[ale] [EXTERNAL] Re: Let's discuss audio settings - why all the volume controls?!

[Steve Litt]

I'm working on that, Allen...

My box has 64GB RAM and 6 dual thread cores, so it's got enough muscle
to run VMs capable of online meetings. I'm working to make a Devuan or
Ubuntu based Zoom/Jitsi appliance qemu VM. I already have the VM guest
networking appearing as just another metal computer on my LAN, and I
already have the sound from my VM coming out my speakers. My remaining
challenge is to get my VM to work with the USB ports for my microphone
and my webcam.

My normal Void Linux is wonderful, but sucks for Jitsi and as you know
Zoom is impossible with Pulseaudio, and Pulsaudio just doesn't work
right under Void. So for the qemu VM meeting appliance, I'll use a
distro that works well with Pulseaudio out of the box.

You know, when it comes to an appliance as opposed to the computer I
use for everything, I don't really care if it uses systemd, Pulseaudio,
dbus, KDE, Gnome, or any of the other massively entangled monoliths that
have taken the world by storm. I mean, it's just an appliance --- I
don't care what's inside of it as long as it does its one and only job.

SteveT


Allen Beddingfield via Ale said on Fri, 13 Aug 2021 04:48:13 +0000

>I wish I could flush pulseaudio down the drain, but I'm pretty sure
>that my required for work applications (MS Teams and Zoom) would not
>work without it. Allen B.
>
>--
>Allen Beddingfield
>Systems Engineer
>Office of Information Technology
>The University of Alabama
>Office 205-348-2251
>allen at ua.edu
>
>
>________________________________________
>From: Ale <ale-bounces at ale.org> on behalf of Steve Litt via Ale
><ale at ale.org> Sent: Thursday, August 12, 2021 6:41 PM
>To: ale at ale.org
>Cc: Steve Litt
>Subject: [EXTERNAL] Re: [ale] Let's discuss audio settings - why all
>the volume controls?!
>
>Allen Beddingfield via Ale said on Thu, 12 Aug 2021 19:19:39 +0000
>
>>Something that drives me crazy is the number of places for adjusting
>>the volume on a PC. For example, I'm currently listening to MP3s with
>>Clementine player.
>>
>>1.  There is a volume control in the player
>>2.  There is a volume control on the audio applet at the bottom of the
>>screen 3.  My speakers have a volume knob
>>4.  If I click the "mixer" button on the audio applet, there is an
>>individual volume level for each running application, and "system
>>sounds"
>>
>>That makes FOUR places to change the volume.  What do you do?
>>Crank all the software volume controls to 100%, and change the volume
>>with the mechanical knob?  Set them all at 50% and use the mechanical
>>knob?  Set the mechanical knob to some sane midpoint, and control the
>>volume with a software control (which one?) Is there an officially
>>recommended procedure? What's the purpose of all of these?  
>
>The first thing I did was get rid of Pulseaudio. That reduces potential
>volume controls, and also and more important, greatly reduces the
>various mutes one sometimes has to diagnose. So I'm using Alsamixer
>exclusively, and if a sound client can't use Alsamixer without
>Pulseaudio, I just don't use it.
>
>I think the volume control in your applet also adjusts the master
>volume in your mixer: You can check on that, and if it's true, you're
>down to 3 volume controls :-)
>
>I don't have an applet. I set my Alsamixer master at 50%, and do
>the rest with the amplifier volume control. That way, I can use
>the mixer to adjust up or down without having to get up and
>adjust the amplifier. As far as the sound application, I set them
>pretty low, and try to set them so all the sound applications are about
>the same volume.
>
>One reason I set alsamixer at 50% is because I made myself an alarm
>clock application that plays the song "Surfin Bird", at high
>distortion, while increasing the master volume. So I need the master
>volume to have room to increase, to be sure I get up right away. I
>guarantee you when you hear "Surfin Bird" at distortion volumes, you'll
>pop right out of bed and turn the thing off.
>
>HTH,
>
>SteveT