Ultimate Edition impressions - Asking for tips

[gfurst]

As you can see i like to ramble a lot, and sadly i'm not a very good english writer ( i'm from brazil), so here is a summary:

1. Ultimate Edition first impressions.
2. My linux journey yet.
3. Current Configuration
4. My Ultimate Edition critics
5. Tips i would like to know = = = JUMP HERE IF YOU'RE ON A HURRY

AND SORRY (i'm afraid you will all hate me)
=============================================================

1. My first impressions on Ultimate Edition( i'm beginning with 2.5) are very good, the overall look and feel is very good, the highly customization potential is something to consider, the themes then really got me horny (just kidding), the best theme collection ever. Although its a little confusing all those apps in the menus and i can't help to wonder if all of this doesn't make my system a bit slower...

2. I first started with Ubuntu 9.04 and shortly after that updated to 9.10. As you see i am yet to have 1 year with Linux experience. Ubuntu is really nice and i had very few problems, and still using WinXP, but for games only. I was unhappy with that, seeing that some of the games should play better on linux than windows, all because of this PulseAudio that still causes problems, any wine application and even some linux based would crash.

So i took a leap of faith and gone to Dreamlinux, only to discover that it is a linux nightmare, a lot of the issues would be solved if i had better researched it). Then gone to the lord of us all Debian, which really works like a charm including all of the previous problems i had with Ubuntu.
But of course if already had a Debian experience you will know that lenny besides being really stable has really old-to-date software so i went through some rough times but ended up with a Debian Squeeze version which is suiting me well.

So i took another leap of faith and gone deleting my old WinXP and putting there this Ultimate Edition which i heard so much about. So then...

3. My current configuration:
hda1:Debian Squeeze 39 GB
hda2:Swap
hda3:Ultimate Edition 39 GB
sdb1: And data 160 GB

4. Its seems to me that Ultimate Edition is just a Ubuntu OS customized to rock, not saying its bad but some bad features of Ubuntu are still hanging around.
Same problems i had with PulseAudio i still get on Ultimate Edition, i hope those will be fixed on Ubuntu 10.
Sounds some times is still glitch, sound in wine doesn't work, and another issues that are annoying but not compromise the functionality of the System.
ps.. i wish Ubuntu still had the ALSA system from the Debian distro, it would be a dream....

5. I really don't expect you all to make the perfect system, but i would like some advice from the experienced users around:

- How to fix this wine problem, or general PulseAudio issues, i read a post around here but its mainly focused on older versions, 9.10 version of PulseAudio is very nice but still got compatibility issues.

- Well this a lot do with the previous one, how the hell do i get games to works on this thing?

- I'm very annoyed with the media system, the best Vlc and Smplayer don't get screen-saver support (i remember when the screen saver was changed and it was a very sad day), we all know that the standard "media player" has very few customizable options, and those previous are great for they have better volume options (we all know how annoying it is to put volume all high so we hear the movie and then comes a system beep so loud that could wake the dead).
So how you people do with media, mp3 player here is alright, i'm mostly concerned with movies and etc?

[gfurst]

Also i forgot about:
- Pidgin some times closes all by himself, what about that, i closed while i was writing this thing

[Admin-Amir]

Hello gfurst and welcome to the U.E Forum.

Well after this book of impression that you have post here,
Let's start close the issue that you have with the system,sound...

1- First start with this process of cleaning the system from the old kernel + old packages.
2- Then Install the NEW package of Ubuntu Tweak :
viewtopic.php?f=66&t=4347
and add from the 3 party the sources of Ubuntu X and FireFox,Ubuntu Tweak.
Then Update/Upgrade the system in the Terminal - After the process is done Restart your machine.
3- Now what you don't know yet is you work with 3 Mixers on your Desktop = All sound issue solved.
here is the Guide for you on the Multimedia part -1 :
viewtopic.php?f=65&t=4036&p=45503&hilit=mixer#p45503
Mixer part -2 :
viewtopic.php?f=65&t=4036&p=44310&hilit=Mixer+pulse#p44310

Let us know How you are doing after those process when you done with all packages installation.
and configure all the mixers Alsa,Pulse Audio,Device Chooser.

