Crackling sound in games, pulseaudio CPU usage high (F10)

[NMONNET]

Couldn't find info about this anywhere, but I have this really annoying 
problem, whereby in games, be they ETQW (full version) or games included 
in the stock Fedora distrib, have very bad sound quality. Lots of 
crackling. The CPU usage of pulseaudio shoots up to 20% (that's on a dual 
core Pentium D).

I can get normal perf. with ETQW by using pasuspend and forcing output to 
hw:0, but there's got to be a better solution.

This is my sound card:

00:1b.0 Audio device: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) HD Audio 
Controller (rev 02)

[root@ws log]# grep -i hda dmesg
HDA Intel 0000:00:1b.0: PCI INT A -> GSI 22 (level, low) -> IRQ 22
HDA Intel 0000:00:1b.0: setting latency timer to 64
hda_codec: Unknown model for ALC883, trying auto-probe from BIOS...
ALSA sound/pci/hda/hda_codec.c:3021: autoconfig: line_outs=4 
(0x14/0x15/0x16/0x17/0x0)
ALSA sound/pci/hda/hda_codec.c:3025:    speaker_outs=0 
(0x0/0x0/0x0/0x0/0x0)
ALSA sound/pci/hda/hda_codec.c:3029:    hp_outs=1 (0x1b/0x0/0x0/0x0/0x0)
ALSA sound/pci/hda/hda_codec.c:3030:    mono: mono_out=0x0
ALSA sound/pci/hda/hda_codec.c:3038:    inputs: mic=0x18, fmic=0x19, 
line=0x1a, fline=0x0, cd=0x0, aux=0x0

[Nigel Henry]

On Monday 01 December 2008 15:13, NM wrote:
>  Couldn't find info about this anywhere, but I have this really
> annoying
>  problem, whereby in games, be they ETQW (full version) or games included
>  in the stock Fedora distrib, have very bad sound quality. Lots of
>  crackling. The CPU usage of pulseaudio shoots up to 20% (that's on a dual
>  core Pentium D). 
Do you have the same sound problems when playing an audio cd, or playing music 
files (.ogg, .mp3)?
>  I can get normal perf. with ETQW by using pasuspend and forcing output to
>  hw:0, but there's got to be a better solution. 
If it is Pulseaudio causing the problem, and you don't use it for anything 
specific, you could just disable it by removing the package 
alsa-plugins-pulseaudio. If you are using KDE like me, this will also remove 
the package kde-settings-pulseaudio. By doing this your audio apps will 
revert to using Alsa directly. If any of the games you play use SDL, you will 
need to add the following line to /home/<user>/.bashrc , which will remove 
the hack that SDL programs need to use Pulseaudio.

unset SDL_AUDIODRIVER


>  This is my sound card:
>
>  00:1b.0 Audio device: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) HD Audio
>  Controller (rev 02)
>
>  [root@ws log]# grep -i hda dmesg
>  HDA Intel 0000:00:1b.0: PCI INT A -> GSI 22 (level, low) -> IRQ 22
>  HDA Intel 0000:00:1b.0: setting latency timer to 64
>  hda_codec: Unknown model for ALC883, trying auto-probe from BIOS...
>  ALSA sound/pci/hda/hda_codec.c:3021: autoconfig: line_outs=4
>  (0x14/0x15/0x16/0x17/0x0)
>  ALSA sound/pci/hda/hda_codec.c:3025:    speaker_outs=0
>  (0x0/0x0/0x0/0x0/0x0)
>  ALSA sound/pci/hda/hda_codec.c:3029:    hp_outs=1 (0x1b/0x0/0x0/0x0/0x0)
>  ALSA sound/pci/hda/hda_codec.c:3030:    mono: mono_out=0x0
>  ALSA sound/pci/hda/hda_codec.c:3038:    inputs: mic=0x18, fmic=0x19,
>  line=0x1a, fline=0x0, cd=0x0, aux=0x0 
What is the make and model of your Laptop/PC ?

Can you post the output from the following commands.

cat /proc/asound/version
grep ^Codec /proc/asound/card?/codec*
/sbin/lspci -vn             (just the bit for the soundcard)

Did the sound just work ok post install of F10, or did you have to set model 
options for snd-hda-intel?

