&Mike.McBride;
&Jost.Schenck;
2005-02-20
3.4
KDE KControl sound server sound aRts

## Sound System

This control module is used to configure the settings for the &arts; sound server (the &kde; sound server).

### &arts;

The top option, labeled Enable the sound system, enables (or disables) the &arts; sound server entirely.

You can find out more about &arts; in general by typing `help:/artsbuilder` into the &konqueror; location bar, or by finding the &arts-builder; documentation in &khelpcenter;.

The rest of the panel consists of options for the &arts; sound server.

Enable networked sound

  If this option is enabled, then sound requests from the network will be honored by the sound server. If this option is disabled, the sound server will only honor requests from the local computer.

Run with the highest possible priority (realtime priority)

  Enabling this option will give the sound server priority over other applications, which will help alleviate any problems delivering uninterrupted sound.

  This option may require permissions you do not have as a regular user.

  This option also relies on certain real time support from your system which may not be available.

  If you do not have the necessary permissions, or your system does not have the real time support necessary, enabling this option will not cause problems.

Sound buffer:

  This slider determines how quickly the sound server can use your computer's resources. The faster the response time, the higher the CPU load will be.

  I would recommend that you start with the sound server set at 250 ms, and use &kde; for a while. If you notice that the sound does not work correctly, increase the responsiveness one step at a time until the problems disappear.

Auto-suspend if idle after:

  Normally &arts; locks the sound card device, so that other applications cannot use it. If you enable this option, then if &arts; has been idle for the amount of time you set, it will suspend itself, allowing any application access to the sound hardware. If &arts; receives another request, it will unsuspend, and continue as normal. Enabling this option may cause a small delay when you start an &arts; application.

At the bottom of this page are two buttons to allow you to test your settings, labelled Test Sound and Test MIDI respectively.

### Hardware

The first option you can configure in the Hardware panel is Select the audio device:. It tells &arts; which sound system to use for input and output of sound. Current choices are ALSA (Advanced &Linux; Sound Architecture), OSS (Open Sound System), ESD (Enlightenment Sound Daemon), no audio at all and autodetect. In most cases Autodetect will be perfect for you.

Other options are:

Full duplex

  This option allows the sound server to play and record sound at the same time. This option should be enabled if you use applications (such as Internet telephones) which require simultaneous record and playback.

Use custom sampling rate:

  Normally, the sound server defaults to using a sampling rate of 44100 Hz (CD quality), which is supported on almost all hardware. If you are using certain Yamaha soundcards, you might need to configure this to 48000 Hz here; if you are using old SoundBlaster cards, like SoundBlaster Pro, you might need to change this to 22050 Hz. All other values are possible too and may make sense in certain contexts (&ie; professional studio equipment).

Quality:

  These settings allow you to configure the quality of the sounds that will be played.

  Note that a higher sound quality causes a higher CPU usage.

  If you find sound is slow, or using too much CPU, try reducing this setting.

Override device location:

  Normally, the sound server defaults to using the device called `/dev/dsp` for sound output. This should work in most cases. An exception is, for instance, if you are using devfs, then you should use `/dev/sound/dsp` instead. Other alternatives are things like `/dev/dsp0` or `/dev/dsp1` if you have a soundcard that supports multiple outputs or you have multiple soundcards.

  If you often use non-&arts; aware applications, and you have a soundcard that supports it, try setting &arts; to use a different device than `/dev/dsp`. This way, other applications will be able to use the default device, while &arts; is still running, without giving any error messages.

Other custom options:

  There are some options offered by &arts; which may not be available in this control module, so you can add command line options here which will be passed directly to artsd. The options will be appended, so they will override the choices made in the GUI. To see the possible choices, open a &konsole; window, and type ``artsd` `-h``.

&midi-kcontrol;