cmus cannot initialise output plug-in

[kjpetrie]

When I try to launch cmus I get a rapidly flashing white bar with a flashing red error message about not being able to initialise any output plug-in. It is very difficult to read.

Any idea what could cause that?

[Rich]

Hi kjpetrie
Welcome to the forum.

Did you install and set up alsa.tcz?

Or if you prefer, pulseadio or pipewire.

[kjpetrie]

Thanks,

I have now, and I can even get cmus to launch and 'play', but whatever I do with alsamixer I can't actually hear the output. I get a loud pop when the file starts to play but nothing else.

I was previously using Puppy Linux on this old machine but it took so long to boot I decided to try something else, so I know it was working until now. I expect there's something missing I need to install or initialise. I've already discovered dependencies don't always get picked up.

[Rich]

Hi kjpetrie
See if this helps:
https://forum.tinycorelinux.net/index.php?topic=22145.msg138620#msg138620

[kjpetrie]

It certainly did. I'm now listening to some Bach while I type this.

However I still get a loud pop as it begins to play. That needs tidying up as it sounds messy and won't do the speakers any good.

Also, I still get a crash/loop every time I launch cmus for the first time so something's still not quite right. If I close the terminal, delete the socket and launch again it works, so it might be an initialisation problem of some sort.

But thanks for your help. We're getting there.

[Rich]

Hi kjpetrie
Well that's progress, and that's good.

See if this fix work for you:
https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=124142

Run a Google search for:

Code: [Select]

cmus music player noisy audio linuxand see if that returns any clues.

[kjpetrie]

Replaygain is already set to disabled. I can try renaming the file to see what that does. I might work round it by providing a silent track to be the first item on every playlist followed by the real track I want. Then I could set it playing before switching the amp on. The pop might be a DC level or burst of noise when play starts, or it could be the sound card being woken up.

The bad first run is a different matter. It's tedious to have to go through the rigmarole of start, delete socket and start again every time I want to play music.

Apart from that, it actually sounds very clear with precise stereo imaging - better than when I ran it on Puppy, though I can't really understand why. After all, surely the tracks and hardware are what determine that, not the player.