Good Luck to you .

[pch.shot]

Just right click on your start button and edit the menu to include only the apps you use. Hope this helps..............

[gfurst]

Thanks for the fast replies guys.

Admin-Amir:
I did these steps you told to, i still have some wondering questions though.
Most of the ALSA and PA packages were already installed, i think its relatively fixed, but still the sound is very buggy.
I run test with:
1- Doom 3 (for linux), run ok but has some glitch sounds.
2- Fallout 2 (in wine) which has run also but has unberable sound.
3- Audacious, starts glitch but then goes ok (with output to ALSA)

info: wine was set to ALSA also. When on debian (which uses ALSA) i was able to run both of those games with great sounds.

question: there you said two sound servers could run together on one session of Ultimate Edition, i didn't understand that completely, just installing would set this up? and which sound server would have direct control over the sound driver?

Anyone-else:
My media playing is great, using Exaile and SMplayer, still i can't enable screensaver.
Is there another Video player that has volume normalizer feature?

[gfurst]

Thx blackwolf, but you did not got the idea... My audio files are ok, the idea is some media player for movies and videos that normalize the volume on the go.
Mplayer is only one with this feature, and SMplayer supports it. If you know XP codec pack you will know what i'm talking about, actually its a ffmpeg feature, that working with the classic windows player enables a filter that normalizes audio range. I looked ffmpeg on linux but it seems its only for convertions and really hard to use, since it had no graphical interface.

ANYWAY ... thats not the biggest problem, the real issue here is about applications that use the ALSA output having a glitch or no sound at all.
I will search the forum now for more useful information, since this is a regular problem with ubuntu i know lots of threads out there...

Question: Has anyone ever tried removing PulseAudio completely from ubuntu?
I remenber trying it after an upgrade from 9.04 to 9.10, which has gone wrong and i ended up with a fresh 9.10 install.

[gfurst]

Thx Blackwolf, yeah i realize its a dangerous thing to do, removing pulseaudio and all. If i install esound only will it remove the default ubuntu desktop??

I just perceived something that might be relevant, there is a "default sound card" link on System->Preferences menu, it won't open, so i tried opening on console:

Code: Select all

gfurst@gfurst-desk:~$ /usr/bin/asoundconf-gtk
sh: /usr/bin/asoundconf: not found
You need to make sure asoundconf is active!
By default, asoundconf's configuration file is ~/.asoundrc.asoundconf
and must be included in ~/.asoundrc. Open this file to make sure it is!

I searched through ~/ (my home directory i guess) & through the usr/bin/ and didn't found anything like that.
Is this relevant???

The System->Preferences->Sound window, doesn't give the option of switching, i know this selection you're talking about, but i have not seen it since 9.04. And i'm running Ultimate Edition 2.5

Try to add user mpd to the pulseaudio groups:

You're saying that i should try this before installing esound? And just for my understanding, what would it do?

[Admin-Amir]

Hello gfurst .

Please upload for me and the Team all the packages that install on your system under this words:
Pulse Audio.
Gstreamer.
Alsa
asf
oss

And please Make a comparison between what you have installed and what is installed in the multimedia guide.
to me , First on wine you did not configure the all option for the sound work for you.
Then you use the Pulse Audio (not full install on your system)(The same like Alsa)
Then your Default server is Pulse Audio and not Alsa.
And I think that Gstreamer is not fully install with the Needed packages.
So it will be batter to go step by step to get it done on your machine.
so please let me/us see all what you have install on the packages in synaptic and I will make the packages for you.

[gfurst]

Hi Admin-Amir, is there a fast way to do this?
I'm guessing filter for installed packages and then search for the words( description and name for each) then what? Print screen?

[Admin-Amir]

Hello gfurst.

you can use OR the Guide that I have build for all the U.E users,
OR just use the KSnapshot.
OR - you can Install Shutter,then mark the frame and+Enter save the frame of the packages page.
Just the part that you can see at the time.
And please do not install the extra packages - just the normal once.
BTW -wine this is what I have try to tell you.

1

Or take A look here please.
viewtopic.php?f=7&t=3785