Hello list,
Is there a knack to getting my plasma desktop to operate happily with my new Bluetooth speakers? I can get a connection using the Bluetooth control panel, and the sound device appears in the Audio control panel, but testing either speaker produces no sound.
The Gentoo wiki was helpful in getting everything I need (well, I thought I had), but still I seem to be missing one link in the chain.
(I still have the old M-Audio speakers with their line-in, but so far I've lost two motherboard sound chips and two USB dongles while using them, so I wanted to try something else.)
I have a photive BT speaker that I've used successfully with plasma on
my Artix laptop. I can test later with my Gentoo desktop to confirm. I don't remember if you use pulseaudio or not, but if so, I'd check
pavucontrol to see if it also thinks that device is active and being
used by whatever app is producing the sound, and also that the volume
meter is showing any output.
Probably not relevant to you, but I've recently solved a long-standing problem with audio (not just BT, also wired, but mostly with the mic)
where my system monitor (gkrellm, and specifically its gkrellmss plugin)
had grabbed the audio device, so although pavucontrol saw that the
device existed, it couldn't actually do anything with it, and the volume meter didn't even show up. Solved in the short term by just disabling
that plugin.
Jack
On 5/5/22 11:22, Peter Humphrey wrote:
Hello list,
Is there a knack to getting my plasma desktop to operate happily with my new Bluetooth speakers? I can get a connection using the Bluetooth
control panel, and the sound device appears in the Audio control panel,
but testing either speaker produces no sound.
The Gentoo wiki was helpful in getting everything I need (well, I thought
I
had), but still I seem to be missing one link in the chain.
(I still have the old M-Audio speakers with their line-in, but so far I've lost two motherboard sound chips and two USB dongles while using them, so
I
wanted to try something else.)
I've never had speakers blowing the audio chips driving them. I would have thought they would be protected electrically from such events occurring.
Anyway, more to the point, I had tried to configure a laptop to connect over bluetooth to an AVR, but I couldn't get it to work until I installed and
used net-wireless/blueman. You may want to give it a spin.
On Thursday, 5 May 2022 21:37:12 BST Michael wrote:
I've never had speakers blowing the audio chips driving them. I would
have
thought they would be protected electrically from such events occurring.
The sound chips have failed on both my workstations' motherboards over the last five years or so. They only seem to last a couple of years. Each time I've plugged in a USB dongle instead, and both of those have now failed. Or perhaps it's the speakers and their amplifiers.
Anyway, more to the point, I had tried to configure a laptop to connect over bluetooth to an AVR, but I couldn't get it to work until I installed and used net-wireless/blueman. You may want to give it a spin.
I will. Thank you. And Jack too.
On Friday, 6 May 2022 08:59:33 BST Peter Humphrey wrote:Not a direct help, but maybe it will trigger some ideas - the only time
On Thursday, 5 May 2022 21:37:12 BST Michael wrote:
I've never had speakers blowing the audio chips driving them. I
would have thought they would be protected electrically from such
events occurring.
The sound chips have failed on both my workstations' motherboards
over the last five years or so. They only seem to last a couple of
years. Each time I've plugged in a USB dongle instead, and both of
those have now failed. Or perhaps it's the speakers and their
amplifiers.
Anyway, more to the point, I had tried to configure a laptop to
connect over bluetooth to an AVR, but I couldn't get it to work
until I installed and used net-wireless/blueman. You may want to
give it a spin.
I will. Thank you. And Jack too.
No joy. I get the same result:
"blueman.bluez.errors.DBusFailedError: br-
connection-profile-unavailable"
So far none of the remedies offered on the web have helped. What
would help is some idea of how the whole BT system works, but the
more I look the more complex it seems.
