"R. David Whitlock" wrote:
>
> Sometimes, after my system has been running awhile, I get a problem with
> my sound that makes all playing impossible. I log in to kdm and try to
> start x11amp or some similar mp3 player, no sound, song quits immediately.
>
> I open a shell and try to play using mpg123, which sometimes helps because
> then I can get error messages, and I get the following:
>
> Audio device open for 22.05Khz, stereo, 8bit failed
> Trying 44.1Khz, 16bit mono.
> /dev/dsp: Cannot allocate memory
> Audio device open for 44.1Khz, mono, 8bit failed
> Trying 22.05Khz, 8bit mono.
> /dev/dsp: Cannot allocate memory
> Audio device open for 22.05Khz, mono, 8bit failed
> Trying 11.025Khz, 8bit stereo.
> /dev/dsp: Cannot allocate memory
> Audio device open for 11.025Khz, stereo, 8bit failed
> Trying 11.025Khz, 8bit mono.
> ....
>
> Etcetera. Thinking perhaps some program is locking up the device, I go to
> top to see what programs are running, and try to one at a time kill
> anything that might be interfering, and then retry the mpg123 play. The
> one time I got a success with this tactic, I had just killed maudio, but
> then right after that song had completed, back to the previous condition.
>
> So any idea's what's going on?
What happens is that the kernel runs out of DMA-able RAM below 16M for
use by the audio card. At least, judging from the description, that's
what it sounds like to me.
I believe the 2.2.x kernels include an option to set aside the low RAM
to ensure that you always have some, but I'm not sure.
--
Steve Philp
Network Administrator
Advance Packaging Corporation
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
