[ltp] Q further2: sound recording, A21m, Caldera 2.4

[Erik Lotspeich]

Robert,

I remember having trouble with non-powered microphones.  I believe that
the mic was powered.  But the built-in microphone should work.  Also try 
the suggestion about using a headphone as a poor-quality microphone.

If you haven't already, I'd strongly recommend using Alsa.  The driver 
support is excellent and I have had no trouble with it on my TP A21m.

Hope this helps,

Erik.

On Wed, 21 Jan 2004, Robert Hueckstedt wrote:

> Thank you for the help and suggestions. I will try to respond to all
> your suggestions together.
> 
> First, the external microphone I want to use is not powered.Erik, is the
> external mike you use powered? Maybe the solution is here. But if not .
> . .
> 
> In addition to the files /dev/dsp and /dev/mixer, I also have /dev/dsp1
> and /dev/mixer1. I checked the permissions for all four of those. They
> are:
> 
> dsp crw------
> dsp1 crw-rw-rw-
> mixer crw------
> mixer1 crw-rw-rw-
> 
> My handy-handy kfm gui popup tells me that that means:
> 
> dsp: Bob is the owner and the user has rw access; group and others do not
> 
> dsp1: root is the owner and user, group, and owner all have read/write access
> 
> The same holds, respectively, for mixer and mixer1.
> 
> I do not know what hardware dsp refers to as opposed to dsp1. Likewise for mixer and mixer1.
> 
> I also see that none of those files have been accessed since May 23, 2000, which may have been the date of installation by linuxcare.
> 
> I decided that I probably need to have executable rights to those files, so I made that change in all of them. I then jacked in my non-powered, external microphone, ran the mixer program and tried the three jacks, called in that program line, line1, and line2, as record sources and again tried to record. Nada for all three. 
> 
> As Erik suggested, I tried the command cat /dev/dsp, in an effort to test the built-in mike. That gave me a blank console with the cursor running all over the place, but it gave me no garbage as if it were picking up sound from that mike. (Where is that mike?)
> 
> So, is the next and only possible solution getting a power thingee to go between the mike and the computer? Any other suggestions?
> 
> Gratefully,
> Bob Hueckstedt
> 

-- 
Erik Lotspeich
Software Engineer, R&D
Cyclades Corporation
erik.lotspeich@cyclades.com
Phone:  510-771-6153
Fax:    510-771-6200
http://www.cyclades.com/
"Everywhere with Linux"