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(yet another) Audigy ebuild question/problem
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bssteph
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PostPosted: Wed Mar 19, 2003 5:38 pm    Post subject: (yet another) Audigy ebuild question/problem Reply with quote

I've been using TenPin's Audigy ebuild for a while now, and while it is a breeze to use, I've been having some sound quality issues I haven't been able to nail down.

When playing songs from file (versus raw CD audio) that seem to use a similar pitch, I get bad distortion/noise. The best example is a certain song (Yasunori Mitsuda's Faraway Promise, if anyone has it) that uses music box chimes. The chimes are high, and when a slightly lower pitch is added for emphasis like on a down-beat, the distortion/noise comes in. This only happens when I'm playing something off my computer. When playing straight from a CD, there's none of this noise. Admittedly, the disc I ripped Faraway Promise from is not of highest quality, but I've used "mastered" discs and gotten similar results from other songs.

These are the other things I've noticed, which I think must somehow be related to my quality issue: (note that I don't really know what they mean, I was just trying stuff to see what happened)

1. After loading /usr/sbin/audigy-script in digital mode, I get IGain, OGain, and Line1 in aumix, but they don't seem to do what TenPin's FAQ says. IGain controls audio CD volume (and the CD entry doesn't do anything), and OGain and Line1 seem to have no affect on output.

2. Doing the above in analog, the CD entry controls CD audio, but OGain and Line1 still don't seem to do anything.

3. In all cases, aumix has CD marked as record, and I can't unclick the button to turn it off (I don't know if this is normal or not for aumix, but gnome-volume-control seems to indicate the same thing if I open it, uncheck the record box, and then close and open it again - the box will still be checked)

I've tried a lot of this with both analog and digital output to no real success. And to make sure it wasn't a compression issue, I tried playing a raw WAV file I ripped -- same problem. And I get it on mp3s not made through my computer, so I don't think it's a creation issue.

Right now in /etc/emu10k1/audigy.conf I have everything set to 'no' in an attempt to use as little "odd" settings to make the problem simpler, but I have tried a large number of different configurations. I should point out that the noise is more distinct when I have tone control on, likely because the treble pitch is higher then.

And for the sake of argument, I'm not sure if it could be a hardware issue or not... I don't remember problems like this back when I used the card in Windows (months ago now.. :D), but I do remember sound taking a total quality dive when using Winamp's equalizer. Although, I could use the Audigy's Windrivers tone control fine.

Any insight/comments would be greatly appreciated, and I'm fully willing to tinker, as I'm a perfectionist and always willing for a way to avoid doing schoolwork.
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nerdbert
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PostPosted: Wed Mar 19, 2003 9:59 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

sorry, dont know anything about an audigy ebuild, but I experienced similar distortion problems as you described when I used alsa.

the problem actually was that it is possible to set the volume higher than line output under alsa (which apparently isnt intended by creative).
So if the volume of mp3s is higher than that from songs from cd, then you can be quite sure that this is the problem
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bssteph
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PostPosted: Thu Mar 20, 2003 1:58 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

It doesn't seem to be that... I dropped Vol and PCM to 50% and muted everything else, and I can still hear the distortion. I think I'd read somewhere here that PCM should be kept below 70%, but I don't notice any less (or more) relative distortion.

I also wanted to point out that in my post I think it sounds like I only had this problem with TenPin's ebuild. I've noticed this problem with a myriad of drivers, including the emu10k1 drivers in the portage tree, those drivers + TenPin's modified scripts, and sourceforge drivers. This is also partially why I'm worried about it being a hardware config problem.
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nerdbert
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PostPosted: Thu Mar 20, 2003 2:25 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Im quite sure this is somehow related to the wav output settings...

have you tried using alsa to run your audigy? There is a tool called gamix for alsa, which really shows all levels of the various in and outputs of the audigy
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bssteph
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PostPosted: Thu Mar 20, 2003 3:09 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I haven't tried, and I've been wary of alsa in the past, but I'll give it a shot. Unfortunately I've got a busy day of class today and a dialup connection, so it will take some time to try, but I'll let you know what happens.
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bssteph
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PostPosted: Fri Mar 21, 2003 1:49 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Oh my Cthulhu!
I think you've just made a convert out of me, sir. Thank you for your help. Everything is crystal clear. :)
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nerdbert
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PostPosted: Fri Mar 21, 2003 2:20 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

thats good news...

Alsa is the future and it will be build into kernel 2.6, so it will be easier to install.
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