344
bytes errors = 204800
bytes buffered = 8192
34062336 == 34062336 ?
run time = 183.256628 s
avg rate = 46177

quoted text
> this is about the simplest possible audio application.  no reading
> data from disk, not synthesizing the samples.  I don't see how
> this could have underrun so much.  what else was running while you
> ran this?

Aside from default processes of 4.7 I had ifstated, X11, cwm, ntpd, rtorrent
(with 7.1/0.6 kbps loadi) and a shell script that sleeps 30 seconds and sends
ifconfig command to the system after that. That's all.

quoted text
> one final question, do you have any sort of power management features
> enabled in the BIOS?

Well, my BIOS is very tiny, it doesn't ask about power management. Still, I
have apmd running "Cool mode".

quoted text
> hmmm, if the codec is somehow under powered, I guess that could explain
> the correlation between higher volume and more dropouts?  maybe?

Don't think so as I had Linux on this box before, and had no single problem
with sound. The default OS was Windows, but I only had it on twice, the last
time on power appliance.

quoted text
> iirc, you have an eapd mixer control.  have you tried switching that
> to off?  I've heard rumors that these are sometimes inverted ...
> eapd (external amp power down) is a tricky name.

I tried turning it off. That muted my system. After turning on I returned to
the previous state.

By the way, do You actually know, what is eapd supposed to be used for?

--
Dmitrij D. Czarkoff