There are a whole bunch of model options for the ALC883 codec, some of which 
may give you more sliders/controls in alsamixer, when run as user in a 
terminal. To see all the controls when pulseaudio is enabled, you will have 
to open alsamixer as below, otherwise you will only see one control for 
pulseaudio.

alsamixer -D hw:0

Crackling sounds can be a problem to resolve. I know that pulseaudio can be 
responsible for low volume output, and if you are having to push the volume 
up to 100% to get decent sound levels to your speakers, it could be that the 
card is being pushed beyong it's capabilities. It's interesting that when you 
don't use pulseaudio, the sound is ok.

I'll give you a list of model options when you post back, but I need to know 
the alsa driver version, that's on F10 first.

All the best.

Nigel.

[NMONNET]

On Tue, 09 Dec 2008 11:18:16 +0100, Christian Nolte wrote:

>  Just for the record: These problems are being tracked in redhat
> bugzilla
>  
>  	[Bug 473080] libpulse segfaults on invalidated **environ
>  	https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=473080
>  
>  	[Bug 471964] Choppy sound and freeze for rhythmbox
>  	https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=471964
>  
>  Best regards,
>  Christian 
Thanks for the pointers.

Still haven't found a fix.

[Christian Nolte]

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Hash: SHA1

Mark Eggers schrieb:
>  On Tue, 02 Dec 2008 14:20:11 +0000, NM wrote:
>  
> > On Mon, 01 Dec 2008 22:31:33 +0000, NMONNET wrote:
> >
> >> Thanks a lot, it seems to be working. ☺
> > Well actually I now get this filling up my messages:
> >
> > Dec  2 15:16:34 ws pulseaudio[30881]: module-alsa-sink.c: ALSA woke us
> > up to write new data to the device, but there was actually nothing to
> > write! Most likely this is an ALSA driver bug. Please report this issue
> > to the PulseAudio developers.
>  
>  
>  First of all, I had to add myself to the pulse-rt group in order to set 
>  my Gnome sound to the pulse audio server.
>  
>  I occasionally get these messages.  Like you, the frequency increased 
>  dramatically when I added tsched=0 to my /etc/pulse/default.pa file.
>  
>  Unfortunately for me, it did not reduce the CPU usage significantly when 
>  running Audacious configured for pulse audio.
>  
>  Adding tsched=0 did eliminate popping and crackling when running 
>  Rhythmbox.
>  
>  Kaffine is rather strange.  When configured to use the GStreamer engine, 
>  the pulse audio volume monitor shows the client as 'unknown'.  When 
>  configured to use the xine engine, the pulse audio volume monitor shows 
>  the client as ALSA (expected).
>  
>  Basically, any music player that appears to use pulse audio directly 
>  causes pulse audio to use 13% - 16% CPU on a 2 GHz P6 ancient Dell system
>  (playing a standard MP3 file).
>  
>  Attempting to use pulse audio with Xine generates an immediate segfault 
>  as shown in the /var/log/messages entry below.
>  
>  xine[25985]: segfault at 0 ip 0072b4dc sp b51bbe30 error 4 in 
>  libpulse.so.0.7.0[6cf000+6e000]
>  
>  While I like the concept of pulse audio, there seems to be some 
>  significant challenges (or at least a lack of understanding on my part).
>  
>  I'll write up more about my adventures with pulse audio in another 
>  message.
>  
>  /mde/
>   

Just for the record: These problems are being tracked in redhat bugzilla

	[Bug 473080] libpulse segfaults on invalidated **environ
	https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=473080

	[Bug 471964] Choppy sound and freeze for rhythmbox
	https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=471964

Best regards,
Christian

- --
"He's an uncontrollable zombie cop from the Mississippi delta. She's a
 vivacious mute journalist from aristocratic European stock. They fight
 crime!"

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[NMONNET]

On Mon, 01 Dec 2008 22:31:33 +0000, NMONNET wrote:

>  Thanks a lot, it seems to be working. ☺ 
Well actually I now get this filling up my messages:

Dec  2 15:16:34 ws pulseaudio[30881]: module-alsa-sink.c: ALSA woke us up 
to write new data to the device, but there was actually nothing to write! 
Most likely this is an ALSA driver bug. Please report this issue to the 
PulseAudio developers.
Dec  2 15:16:35 ws pulseaudio[30881]: module-alsa-sink.c: ALSA woke us up 
to write new data to the device, but there was actually nothing to write! 
Most likely this is an ALSA driver bug. Please report this issue to the 
PulseAudio developers.
Dec  2 15:16:35 ws pulseaudio[30881]: module-alsa-sink.c: ALSA woke us up 
to write new data to the device, but there was actually nothing to write! 
Most likely this is an ALSA driver bug. Please report this issue to the 
PulseAudio developers.
Dec  2 15:16:35 ws pulseaudio[30881]: module-alsa-sink.c: ALSA woke us up 
to write new data to the device, but there was actually nothing to write! 
Most likely this is an ALSA driver bug. Please report this issue to the 
PulseAudio developers.

