AC97 virtual sound in unraid KVM

[JonathanM]

Has anybody done this? Having a virtual sound card is useful on a headless system. I've been using virtualbox and the sound works great over RDP, but I haven't been able to figure what all I need to do to get the same type system up and working on KVM. Would it be easier just to plug in a cheap usb sound card and pass it through? Seems like a waste since I wouldn't be plugging anything into it.

[JonathanM]

Replying to myself here for posterity. I installed the driver found here.

http://vb-audio.pagesperso-orange.fr/Cable/index.htm

It works just fine for the purposes described in the OP, when I connect to the VM through RDP, I get audio just fine.

[jonp]

You can add <sound model='ich6'/> right before </devices>.  You can try other things for "model" than ich6:  'es1370', 'sb16', 'ac97', 'ich6' and 'usb'.

 

Depending on the guest you're using, some may work better than others.

[JonathanM]

You can add <sound model='ich6'/> right before </devices>.  You can try other things for "model" than ich6:  'es1370', 'sb16', 'ac97', 'ich6' and 'usb'.

 

Depending on the guest you're using, some may work better than others.

Cool! I'll play around with that.

 

What is the accepted way of editing the xml so that changes stick if you later change something via the vm manager webgui? I must be doing something wrong, because it seems like my changes get wiped out if I use the gui.

[jonp]

You can add <sound model='ich6'/> right before </devices>.  You can try other things for "model" than ich6:  'es1370', 'sb16', 'ac97', 'ich6' and 'usb'.

 

Depending on the guest you're using, some may work better than others.

Cool! I'll play around with that.

 

What is the accepted way of editing the xml so that changes stick if you later change something via the vm manager webgui? I must be doing something wrong, because it seems like my changes get wiped out if I use the gui.

 

The accepted way is to not edit using the webGui once you've committed custom XML edits, or else they will be lost ;-).  We need to add a warning.  If you edit XML, then later edit the normal webGui way, your XML edits will be lost.  Making those persist is a bit of a nightmare.  Instead, we want to just bake support for these use cases into the UI editor directly.  The XML editor is only for advanced users / use cases right now.

[JonathanM]

What is the accepted way of editing the xml so that changes stick if you later change something via the vm manager webgui? I must be doing something wrong, because it seems like my changes get wiped out if I use the gui.

 

The accepted way is to not edit using the webGui once you've committed custom XML edits, or else they will be lost ;-).  We need to add a warning.  If you edit XML, then later edit the normal webGui way, your XML edits will be lost.  Making those persist is a bit of a nightmare.  Instead, we want to just bake support for these use cases into the UI editor directly.  The XML editor is only for advanced users / use cases right now.

So, is there a running list of UI editor options to be added?

 

Would you consider making a lockable UI editor option that automatically toggled when you manually edited the XML to inhibit further UI editor changes without unsetting the toggle so that forgetful types like me don't accidently undo changes we've made and wonder what happened?

 

How about the ability to revert to a previous XML version, where every time a change is made, the old version is backed up, like Joe's unmenu config/system file editor? Keeping a copy of the last 5 revisions would probably be more than plenty.

[Tomahawk51]

Replying to myself here for posterity. I installed the driver found here.

http://vb-audio.pagesperso-orange.fr/Cable/index.htm

It works just fine for the purposes described in the OP, when I connect to the VM through RDP, I get audio just fine.

 

Thanks for this input (or for linking for yourself  ).  I was really struggling with my audio on a headless server w/ no sound card.  I had effective sound with the "ich6" sound card XML addition (win 10), but it was crappy.  When I removed all sound cards from VM XML, and installed your "VB-Audio Virtual Cable" software it's night and day better.  It's perfect.  I'm sending audio to my Steam Link over ethernet.

 

THANKS SO MUCH!  This saved me from buying another computer essentially.

[ruthan]

Hmm, i have tried todays W98SE, sound card emulation, only working driver i have found for AC97, but not sound from speakers, i have tested Windows 7 with HD audio and again same problem, but through Teamviewer i can check that sound is working, so maybe whole Unraid sound emulation is not wokring, only sound pass through is working.

[methanoid]

On 8/22/2015 at 7:13 AM, jonp said:

You can add <sound model='ich6'/> right before </devices>.  You can try other things for "model" than ich6:  'es1370', 'sb16', 'ac97', 'ich6' and 'usb'.

 

Depending on the guest you're using, some may work better than others.

 

@jonp  this is VERY useful info (I have some OS to virtualise that only will work with these options) but please, do share where you got this info from? I am looking for the same on networking - I know we have vmxnet3 as an option but where is the list of what we could use??