Re: No sound with VMWare 6.5 and Ubuntu 8.10

the_seeker · ‎11-06-2008

What is your host OS and include if it is 32-bit or 64-bit OS. If

Linux include the exact Linux distribution and kernel version.

Ubuntu 8.10

What is the guest OS and include if it is 32-bit or 64-bit OS. If

Linux include the exact Linux distribution and kernel version.

Windows XP Home SP2

How often you see the problem (e.g. all the time, sometimes, rarely,

etc.), and if it had previously worked in the same setup (e.g. same

virtual machine, same computer)

When attempting to connect to the sound card I receive the error:

Nov 05 21:52:28.723: vmx| http://msg.noAutodetectBackingQuestion Cannot connect virtual device sound. No corresponding device is available on the host.

However, sound is working on the host. No other devices seem to have an issue, even when the host initially has control - I am usually prompted to close host driver and allow the device to be used by the VM. The sound card however has never worked, always with the same error.

Any help would be greatly appreciated as no sound on the guest OS is unfortunately a deal breaker for me with an otherwise stellar product so far.

Noel · ‎11-06-2008

Sound does work with Ubuntu 8.10 hosts and WinXP guests, but I have seen problems where the host has /dev/dspX (X is a number) and VMwre is looking for /dev/dsp; or the VMware is looking for /dev/dspX and the host has /dev/dsp. Similar to the same problem reported regarding /dev/rtc(X).

Please note that you'll still have a problem in that once you have sound working on the guest, if the host starts to use the sound device, the guest will lose it. Sound on linux is one area where VMware is still seriously lagging, being tied to an archaic sound architecture, and not using modern Linux audio, which would allow the audio device to be shared across the host and multiple guests.

the_seeker · ‎11-06-2008

Noel,

Thanks for the reply. I have seen that exact error and was getting it prior to trying one of the suggestions I had received via Ubuntu forums (wrapping the alsa drivers with a oss interface using alsa-oss). I imagine if I revert that change, I'd see the can't connect to /dev/dsp again. That being said, where would I indicate to the VM the location of the sound driver i.e. /dev/dsp? Although the issue with potentially ping-ponging between host and guest for control of the device doesn't sound great, I might be able to live short term with that if I could get the guest working. Hopefully VMWare will solve this issue as I've gone back and seen many many posts on it.

Regards

Noel · ‎11-11-2008

where would I indicate to the VM the location of the sound driver i.e. /dev/dsp

Rather than edit the .vmx to point to the device, I just symlink, e.g., ln -s /dev/dspX /dev/dsp or ln -s /dev/dsp /dev/dspX, as necessary depending upon what VMware thinks it wants.

madhavvk · ‎04-29-2009

I'm sorry, but could you please explain this thing in detail?

I'm facing the same issue, and not able to make out!!!

Thanks,

Madhav.