Not a direct help, but maybe it will trigger some ideas - the only time
I've seen any message about bluetooth profiles has been with a pair of noise-canceling headphones. They work fine for either "High Fidelity PLAYBACK (A2DP Sink)" or "Handsfree Head Unit (HFP)" but the last
profile is always "Headset Head Unit (HSP) (unavailable)". These are
all in the dropdown for the headset in the pulseaudio voluime control
app, once the device is connected. I just connected my BT speaker,
and it only shows the first two profiles, so at least it appears to recognizes that it doesn't have a mic. You should be able to get
similar info from the bluetoothctl command.
What would help is some idea of how the whole BT system works,...
Peter:
...
What would help is some idea of how the whole BT system works,
...
There are two incompatible types of bluetooth:
Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE)
Bluetooth Classic
see:
https://www.bluetooth.com/learn-about-bluetooth/tech-overview/
You must check which generation of bluetooth your speaker uses.
If your speaker uses the classic type, this might help you:
https://wiki.debian.org/Bluetooth/Alsa
///
More info about bluetooth:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bluetooth
https://www.bluetooth.com/specifications/specs/
///
Current linux bluetooth tools (http://www.bluez.org/) doesn't
handle bluetooth classic, unless you build bluez with
--enable-deprecated configure option.
Also, bluez has dropped direct /dev file access for users, you
have to set up and go through dbus regardless wether you like it
or not.
Regards,
/Karl Hammar
On Monday, 9 May 2022 14:56:42 BST karl@aspodata.se wrote:
Peter:
...
What would help is some idea of how the whole BT system works,
...
There are two incompatible types of bluetooth:
Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE)
Bluetooth Classic
see:
https://www.bluetooth.com/learn-about-bluetooth/tech-overview/
You must check which generation of bluetooth your speaker uses.
If your speaker uses the classic type, this might help you:
https://wiki.debian.org/Bluetooth/Alsa
///
More info about bluetooth:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bluetooth
https://www.bluetooth.com/specifications/specs/
///
Current linux bluetooth tools (http://www.bluez.org/) doesn't
handle bluetooth classic, unless you build bluez with
--enable-deprecated configure option.
Also, bluez has dropped direct /dev file access for users, you
have to set up and go through dbus regardless wether you like it
or not.
Regards,
/Karl Hammar
I've met some success getting BT to work and I tend to follow these basic steps:
1. Configure the kernel according to the BT chipset available on the PC.
2. Power the BT chip by using whatever hardware button is available and
check dmesg identified the device and loaded whatever module and firmware
is necessary.
3. Use 'rfkill list' to check the device is not blocked and unblock it if necessary.
4. Run 'rc-service -v bluetooth start'.
5. Run 'bluetoothctl' to scan, list, pair and trust any peripherals - exchange a PIN to facilitate pairing as necessary.
These steps should be relatively easy to complete and GUI tools are also available to assist with the above. Any problems thereafter are userspace related, i.e. whether the applications I use will be able to work with the
BT peripherals. Audio has been problematic on a particular use case, where neither alsa (bluez-alsa), nor pulseaudio allowed me to output audio via
BT. Eventually I tried blueman which after a couple of restarts helped pulseaudio to recognise the device and output audio through it.
In all cases I prefer cables to temperamental radio connectivity and where quality matters, like it can be in some audio applications, I would seek to connect with a cable.
Indeed, and I've now replaced the speakers, the 3.5mm cable and the USB dongle - every sound component is new. When I tested it yesterday in the plasma control panel, I heard one "front left", very loud, and then nothing. I thought some BT stuff must still be lying around somewhere, so I've installed a new system from scratch, using a kernel .config from before I started with BT, and today I still hear no sound.
This seems like witchcraft now.
On Tuesday, 10 May 2022 09:17:32 BST Peter Humphrey wrote:
Indeed, and I've now replaced the speakers, the 3.5mm cable and the USB dongle - every sound component is new. When I tested it yesterday in the plasma control panel, I heard one "front left", very loud, and then nothing. I thought some BT stuff must still be lying around somewhere, so I've installed a new system from scratch, using a kernel .config from before I started with BT, and today I still hear no sound.
This seems like witchcraft now.
