USB Microphones in Linux

[Tim Bower]

I made an unexpected discovery today. I brought my laptop running
Ubuntu Linux to work that I normally leave at home. Just for fun, I
borrowed my colleague's Microsoft LX-3000 USB microphone and plugged
it in to my Ubuntu laptop. It worked right away! This surprised me.

A few months ago when I bought my Samson C01U (which I'm very happy
with), I looked all over the Internet for information on which USB
microphones work with Linux and which do not. I found several
warnings that only a few USB microphones work with Linux. One reason
for buying the Samson was that I found some web pages where others
reported success using it with Linux. This latest discovery has me
wondering what other USB microphones actually do work with Linux.

If you have first hand experience with USB microphones (or USB mixers)
either working or not working with Linux, please send me the make and
models of those and I will collect a list and post to a web page and
send a link to these groups. Also, if you know of other web pages
with this information, which is believed to be accurate, let me know.
Any one have contact with any one that works directly with the Linux
USB sound (ALSA) drivers?

--
Tim Bower
Assistant Professor
Computer Systems Technology
Kansas State University at Salina

[Gasto]

I just know that my Lambda Lexicon USB audio interface does work with
Ubuntu 9.04, after some updates (I think it is working with the old
OSS). Still having trouble in some sound mixers like Arduino.

[Alan Pope]

Hi Tim,

2009/11/6 Tim Bower <t...@ksu.edu>:

> I made an unexpected discovery today.  I brought my laptop running
> Ubuntu Linux to work that I normally leave at home.  Just for fun, I
> borrowed my colleague's Microsoft LX-3000 USB microphone and plugged
> it in to my Ubuntu laptop.  It worked right away! This surprised me.
>

Contrary to popular opinion, (Ubuntu) Linux has excellent hardware
support out of the box, better than any other OS in fact :)

Looking around my desk I can see various USB devices including my HP
OfficeJet 6310 printer, lots of USB memory sticks and hard disks, two
webcams, my Palm PDA and Android mobile phone, Canon Digital camera,
Apple USB Ethernet dongle, Plantronics iAudio 550 USB Headset,
Soundblaster Extigy audio card, USB XLR adapter and so on.. ..all
working out of the box.

There are of course a few exceptions, and sadly a few USB mixers fall
into this category along with some sound cards due to the 'odd' way
they present themselves to the host, requiring some funky drivers.
I've yet to find any USB headsets that don't work though luckily. My
Plantronics one works perfectly.

Cheers,
Al.

[Ian Ozsvald]

My only glitch on Linux is the fact that my M-Audio FastTrack USB doesn't work (and, it seems, mostly won't work).  This is an updated version of my several-year-old box:
http://www.m-audio.com/products/en_us/FastTrack.html

It does work on Windows and Mac out of the box.  Some googling suggested that a few people did get the FastTrack interface to work but the steps were pretty complex and I wasn't convinced to try it.

My Logitech 9000 Pro webcam works on Linux (even though it has the firmware revision that apparently has problems with linux), the built-in mic isn't great but works fine.

i.

2009/11/6 Alan Pope <al...@popey.com>

--
Ian Ozsvald (Professional Screencaster)
i...@ProCasts.co.uk

http://ProCasts.co.uk/examples.html
http://TheScreencastingHandbook.com
http://IanOzsvald.com + http://ShowMeDo.com
http://twitter.com/ianozsvald

[Xanalogica]

One problem I've had is that either PulseAudio or ALSA (can't remember
which) lacks support for 24-bit audio samples. While the plughw ALSA
driver and the OSS driver can 'fake it' by truncating to 16-bits, you
don't get the benefit of a fuller dynamic range. The audio layer
reports the list of sample widths detected but when an app tries to
select 24-bit the API fails.

Where I see 24-bit hardware is for your higher-end professional grade
USB audio such as the Alesis IO|2 USB audio hub. That box -only-
supports 24-bit samples at the hardware level.

The problem has been reported upstream but remains unfixed after two
years, with a note to use plughw to work around the problem. Sigh.

-Jeff

Ian Ozsvald wrote:
> My only glitch on Linux is the fact that my M-Audio FastTrack USB
> doesn't work (and, it seems, mostly won't work). This is an updated
> version of my several-year-old box:
> http://www.m-audio.com/products/en_us/FastTrack.html
>
> It does work on Windows and Mac out of the box. Some googling suggested
> that a few people did get the FastTrack interface to work but the steps
> were pretty complex and I wasn't convinced to try it.
>
> My Logitech 9000 Pro webcam works on Linux (even though it has the
> firmware revision that apparently has problems with linux), the built-in
> mic isn't great but works fine.
>
> i.
>

> 2009/11/6 Alan Pope <al...@popey.com <mailto:al...@popey.com>>
>
>
> Hi Tim,
>
> 2009/11/6 Tim Bower <t...@ksu.edu <mailto:t...@ksu.edu>>:

> > I made an unexpected discovery today. I brought my laptop running
> > Ubuntu Linux to work that I normally leave at home. Just for fun, I
> > borrowed my colleague's Microsoft LX-3000 USB microphone and plugged
> > it in to my Ubuntu laptop. It worked right away! This surprised me.
> >
>
> Contrary to popular opinion, (Ubuntu) Linux has excellent hardware
> support out of the box, better than any other OS in fact :)
>
> Looking around my desk I can see various USB devices including my HP
> OfficeJet 6310 printer, lots of USB memory sticks and hard disks, two
> webcams, my Palm PDA and Android mobile phone, Canon Digital camera,
> Apple USB Ethernet dongle, Plantronics iAudio 550 USB Headset,
> Soundblaster Extigy audio card, USB XLR adapter and so on.. ..all
> working out of the box.
>
> There are of course a few exceptions, and sadly a few USB mixers fall
> into this category along with some sound cards due to the 'odd' way
> they present themselves to the host, requiring some funky drivers.
> I've yet to find any USB headsets that don't work though luckily. My
> Plantronics one works perfectly.
>
> Cheers,
> Al.
>
>
>
>
>
> --
> Ian Ozsvald (Professional Screencaster)

> i...@ProCasts.co.uk <mailto:i...@ProCasts.co.uk>

[Gary]

What a great idea Tim!

I recently hammered on an old laptop to get a Sony Eye webcam working.
The laptop was running Ubuntu 9.04 via wubi. I removed Ubuntu before
migrating data to a new Windows 7 laptop.
BUT
I'll get the webcam up again and document.

Gary

"There is support for the camera in Linux kernel 2.6.29.[25] Drivers
for earlier kernels can be downloaded from http://kaswy.free.fr/?q=node/38#ps3"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PlayStation_Eye

I had to add support to that kernel. I intend to test with Ubuntu 9.10
to see if it 'just works'.

[dennis]

I would be interested in your list when you get it done. I used wubi
to get Ubuntu on my computer, playing with the settings I could get my
USB logitech headset to work with Audacity but never could get it to
work with Record My Desktop or another screencasting program I tried.

Dennis

--
Genealogy: It's all about family.

[Tim Bower]

Thanks to all that sent information. I know that this list is far from
complete. But I don't want to mention any devices that someone has
not confirmed to either work or not work with Linux. Hopefully others
will send information about more USB microphones and mixers.

Here is the link to the list:
http://www.sal.ksu.edu/faculty/tim/linux_mics.html