Specifications

A device driver for true Roland MPU−401 compatible MIDI interfaces (including Roland SCC−1 and
RAP−10/ATW−10). Comes with a useful collection of utilities including a Standard MIDI File player and
recorder.
Numerous improvements have been made since version 0.11a. Among other things, the driver now features
IRQ sharing policy and complies with the new kernel module interface. Metronome functionality, possibility
for synchronizing e.g. graphics on a per beat basis without losing precision, advanced replay/record/overdub
interface and much, much more.
It can be found at ftp://www.ibiblio.org/pub/Linux/kernel/sound/mpu401−0.2.tar.gz.
3.4.5. SoundBlaster Live!
Creative Labs has Linux drivers for several cards, including the SoundBlaster Live!, at
http://opensource.creative.com.
3.4.6. Packet Radio
Another novel use for a sound card under Linux is as a modem for amateur packet radio. The 2.1 and later
kernels include a driver that works with SoundBlaster and Windows Sound System compatible sound cards
to implement 1200 bps AFSK and 9600 bps FSK packet protocols. See the Linux AX25 HOWTO for details
(I'm a ham myself, by the way −− callsign VE3ICH).
3.4.7. PC Speaker
An alternate sound driver is available that requires no additional sound hardware; it uses the internal PC
speaker. It is software compatible with the sound card driver, but, as might be expected, provides much lower
quality output and has much more CPU overhead. The results seem to vary, being dependent on the
characteristics of the individual loudspeaker. For more information, see the documentation provided with the
release.
The latest version of the PC speaker driver can be found at ftp://ftp.infradead.org/pub/pcsp/.
3.4.8. Parallel Port
Another option is to build a digital to analog converter using a parallel printer port and some additional
components. This provides better sound quality than the PC speaker but still has a lot of CPU overhead. The
PC sound driver package mentioned above supports this, and includes instructions for building the necessary
hardware.
The Linux Sound HOWTO
3.4.5. SoundBlaster Live! 8