Strange, innit?

[NMONNET]

On Mon, 01 Dec 2008 09:55:33 -0800, Mike Cloaked wrote:

>  load-module module-hal-detect tsched=0"
>  
>  Doing this and rebooted fixed the problem for me.  Maybe it will help in
>  your case? 
Thanks a lot, it seems to be working. ☺

[Nigel Henry]

On Monday 01 December 2008 19:19, NM wrote:
>  On Mon, 01 Dec 2008 17:04:14 +0100, Nigel Henry wrote:
>  > Do you have the same sound problems when playing an audio cd, or playing
>  > music files (.ogg, .mp3)?
>
>  Nope, no such problem.
>
>  > If it is Pulseaudio causing the problem, and you don't use it for
>  > anything specific, you could just disable it by removing the package
>  > alsa-plugins-pulseaudio. If you are using KDE like me, this will also
>  > remove the package kde-settings-pulseaudio. By doing this your audio
>  > apps will revert to using Alsa directly. If any of the games you play
>  > use SDL, you will need to add the following line to /home/<user>/.bashrc
>  > , which will remove the hack that SDL programs need to use Pulseaudio.
>  >
>  > unset SDL_AUDIODRIVER
>
>  Thanks for the tip.
>
>  >> This is my sound card:
>  >>
>  >> 00:1b.0 Audio device: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) HD Audio
>  >> Controller (rev 02)
>  >>
>  >> [root@ws log]# grep -i hda dmesg
>  >> HDA Intel 0000:00:1b.0: PCI INT A -> GSI 22 (level, low) -> IRQ 22 HDA
>  >> Intel 0000:00:1b.0: setting latency timer to 64 hda_codec: Unknown
>  >> model for ALC883, trying auto-probe from BIOS... ALSA
>  >> sound/pci/hda/hda_codec.c:3021: autoconfig: line_outs=4
>  >> (0x14/0x15/0x16/0x17/0x0)
>  >> ALSA sound/pci/hda/hda_codec.c:3025:    speaker_outs=0
>  >> (0x0/0x0/0x0/0x0/0x0)
>  >> ALSA sound/pci/hda/hda_codec.c:3029:    hp_outs=1
>  >> (0x1b/0x0/0x0/0x0/0x0) ALSA sound/pci/hda/hda_codec.c:3030:    mono:
>  >> mono_out=0x0 ALSA sound/pci/hda/hda_codec.c:3038:    inputs: mic=0x18,
>  >> fmic=0x19, line=0x1a, fline=0x0, cd=0x0, aux=0x0
>  >
>  > What is the make and model of your Laptop/PC ?
>
>  It's home-made with an Asus motherboard. I'll post the details when I get
>  back home.
>
>  > Can you post the output from the following commands.
>  >
>  > cat /proc/asound/version
>
>  Advanced Linux Sound Architecture Driver Version 1.0.17.
>
>  > grep ^Codec /proc/asound/card?/codec* /sbin/lspci -vn             (just
>  > the bit for the soundcard)
>
>  Codec: Realtek ALC883
>
>  00:1b.0 0403: 8086:293e (rev 02)
>   Subsystem: 1043:8277
>   Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 0, IRQ 22
>   Memory at f9ff8000 (64-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=16K]
>   Capabilities: [50] Power Management version 2
>   Capabilities: [60] Message Signalled Interrupts: Mask- 64bit+
>  Count=1/1 Enable-
>   Capabilities: [70] Express Root Complex Integrated Endpoint, MSI
>  00
>   Capabilities: [100] Virtual Channel <?>
>   Capabilities: [130] Root Complex Link <?>
>   Kernel driver in use: HDA Intel
>   Kernel modules: snd-hda-intel
>
>  > Did the sound just work ok post install of F10, or did you have to set
>  > model options for snd-hda-intel?
>
>  Didn't set anything.
>
>  Sounds works ok without PA (used to run under Ubuntu w/o PA)
>
>  > There are a whole bunch of model options for the ALC883 codec, some of
>  > which may give you more sliders/controls in alsamixer, when run as user
>  > in a terminal. To see all the controls when pulseaudio is enabled, you
>  > will have to open alsamixer as below, otherwise you will only see one
>  > control for pulseaudio.
>  >
>  > alsamixer -D hw:0
>  >
>  > Crackling sounds can be a problem to resolve. I know that pulseaudio can
>  > be responsible for low volume output, and if you are having to push the
>  > volume up to 100% to get decent sound levels to your speakers, it could
>  > be that the card is being pushed beyong it's capabilities. It's
>  > interesting that when you don't use pulseaudio, the sound is ok.
>  >
>  > I'll give you a list of model options when you post back, but I need to
>  > know the alsa driver version, that's on F10 first.
>  >
>  > All the best.
>  >
>  > Nigel.
>
>  Thanks for your help.
>
>  One other problem I notice with PA is that sometimes the sound sounds
>  saturated, as if it was compressed up and then scaled back down. I have
>  this problem after playing around with various volume settings (either pa-
>  volume or alsamixer etc)
>
>  The main problem here is the CPU usage, which is strange. Any idea what
>  causes this? 
No Idea on the CPU useage, but I havn't psyched myself up yet to download the 
iso's for F10 on dialup, so don't have it installed yet to try to recreate 
your problem. 6 cd iso's for F9 was bad enough, and I'm still recovering from 
14/15 days of downloading them on dialup, with frequent pausing of Kget, so 
as to retrieve mail, etc.

