Looping sound output from pcm

[Scott Long]

Daniel Eischen wrote:
> On Mon, 22 Dec 2003, Scott Long wrote:
> 
> 
>>Robert Watson wrote:
>>
>>>I ran aim after a recent kernel update, and had a rather odd problem.  I
>>>got an instant message from someone which resulted in a "ding" from aim. 
>>>However, the ding never stopped dinging -- the sample repeated over and
>>>over again, and continues as I type.  Even after the aim process exited. 
>>>Sending additional sound output didn't make it go away either.  KDE/arts,
>>>etc, don't seem to be involved in the problem, so it really seems like the
>>>kernel is looping the sample.  When I try to unload pcm, I get: 
>>>
>>>pcm0: unregister: channel pcm0:play:2 busy (pid 965)
>>>
>>>And there's no pid 965.
>>>
>>>paprika# cat /dev/sndstat 
>>>FreeBSD Audio Driver (newpcm)
>>>Installed devices:
>>>pcm0: <ESS Technology Maestro3> at io 0xd800 irq 5 (4p/1r/0v channels duplex default)
>>>
>>>Any suggestions welcome; in the mean time, I'll just listen to it ding
>>>away ad naueseum. 
>>>
>>>Robert N M Watson             FreeBSD Core Team, TrustedBSD Projects
>>>robert at fledge.watson.org      Senior Research Scientist, McAfee Research
>>>
>>
>>As was pointed out, this is probably an interrupt problem.  The sound
>>hardware should have interrupted the driver to say that it was almost
>>done playing what was in the _ring_ buffer, and the driver should have
>>responded by either filling the buffer with new data, or turning off the
>>hardware.  Instead, the hardware just kept on doing what it was designed
>>to do: keep on playing through the ring buffer.  The same thing would
>>have happened if the OS had crashed while a sample was playing.
>>
>>The maestro3 driver is growing more stale over time.  I no longer have
>>any hardware to deal with it though.  If anyone knows where I can get
>>an Maestro3 or Allegro-1 PCI card, I'll gladly buy it and fix start
>>working on the driver again.
> 
> 
> If you can get your hands on some not-so-old Dell
> laptops.  My Lattitude C400 at work has a Maestro3.
> 
> 
> 

I found an Allegro-1 PCI card on eBay, hopefully it won't get bid out of
my price range.  Unfortunately, I don't have the cash (nor does my wife
have the sanity) to buy another laptop =-)  There are rumors of 
Maestro-3 PCI mule cards in the wild.  If someone has one (Cameron?),
I'll gladly purchase it.

Scott