syslog says modprobe error on sound module

[C_Pac]

Inside my syslog I've got the following error reports:

modprobe: modprobe: Can't locate module sound-slot-2
modprobe: modprobe: Can't locate module sound-service-2-0

I get this error about 200 times /day.

It might be related to this error, which I get at boot times:

insmod: /lib/modules/2.4.26/kernel/drivers/char/joystick/cs461x.o.gz: init_module: No such device

insmod: /lib/modules/2.4.26/kernel/drivers/char/joystick/cs461x.o.gz: insmod cs461x failed

This is a Slackware 10.0 install. I get audio "out of the box" on my Turtle Beach card so I don't ever mess with sound configs. (ALSA and OSS confuse me so I don't want to mess with what works).

Since I get sound, I am not too worried, but I figure searching for a module and failing 200 times/day can't possibly be good for my system performance. Any help on where to start fixing this would be appreciated.

[bwkaz]

It almost looks like an Alsa thing. Some part of Alsa (either the kernel driver or the userspace toolset, and I suspect the userspace stuff) tries to load various sound-slot-* and sound-service-*-* modules (various values of *).

You're supposed to add aliases to /etc/modules.conf (Slackware 10.0 uses kernel 2.6, right?) to translate from sound-slot-1 to your first actual sound card, and sound-service-X-Y to the various modules for the various parts of your sound card. This allows your system to automatically load the modules at boot time. I'm guessing that sound-slot-1 is probably your Turtle Beach card, and sound-slot-2 fails because you don't have any other cards set up.

I've always found that setup (sound-slot-*) more than a bit confusing, though, so I don't use it. I just have hotplug load the correct modules for my hardware, and hardcode some extra modules that don't correspond directly to hardware (such as snd-pcm-oss, which controls the OSS emulation layer).

The error you're getting from init_module is nothing to worry about, it just means your system is trying to load a module that isn't detecting any hardware that it can drive on your system. If you want to remove it, try to figure out what's loading the module (same with the sound-slot-X stuff -- try to figure out what's loading those modules, and see if you can disable anything higher than 1).

[C_Pac]

Hey, thanks for your advice.

My latest theory is that it has to do with either an ALSA/OSS conflict or the OSS emulator. I had XMMs outputting to the OSS driver. I switched to the ALSA driver and the syslog has not updated since.

When I call up the mixer for OSS, it behaves touchily-- could be caused by failed modprobing in the background.

I'll continue to monitor the log.


As for the joystick module not loading, I think it must be that there is a joystick driver matched to my soundcard, though my card does not have a joystick port. For now I will just disable the driver so it doesn't keep trying to load at boot. I'm sure there's a script somewhere forcing that, but I can't find it.

Thanks again.

[bwkaz]

The joystick thing might be hotplug. Try adding "cs461x" (without the quotes) on a line by itself to /etc/hotplug/blacklist (if you have that file), reboot, and see if it tries to load.