Nigel.

[NMONNET]

On Mon, 01 Dec 2008 17:04:14 +0100, Nigel Henry wrote:

>  Do you have the same sound problems when playing an audio cd, or
> playing
>  music files (.ogg, .mp3)? 
Nope, no such problem.

>  If it is Pulseaudio causing the problem, and you don't use it
> for
>  anything specific, you could just disable it by removing the package
>  alsa-plugins-pulseaudio. If you are using KDE like me, this will also
>  remove the package kde-settings-pulseaudio. By doing this your audio
>  apps will revert to using Alsa directly. If any of the games you play
>  use SDL, you will need to add the following line to /home/<user>/.bashrc
>  , which will remove the hack that SDL programs need to use Pulseaudio.
>  
>  unset SDL_AUDIODRIVER 
Thanks for the tip.

> > This is my sound card:
> >
> > 00:1b.0 Audio device: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) HD Audio
> > Controller (rev 02)
> >
> > [root@ws log]# grep -i hda dmesg
> > HDA Intel 0000:00:1b.0: PCI INT A -> GSI 22 (level, low) -> IRQ 22 HDA
> > Intel 0000:00:1b.0: setting latency timer to 64 hda_codec: Unknown
> > model for ALC883, trying auto-probe from BIOS... ALSA
> > sound/pci/hda/hda_codec.c:3021: autoconfig: line_outs=4
> > (0x14/0x15/0x16/0x17/0x0)
> > ALSA sound/pci/hda/hda_codec.c:3025:    speaker_outs=0
> > (0x0/0x0/0x0/0x0/0x0)
> > ALSA sound/pci/hda/hda_codec.c:3029:    hp_outs=1
> > (0x1b/0x0/0x0/0x0/0x0) ALSA sound/pci/hda/hda_codec.c:3030:    mono:
> > mono_out=0x0 ALSA sound/pci/hda/hda_codec.c:3038:    inputs: mic=0x18,
> > fmic=0x19, line=0x1a, fline=0x0, cd=0x0, aux=0x0
>  
>  What is the make and model of your Laptop/PC ? 
It's home-made with an Asus motherboard. I'll post the details when I get 
back home.

>  
>  Can you post the output from the following commands.
>  
>  cat /proc/asound/version 
Advanced Linux Sound Architecture Driver Version 1.0.17.

>  grep ^Codec /proc/asound/card?/codec* /sbin/lspci -vn            
> (just
>  the bit for the soundcard) 
Codec: Realtek ALC883

00:1b.0 0403: 8086:293e (rev 02)
	Subsystem: 1043:8277
	Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 0, IRQ 22
	Memory at f9ff8000 (64-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=16K]
	Capabilities: [50] Power Management version 2
	Capabilities: [60] Message Signalled Interrupts: Mask- 64bit+ 
Count=1/1 Enable-
	Capabilities: [70] Express Root Complex Integrated Endpoint, MSI 
00
	Capabilities: [100] Virtual Channel <?>
	Capabilities: [130] Root Complex Link <?>
	Kernel driver in use: HDA Intel
	Kernel modules: snd-hda-intel


>  Did the sound just work ok post install of F10, or did you have to
> set
>  model options for snd-hda-intel? 
Didn't set anything. 

