Aureal 3D Developing Linux Drivers 76
Guy Saban writes "I've just received news that Aureal 3D plans on releasing Linux drivers for their Vortex sound cards in February. These cards have a good reputation for quality sound and 3D effects. The A3D technology for creating realistic acoustic effects has become a favorite among many. Apparently 4Front Technologies are working on drivers for the Vortex 1 and 2 chipsets under Linux through their OpenSound package.
"
Re:Binary driver kernel compatibility. (Score:1)
That one company can then maintain that just that single section of code (instead of all the separate single binary drivers), and update just that single section of code - and have only binary only modules, compiled just the single time.
Although the patch might not be accepted into the standard kernel tree, it wouldn't be too hard to design an "easy install" wrapper around the patch.
Any company that plans to support a lot of hardware in a closed source way might think in the same way.
This is going to cause more problems than you could imagine - all these patch programs patching every companies binary compatibility layer into the kernel. And they might just be incompatible - or badly designed.
My suggestion - get on it and make a binary compatibility standard before someone else does it for you.
Don't ask me to do it either - I'm not a real programmer.
Just my 2 cents.
trouble with the drivers (Score:1)
Re:Binary driver kernel compatibility. (Score:1)
One point I'd like to add: apparently there are more factors than just the kernel version. SMP-ness and even the compiler used matter as well.
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not impressed with vortex 2 (Score:1)
Re:trouble with the drivers (Score:1)
And, to the 'moderator' that marked this as offtopic: Get a friggin' clue. If you have the courage, let us know what exactly is offtopic about this post. Justify your action in a more public manner. Excuse me while I go turn off my 'willing to moderate' flag.
Aren't they already available??? (Score:1)
The FAQ says they'll also be porting their A3D 3.0 to linux.
SB Live. (Score:1)
Are SB Live drivers now in the kernel tree, or is it that the source is merely downloadable from Creative? Just curious.
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Re:SB Live. (Score:1)
Re:ALSA Support? (Score:1)
Re:ALSA Support? (Score:1)
Even tho I don't have an A3d card, I may consider getting one when I upgrade
(probably fairly soon, even tho my computer is pretty new
because my sound card (Trident 4Dwave DX) isn't supported by OSS-Free. But
I don't care about OSS any more - I say screw 'em. I'm not going to PAY for
drivers when I can get better ones for free. ALSA supports multiple audio
streams SEAMLESSLY - and AFAIK OSS does not.
So who cares about OSS any more? Alsa is just plain BETTER. And it's free
(speech) as well.
Re:trouble with the drivers (Score:1)
The drivers were released and so I am going to install it and may have a problem. shesh Thus I ask it here.
No it isn't open source. (Score:1)
Let's look at the actual source and binaries included (i.e. excluding Makefiles and text notes):
>vortex.c driver source file
This is basically a reworked AudioPCI ES1371 driver. Have a look at it. It's little more than a kernal interface to the files listed below.
>asp30.o object file containing Au8830 core
>asp10.o object file containing Au8810 core
>asp20.o object file containing Au8820 core
These are the actual guts of the driver that do all the work. And they don't come with source. This is a big downside as far as I'm concerned. One of the major reasons I wanted open-source drivers is so that I can hack in support for an S/PDIF input.
The asp30.o file contains the text string "EnableSpdifIn" so presumably the code's done. The Xitel storm platinum (the card I have) is Aureal's reference design so they've obviously tested the S/PDIF input already. If I had the source I'd probably have S/PDIF input going in a few hours.
Oh well, I bought a used AudioPCI because it *does* have open source drivers *now*. I'm going to hold out a little while longer for Aureal and see if they do finally get their act together, otherwise I'll have a Vortex 2 card for sale cheap
Re:How many customers has Aureal lost as of late? (Score:1)
Woohoo! (Score:1)
Whew, first I get rid of Win98, now I can get rid of ISA... I'm having a good time with this.
Mommy, can I rant now? (Score:1)
2: From the readme.txt in the drivers section of linux.aureal.com:
This driver has been tested on the following distributions:
Red Hat 6.0, kernel version 2.2.5-15.
Red Hat 6.1, kernel version 2.2.12-20.
Red Hat 6.1, kernel version 2.2.13.
Hey Aureal! REDHAT ALONE DOES NOT LINUX MAKE. They may (probably will) work under the wondrous Slack7 I use, among others (debian? mandrake SuSE?) but to ignore these segments at a minimum is shortsighted, at a maximum is just plain stupid and shitty.
