Any issue having multiple sound cards running at the same time in 6.1?

[Garrett Cooper]

Karol Kwiatkowski wrote:
> On 30/08/2006 19:35, Philip Hallstrom wrote:
>   
>>>> I've got a freebsd server in the garage that has a low end
>>>> soundblaster (I think) card in it that I've been using to play music.
>>>> Works just fine. We moved and now I'd like to be able to have
>>>> different music play in different rooms (living, family, and outside).
>>>> I can do all the other wiring for speakers...
>>>>
>>>> But was wondering if there are any problems having three sound cards
>>>> in the box and have them all work at the same time.  I'm currently
>>>> using flac123 to play music and would probably continue to do so...
>>>>
>>>> Thoughts?
>>>>         
>>> In principle, there's no problem.  But most software will only drive
>>> one audio device at a time.  Also, note that running long cables at
>>> fairly low signal levels can degrade the audio quality...
>>>       
>> Good points... but no reason I couldn't run three flac123 processes and
>> point each to their own /dev/ entry...?
>>     
>
> I'm using two sound cards all the time. One (Audigy, PCI) to make
> noise in my room (music/tv/etc), and the second (nVidia, onboard) to
> make calls with skype or listen to music late at night.
>
> I don't know about flac123 - have a look at it's manpage - but at
> least with xmms, mplayer and skype (that's what I've got here) you can
> change output /dev/dsp device to whichever you like.
>
> HTH,
>
> Karol
    Just looking at the source a bit for libao and flac123, it appears 
that flac123 is capable of using multiple sound daemons to send 
information out to the soundcard. So, if you configure OSS and arts 
(assuming you have arts installed) differently in terms of which default 
device the daemon uses when playing sound, you should be ok I think. 
Other than that, I think you're stuck because OSS doesn't support sound 
input from multiple sources, and last I remember arts and the rest that 
actually supported taking sound from multiple inputs didn't support 
outputting sound on multiple cards simultaneously.
-Garrett