Before you start ritual exorcisms, have you checked you are using the
correct 3.5mm jack and it is inserted properly? See below:
On Tuesday, 10 May 2022 10:26:13 BST Michael wrote:
On Tuesday, 10 May 2022 09:17:32 BST Peter Humphrey wrote:
Indeed, and I've now replaced the speakers, the 3.5mm cable and the USB dongle - every sound component is new. When I tested it yesterday in the plasma control panel, I heard one "front left", very loud, and then nothing. I thought some BT stuff must still be lying around somewhere,
so
I've installed a new system from scratch, using a kernel .config from before I started with BT, and today I still hear no sound.
This seems like witchcraft now.
Before you start ritual exorcisms, have you checked you are using the
correct 3.5mm jack and it is inserted properly? See below:I thought of the easy check, eventually. I booted into Windows 10 and was immediately greeted with its bing-bong-bong sound - over the 3.5mm jack connection.
So now I just have to find out what's wrong with my plasma sound system.
So now I just have to find out what's wrong with my plasma sound system.
This seems like witchcraft now.
On Monday, 9 May 2022 14:56:42 BST karl@aspodata.se wrote:
Peter:
...
What would help is some idea of how the whole BT system works,
...
There are two incompatible types of bluetooth:
Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE)
Bluetooth Classic
see:
https://www.bluetooth.com/learn-about-bluetooth/tech-overview/
You must check which generation of bluetooth your speaker uses.
If your speaker uses the classic type, this might help you:
https://wiki.debian.org/Bluetooth/Alsa
///
More info about bluetooth:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bluetooth
https://www.bluetooth.com/specifications/specs/
///
Current linux bluetooth tools (http://www.bluez.org/) doesn't
handle bluetooth classic, unless you build bluez with
--enable-deprecated configure option.
Also, bluez has dropped direct /dev file access for users, you
have to set up and go through dbus regardless wether you like it
or not.
Regards,
/Karl Hammar
I've met some success getting BT to work and I tend to follow these basic steps:
1. Configure the kernel according to the BT chipset available on the PC.
2. Power the BT chip by using whatever hardware button is available and
check dmesg identified the device and loaded whatever module and firmware
is necessary.
3. Use 'rfkill list' to check the device is not blocked and unblock it if necessary.
4. Run 'rc-service -v bluetooth start'.
5. Run 'bluetoothctl' to scan, list, pair and trust any peripherals - exchange a PIN to facilitate pairing as necessary.
These steps should be relatively easy to complete and GUI tools are also available to assist with the above. Any problems thereafter are userspace related, i.e. whether the applications I use will be able to work with the
BT peripherals. Audio has been problematic on a particular use case, where neither alsa (bluez-alsa), nor pulseaudio allowed me to output audio via
BT. Eventually I tried blueman which after a couple of restarts helped pulseaudio to recognise the device and output audio through it.
In all cases I prefer cables to temperamental radio connectivity and where quality matters, like it can be in some audio applications, I would seek to connect with a cable.
I'm leaning towards concluding that there's no way to have sound on
this machine any more. At every stage in setting up yet another new
user account, together with mail, browser etc., I log out and in again
to check that I still have (wired) sound. No problem until the first
reboot, then no sound again.
I don't know what the KDE team have done, but some configuration
variable or other is killing some system services: sound, and unclean shutdown of Konsole:
Have you tried setting up a new user that doesn't use KDE? That would
help decide if kgremlins are at play.
Is there a knack to getting my plasma desktop to operate happily with my new Bluetooth speakers? I can get a connection using the Bluetooth control
panel, and the sound device appears in the Audio control panel, but testing either speaker produces no sound.
On Thursday, 5 May 2022 16:22:56 BST Peter Humphrey wrote:
Is there a knack to getting my plasma desktop to operate happily with my new Bluetooth speakers? I can get a connection using the Bluetooth
control panel, and the sound device appears in the Audio control panel,
but testing either speaker produces no sound.
I think I've solved the problem. No, not BT but with a wired connection I do now have sound. BT can wait until I need it.