3: Binaries. What more needs to be said (though I understand source is coming, so that can be forgiven).
I like the sound from the Dell and the fact it appears to do duplex output.. but this dragging-of-the-feet for linux support has me considering against any Aureal hardware for future purchases.
Excellent news. but... (Score:1)
This is great news since it makes linux more
respectable as a gaming platform.
It does raise the issue of kernel versions (again)
Modules compiled for one version of the kernel
won't necessarily work for other versions. I can
imagine that it could be a nightmare for a company
to support multiple versions of a binary-only
driver. Linus has repeatedly said (quite rightly
from an OS standpoint) that he makes no guarantees
of binary compatibility between versions. He
will work hard to ensure source compatibility
though.
Yes, binary only sucks but giving source/register
level information can give away IP to compeditors.
Perhaps an optional binary compatibility layer
should be introduced into the kernel. It may not
be quite as fast as a 'native' version, but hey
thats the price you pay for a binary only multiple
version driver.
Steve.
Re:Binary driver kernel compatibility. (Score:1)
Actually I wasn't talking about binary level
compatibility. I suggested the possibility
of a binary compatibility _layer_.
That is: use a set of functions to read values
from kernel structures instead of accessing
the values directly. One cause of problems
occur when structure sizes or layouts change.
Of course, if the interface changes there might
not be a lot you can do.
Looking at some previous posts it seems that
aureal have taken this approach - a binary
driver and open source glue between the kernel
and driver.
I suggest a standard 'glue layer' could be a
good idea.
Steve.
About the source code... (Score:1)
The current driver distribution contains both source and object files. Access to Vortex hardware is provided by object files, while the code that interfaces to the Linux kernel is provided in source form. This allows the driver to be recompiled by the customer to support new kernel distributions. We are working on a full source distribution of the driver including chip documentation.
Chris Hagar
Aureal vs Creative (Score:1)
Bad news. Hear that ALSA? (Score:1)
PS- The first person who argues that making a standardized API is not the Linux "way" gets a "living in la la land award of the day." Competing window systems is one thing. Things can be ported from KDE to GNOME fairly simply, but editing some code and recompiling. Were talking about acceleration. Competing acceleration APIs is bad because it screws the user having to decide which API to spend his money oon, then potentially losing it when that API sinks. Not to mention the fact that until there is a global standard, most app developers won't use it. Until Direct3D no apps were hardware accelerated because only 3dfx users could then use the game. But after D3D it is hard to find a non-accellarator required game on the shelves. Same for 3D Sound and ForceFeedback.
Linux users- quit bitching about GPL drivers. (Score:1)
Why won't they use the BSD (2-clause) license? (Score:1)
This would allow a larger audience (*BSD) to include the driver with the OS. It is not as if Creative is going to take the driver and make their own version of it.
Re: ALSA (Score:1)
The ALSA web site is at:
www.alsa-project.org [alsa-project.org]
All they ask is for enough specs to write a good device driver. They don't need blueprints for the card. So all the companies need to do is supply some specs and help to ALSA, only a few companies seem willing to do even this small task. Do they not want to sell more hardware!? Seems not.
Yes! (Score:1)
Finally I can format my Windows 98 partition. The only reason, why I still have W98 is my Terratec sound card. I hope that the driver will support wavetables.
Already out (and other good news)! (Score:1)
A3D support is on the way too but, unsurprisingly, there's no mention of any open sourcing. Even so, this is good. One more key resource for games support under Linux....
The only real disappointment (for me) is that multi-processor support isn't the initial release.
Crappy Driver (Score:1)
From asp30.o:
Software\Aureal\Vortex\AU8810\ControlPanel
Looks suspeciously like a Windows Registry entry, doesn't it? Not to mention the fact that the final binary is **148K** in size!
Re:Been using the OSS beta drivers (Score:1)
Re:Closed Source Linux Drivers (Score:1)
#
# Copyright (c) 1999 Aureal Inc.
#
# Environment:
# AUCHIP - AU8830 (default), AU8820, or AU8810
#
# This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify
# it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
# the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or
# (at your option) any later version.
The faq on the linux.aureal.com webpage:
Is the source code to the driver available? How about chip specifications?
