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1.4 Miscellaneous New Features

Miscellaneous New Features

These new features defy categorization:

1.4.1 Modular Sound Drivers

Modular Sound Drivers

In Red Hat Linux 5.0, the standard OSS/Free sound drivers have been modified to be completely modular. This allows for such things as loading and unloading of the various sound drivers without recompiling the kernel tree or rebooting. The work was performed by Alan Cox and was sponsored by Red Hat Software, Inc.

For additional information, please consult the README files in the sndconfig documentation directory (/usr/doc/sndconfig*). The latest information can always be found at ftp://ftp.redhat.com/pub/sound/.

If you have any issues concerning the modular sound drivers, please send mail to sound-bugs@redhat.com. There is also a mailing list associated with the modular sound drivers (sound-list@redhat.com). To subscribe, send mail to sound-list-request@redhat.com with "subscribe" as the subject line.

1.4.1.1 Supported Sound Cards

Supported Sound Cards

At present, the following sound cards are supported:

1.4.2 Sound Card Configuration Tool

Sound Card Configuration Tool

Also included in Red Hat Linux 5.0 is sndconfig, a screen-oriented utility that can properly configure modular sound card drivers.

There are a few things that you should know about sndconfig:

Plug and Play Aware -- sndconfig is able to detect and configure Plug and Play sound cards such as the Sound Blaster 16 PnP. Please note, however, that the present version of sndconfig creates a new version of the file
/etc/isapnp.conf with only the sound card's settings uncommented. Therefore, if you have other Plug and Play devices on your system, you must do one of two things:

  • You can manually add your sound card's PnP information to your existing /etc/isapnp.conf, and run sndconfig using the --noprobe option.

  • You can run sndconfig without the --noprobe option, and uncomment the configuration information for your other PnP cards in the
    /etc/isapnp.conf file created by sndconfig.

In any case, note that sndconfig saves your original /etc/isapnp.conf file as /etc/isapnp.conf.bak.

  • Modifies /etc/conf.modules -- sndconfig modifies the module configuration file /etc/conf.modules by adding information about the module options required for your sound card. Note that sndconfig saves your original /etc/conf.modules file as /etc/conf.modules.bak.

    • To set up your sound card, run /usr/sbin/sndconfig.

    1.4.3 Window Manager Enhancements

    Window Manager Enhancements

    Enhancements have been made to the supplied window managers and their
    menus.

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