[gentoo-embedded] Audio on a 486

[gentoo-embedded] Audio on a 486

[Joe Sapp]

[-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 927 bytes --]

Hi all,

I've built a system using a uclibc stage1 tarball with the intention
of only running dropbear, boa, and some audio player on an old 486.
So far, it boots and I've got mplayer running using alsa as the audio
driver, but the audio is choppy at best (I've tried other audio
players with the same result).  It isn't caught up on buffering or
anything like that, just seems that the processor is "too slow" (but
I've played audio on it before when it ran Windows 95).  First, I
tried lowering the output sample rate, but that didn't fix anything.
I then switched to the OSS driver, which yielded some progress, but it
still remains choppy.

After doing some searches, it seems that I might have to fiddle with
the DMA settings of my audio card (an ALS100 ISA card).  Can anybody
give me a suggestion on what I can try other than this or how to do
something like this in the first place?

-- 
Joe Sapp


[-- Attachment #2: OpenPGP digital signature --]
[-- Type: application/pgp-signature, Size: 254 bytes --]

Re: [gentoo-embedded] Audio on a 486

[solar]

On Mon, 2006-02-20 at 23:09 -0500, Joe Sapp wrote:
> Hi all,
> 
> I've built a system using a uclibc stage1 tarball with the intention
> of only running dropbear, boa, and some audio player on an old 486.
> So far, it boots and I've got mplayer running using alsa as the audio
> driver, but the audio is choppy at best (I've tried other audio
> players with the same result).  It isn't caught up on buffering or
> anything like that, just seems that the processor is "too slow" (but
> I've played audio on it before when it ran Windows 95).  First, I
> tried lowering the output sample rate, but that didn't fix anything.
> I then switched to the OSS driver, which yielded some progress, but it
> still remains choppy.

got the CHOST= set at i486?
I'm not totally shocked if you don't have decent audio.
The i486 lacked mmx instructions iirc and a lot of the x86 audio 
code I've come by at gentoo depends on mmx or you end up with 
very generic routines. Try doing a little -Os -> -O[1-3] optimizations.


> After doing some searches, it seems that I might have to fiddle with
> the DMA settings of my audio card (an ALS100 ISA card).  Can anybody
> give me a suggestion on what I can try other than this or how to do
> something like this in the first place?
> 
-- 
solar <solar@gentoo.org>
Gentoo Linux

-- 
gentoo-embedded@gentoo.org mailing list