The current driver distribution contains both source and object files. Access to Vortex hardware is provided by
object files, while the code that interfaces to the Linux kernel is provided in source form. This allows the driver to be recompiled by the customer to support new kernel distributions. We are working on a full source distribution of the driver including chip documentation.
Forgive me if I'm wrong, but wouldn't this make the future source code release GPL-ed too?
--
/* Manuël Beunder, web master of the Linux SB Live! page: http://www.euronet.nl/~mailme
.
Source code will be released to (Score:1)
Re:SMP support? (Score:1)
Some support was available (Score:1)
Not much use if not GPL'ed (Score:1)
Been using the OSS beta drivers (Score:1)
I will be VERY happy to try the http://linux.aureal.com drivers tonight...
I can't WAIT to get a good fully implemented driver for my sound card...
Re:SMP support? (Score:1)
Anyone have the URL for Aureal's beta drivers?
-- Rev.
dangerous thinking (Score:1)
Not all companies can, or will release their drivers as fully open source, that is a fact.
if, as you are suggesting, the only options which companies are going to be given is open, or nothing, I fear that could be very detrimental to future companies considering releasing drivers which support linux.
MX300 gone SBlive alive! (Score:1)
Not open source (yet). (Score:2)
Krishna
Re:trouble with the drivers (Score:2)
> the error
> or Resource busy
Hmm. As sort of a rough, lousy guess, I'd see if something sound-card-related was installed already. Maybe when you installed Linux, some stub sound module or something was installed. My suggestions:
First off, make sure that au8810.o didn't actually get installed. I know that the error message implies that it wasn't installed, but I'd run "find / -name 'au8810.o'" anyway, just out of paranoia, to double-check.
Second, reboot and check the messages that you see on startup, like "Checking for sound module . . . [ OK ]." My guess is that if you see "OK," there's a problem and *some* sound module is installed, even if it's not working. You probably should want to see "Checking for sound module . . . [FAILED]," or something like that.
I'm not sure whether this will seriously help or not. I'm just going by hunches and little observations I made when I installed OSS a few months ago. (I've since installed Aureal's drivers today, and except for some MIDI-related stuff, it seems to work fine.)
SMP support? (Score:2)
Closed Source Linux Drivers (Score:2)
Re:Excellent (Score:2)
I think stuff like that adds up and they're getting the message.
Re:Excellent news. but... (Score:2)
In fact, the interface layer is basically a reworked AudioPCI driver.
It also looks like the binary-only object is very similar to their Windows code...
strings asp30.o includes the following:
Software\Aureal\Vortex\AU8830\InstallSettings
Software\Aureal\Vortex\AU8830\ControlPanel
EnableSpdifIn
DetectSpdifIn
EnableSpdifOut
DetectSpdifOut
The phrase "yeahright" also comes up a bunch of times.
Re:Binary driver kernel compatibility. (Score:2)
Actually, things depend also on the kernel configuration.
For example, modules compiled for SMP kernels won't work on non-SMP kernels and vice-versa, and this is not the only issue. Someone on the kernel mailing list estimated that one should offer something in the order of tens of different binaries for a single module for various configurations.
It shouldn't be too problematic to put up a page with a form to choose different configurations for some kernel versions (and perhaps compile it on the fly before downloading), but it's still a pain for the inexperienced user who don't know even what a module is loaded in first instance and expects its installation process to just recognize as much hardware as possible, otherwise he gets stuck.
My 0.02 Euro.
The code is already included (Score:2)
The source code is included. The filename is vortex.c, which is a ~64KB file. A Makefile is also included (`make compile` will recompile your driver).
There are a lot of people here complaining that it's closed source, etc.
They are wrong, very wrong. Aureal have done exactly what we wanted. We now have completely GPLed drivers, which appear to be much better than the OSS I bought a while back (cannot record, no gameport support, much etc.).
Ooops, I guess I misjudged (Score:2)
I guess I jumped the gun. My apologies.
They are promising full source, though.
Yes it is open source (Score:2)
Check out this link [aureal.com].
Here's a "quote":
(Emphasis mine).
Last I recalled, GPL happens to be open source.
Now I wonder how long it'll take to be distributed in the kernel releases.
Not quite. (Score:2)
4Front have had drivers for Vortex in OpenSound for the last half a year, and they worked quite well for the week one is allowed to test them. The OpenSound package + Aureal drivers costed $30 however, so you might as well have bought a Soundblaster PCI 128 (yes, the Aureals are better, but the OpenSound drivers don't have any of the features anyways).