Sounds works ok without PA (used to run under Ubuntu w/o PA)

>  There are a whole bunch of model options for the ALC883 codec, some
> of
>  which may give you more sliders/controls in alsamixer, when run as user
>  in a terminal. To see all the controls when pulseaudio is enabled, you
>  will have to open alsamixer as below, otherwise you will only see one
>  control for pulseaudio.
>  
>  alsamixer -D hw:0
>  
>  Crackling sounds can be a problem to resolve. I know that pulseaudio can
>  be responsible for low volume output, and if you are having to push the
>  volume up to 100% to get decent sound levels to your speakers, it could
>  be that the card is being pushed beyong it's capabilities. It's
>  interesting that when you don't use pulseaudio, the sound is ok.
>  
>  I'll give you a list of model options when you post back, but I need to
>  know the alsa driver version, that's on F10 first.
>  
>  All the best.
>  
>  Nigel. 
Thanks for your help.

One other problem I notice with PA is that sometimes the sound sounds 
saturated, as if it was compressed up and then scaled back down. I have 
this problem after playing around with various volume settings (either pa-
volume or alsamixer etc)

The main problem here is the CPU usage, which is strange. Any idea what 
causes this?

[mike cloaked]

nm-5 wrote:
>  
>  Couldn't find info about this anywhere, but I have this really annoying 
>  problem, whereby in games, be they ETQW (full version) or games included 
>  in the stock Fedora distrib, have very bad sound quality. Lots of 
>  crackling. The CPU usage of pulseaudio shoots up to 20% (that's on a dual 
>  core Pentium D).
>  
>   
I don't know if this is related to your problem but I had stuttery sound
with Amarok and after a lot of searching found this on a web page:
"The PulseAudio sound server has been rewritten to use timer-based audio
scheduling instead
 of the traditional interrupt-driven approach. Timer-based scheduling may
expose issues in
 some Alsa drivers. To turn timer-based scheduling off, replace the line

load-module module-hal-detect

in /etc/pulse/default.pa by

load-module module-hal-detect tsched=0"

Doing this and rebooted fixed the problem for me.  Maybe it will help in
your case?
-- 
View this message in context:
http://www.nabble.com/Crackling-sound-in-games%2C-pulseaudio-CPU-usage-hi...
Sent from the Fedora List mailing list archive at Nabble.com.

[Mark Eggers]

On Tue, 02 Dec 2008 14:20:11 +0000, NM wrote:

>  On Mon, 01 Dec 2008 22:31:33 +0000, NMONNET wrote:
>  
> > Thanks a lot, it seems to be working. ☺
>  
>  Well actually I now get this filling up my messages:
>  
>  Dec  2 15:16:34 ws pulseaudio[30881]: module-alsa-sink.c: ALSA woke us
>  up to write new data to the device, but there was actually nothing to
>  write! Most likely this is an ALSA driver bug. Please report this issue
>  to the PulseAudio developers. 

First of all, I had to add myself to the pulse-rt group in order to set 
my Gnome sound to the pulse audio server.

I occasionally get these messages.  Like you, the frequency increased 
dramatically when I added tsched=0 to my /etc/pulse/default.pa file.

Unfortunately for me, it did not reduce the CPU usage significantly when 
running Audacious configured for pulse audio.

Adding tsched=0 did eliminate popping and crackling when running 
Rhythmbox.

Kaffine is rather strange.  When configured to use the GStreamer engine, 
the pulse audio volume monitor shows the client as 'unknown'.  When 
configured to use the xine engine, the pulse audio volume monitor shows 
the client as ALSA (expected).

Basically, any music player that appears to use pulse audio directly 
causes pulse audio to use 13% - 16% CPU on a 2 GHz P6 ancient Dell system
(playing a standard MP3 file).

Attempting to use pulse audio with Xine generates an immediate segfault 
as shown in the /var/log/messages entry below.

xine[25985]: segfault at 0 ip 0072b4dc sp b51bbe30 error 4 in 
libpulse.so.0.7.0[6cf000+6e000]

While I like the concept of pulse audio, there seems to be some 
significant challenges (or at least a lack of understanding on my part).

I'll write up more about my adventures with pulse audio in another 
message.

/mde/