On Saturday, 14 May 2022 17:34:58 BST Peter Humphrey wrote:
On Thursday, 5 May 2022 16:22:56 BST Peter Humphrey wrote:
Is there a knack to getting my plasma desktop to operate happily with my new Bluetooth speakers? I can get a connection using the Bluetooth control panel, and the sound device appears in the Audio control panel, but testing either speaker produces no sound.
I think I've solved the problem. No, not BT but with a wired connection I do now have sound. BT can wait until I need it.
Wrong again. In fact, the problem was that pulseaudio was not running. A simple 'pulseaudio start' - et voila! Sound.
I found this along the way:
# pulseaudio --dump-conf
### Read from configuration file: /etc/pulse/daemon.conf ###
daemonize = no
[...]
Why is it set to No by default? Isn't PA deaf without the daemon running?
Somewhere around here I said I had too many USE flag staatements under /etc/ portage, so I removed package.use and just set whatever flags were needed
to install all my packages. That was fine, but it meant that USE=pulseaudio was only set on alsa-plugins, which was fine as far as it went, but nothing else could use PA. Now that I've put pulseaudio back into make.conf and recompiled, I hope for a quieter life, if you see what I mean...
Thanks again for everyone's patience.
On Wednesday, 18 May 2022 09:51:57 BST Peter Humphrey wrote:
On Saturday, 14 May 2022 17:34:58 BST Peter Humphrey wrote:
On Thursday, 5 May 2022 16:22:56 BST Peter Humphrey wrote:
Is there a knack to getting my plasma desktop to operate happily with my
new Bluetooth speakers? I can get a connection using the Bluetooth control panel, and the sound device appears in the Audio control
panel,
but testing either speaker produces no sound.
I think I've solved the problem. No, not BT but with a wired connection
I
do now have sound. BT can wait until I need it.
Wrong again. In fact, the problem was that pulseaudio was not running. A simple 'pulseaudio start' - et voila! Sound.
I found this along the way:
# pulseaudio --dump-conf
### Read from configuration file: /etc/pulse/daemon.conf ###
daemonize = no
[...]
Why is it set to No by default? Isn't PA deaf without the daemon running?
Pulseaudio is currently set to "daemonize = no" by default and it should
also be set "autospawn = no", in order for Plasma to use pipewire instead
of pulseaudio. Pipewire is the new audio solution, which is meant to satisfy use cases previously addressed with pulseaudio and/or jack,
although it should co-exist and work with both regardless.
As I understand it originally udev would probe, auto-detect and hotplug devices, calling pulseaudio to process audio. I am not up to speed how pipewire now interacts with pulseaudio in depth, but I can see on a Plasma system which has pulseaudio installed, pipewire is launched and uses pipewire- pulse.conf:
\_ /usr/bin/wireplumber
\_ /usr/bin/pipewire
\_ /usr/bin/pipewire -c pipewire-pulse.conf
I have audio working, but no pulseaudio process shows up.
Somewhere around here I said I had too many USE flag staatements under/etc/ portage, so I removed package.use and just set whatever flags were needed to install all my packages.
On 18/05/2022 15:22, Peter Humphrey wrote:
Somewhere around here I said I had too many USE flag staatements
under/etc/
portage, so I removed package.use and just set whatever flags were needed to install all my packages.
If you make package.use a directory, you can do what I do, and try to
have one file in package.use for each package I actually want installed.
And if you qualify the packages with "current version" however you do
that, then they'll expire regularly so you're forced to keep it
up-to-date :-)
Hello list,
Is there a knack to getting my plasma desktop to operate happily with my new Bluetooth speakers? I can get a connection using the Bluetooth control
panel, and the sound device appears in the Audio control panel, but testing either speaker produces no sound.
The Gentoo wiki was helpful in getting everything I need (well, I thought I had), but still I seem to be missing one link in the chain.
(I still have the old M-Audio speakers with their line-in, but so far I've lost two motherboard sound chips and two USB dongles while using them, so I wanted to try something else.)
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