Now Aureal have finally come through and released real drivers for the kernel (better late then never, but still to late to be easily forgiveable). According the the email they sent me about this (I have been hounding them about the lack of Linux drivers for a while) they will go on to OpenSource the drivers as well (I think the page says as much).
-
We cannot reason ourselves out of our basic irrationality. All we can do is learn the art of being irrational in a reasonable way.
How many customers has Aureal lost as of late? (Score:2)
Has anybody else here had that kind of experience leading to the use of some other sound cards besides Aureal's stuff?
When the heck will the A3D sound stuff work with Q3A? I thought that's more of a vestige from the programming with the Windows edition of Q3A, knowing that Aureal didn't do a thing for the A3D 3D sound stuff for linux yet.
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Re:SB Live. (Score:2)
ALSA Support? (Score:2)
Re:Closed Source Linux Drivers (Score:2)
However, I'm concerned that some of these hardware companies aren't releasing the source of the drivers they're providing. I'm not sure why they want to keep their source closed, because I personally can't see any disadvantage in opening the source for a hardware driver - after all, it's in selling the piece of kit that they make their money, not selling the driver, surely.
I wonder whether Aureal have a problem with the way A3D is supported on the older cards. As far as I know, the Vortex 1 (AU8820) supports A3D 1.0 in hardware, but relies on the driver to provide A3D 2.0 if it is requested. The Vortex 2 (AU8830) does A3D 2.0 in hardware, but now that there is A3D 3.0 in the works, I wonder whether we will see a software implementation of A3D 3.0 for the AU8830 chipset. The cost with a semi-hardware solution is, of course, CPU time.
What this boils down to is that to avoid putting any A3D code (and in effect Intellectual Property) into the drivers, there will be a need to provide separate drivers for each chipset. At the moment, I'm happy that my soundcard (which came bundled with my machine) is having drivers developed by the manufacturer for Linux. And I hope that sooner or later, we will see source code releases for each chipset to take advantage of the features available from the hardware, albeit without the latest version of A3D software patched over the top.
Cheers,
Toby Haynes
Re:ALSA Support? (Score:2)
If I had you come over and clean the leaves out of my gutter you would expect to be paid and probably paid well. Is you time more valuable than theirs?
Take it for what it's worth. I'm happy to finally have some drivers for my MX300. I bought the pre-order bundle with the Monster Fusion (banshee) and soon after bought my first Linux (RH5.2). The MX300 is in my pure Windows Athlon gamer rig. I can finally have a couple Linux gaming rigs now.
Drivers OK (Score:3)
The driver requires soundcore ("Sound card support") which can be compiled as module.
The drivers made by 4front seem less stable (three oopses for me) and also cost money.
Looking forward to seeing A3D in the future, and hopefully 100% Open Source drivers.
Binary driver kernel compatibility. (Score:3)
There was a thread on binary module compatibility on linux-kernel last month.
The short summary is this: it ain't gonna happen. Search the mailing list archives for the details.
I'm not sure I understand what is so terribly difficult for someone in that company to simply recompile the modules for every kernel rev that comes out. It's not like that we have a new kernel rev every day. Gee, how terrible: someone actually has to type 'make' every other month, or so.
This seems to me to be very logical. If you want to keep your module source closed, you can go ahead and do that, but then it becomes your sole responsibility to maintain your binary-only driver.
It seems that companies simply are looking for a free lunch. They want to keep their source closed, but then they also don't want to actively maintain their driver. Well, that's just not going to fly. If you want someone else to make sure that your module works in the next kernel rev, and you don't want that to be your responsibility, well, that's fine, but you'll have to open your source. Seems a fair tradeoff to me.
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Excellent (Score:3)
They Delivered (Score:3)
There are plans to support other operating systems besides Windows 9x and Windows NT. Currently, we are working on WDM drivers, but plans are already underway on working with different companies on Linux and BeOS drivers. We have been in contact with Be on getting supporting for the Vortex chipsets, and hopefully will follow through on that shortly.
There are no definite plans or release dates scheduled for these drivers, however, and there are no guarantees.
I's sure glad some folks out there deliver without expressed guarantees. The drivers can be found at Aureal [aureal.com]
Never knock on Death's door:
Binaries available (Score:4)
linux.aureal.com [aureal.com]
I haven't tried them yet, though.
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