OSS
OSS provides sound card drivers for most popular sound cards under Linux, *BSD, Solaris, UnixWare, OpenServer, AIX, HPUX, LynxOS, VxWorks, and Tru64. These drivers support digital audio, MIDI, synthesizers, and mixers found on sound cards. These sound drivers comply with the Open Sound System API specification. OSS provides a user-friendly GUI which makes the installation of sound drivers and configuration of sound cards very simple. It supports over 200 brand name sound cards, and provides automatic sound card detection, Plug-n-Play support, support for PCI audio soundcards, and support for full duplex audio.
| Licenses | Freeware Public Domain |
|---|---|
| Operating Systems | Windows Windows Windows Windows CE Windows |
Recent releases
- 11 Oct 2007 14:45
Changes: USB bugs with Linux and Solaris have been fixed. There are still some issues with SB AudigyNX and M-Audio Sonica Theatre. HDaudio mixers have been fixed. Unused controls are no longer displayed. Kernel panics related to VMIX have been fixed. The Solaris uninstall script has been fixed so that the old SADA drivers are re-added. Solaris SADA support for recording and playback has been fixed.
- 13 Jun 2007 19:33
No changes have been submitted for this release.
- 02 Apr 2007 18:03
Changes: Solaris MUTEX lockups were fixed. New NVIDIA ICH and HDA models were added. Lockups with VMIX on SMP systems were fixed. envy24ht multichannel mode open was fixed up.
- 15 Mar 2007 09:19
Changes: This release fixes select/poll on FreeBSD. Conexant HDAudio codec support has been added. There are fixes for AudigyLS. SCO OSR6 lockup issues have been fixed. Tarball installation is available for Linux. There are OSS Core Audio fixes for Poll/Select mode operations.
- 14 Feb 2007 23:08
Changes: VMIX fixes were made. The ALC888 HDAudioCodec has been added. The ALSA library was fixed under Ubuntu/Debian. Solaris SADA emulation fixes were made. ossplay and ossrecord have new features.
- All comments
Recent commentsRe: Souncard drivers should be free.
> What makes you think there is just 3
> hour trial time? It was the situation 5
> years ago.
I just had to point out that I find it funny that you're saying that they're remarking on the state of affairs 5 years ago, when their comment was made 6 years ago... :)
Re: Souncard drivers should be free.
> "Free as in beer, but not free as
> in speech." Bah! Whatever. You
> don't have to pay for hardware drivers
> in Windows, so why should you have to
> pay for them in Linux? 3 hour trial.
> Wow. I might be able to listen to 2 CDs
> if I'm lucky. Even most Windows
> software comes with a 30 day trial.
What makes you think there is just 3 hour trial time? It was the situation 5 years ago. Currently the limit is 6 months if you use the binary version and there is no time limit if you compile OSS from the sources.
Also you have seriously misunderstood the "free" windows driver thing. The Windows drivers are not free. You will pay for them when you buy a sound card or motherboard. And you will pay for the Windows drivers even when you never use Windows yourself.
Re: Souncard drivers should be free.
> Eh, well...you bought their soundcard
> didn't you? So, why shouldn't drivers
> for it be free?
Why does this need to be explained further? Pay attention: These drivers are not made by the hardware company they are independently developed and supported. You paid for the hardware card and just plain got ripped off on the drivers in all likelyhood.
These drivers are by far better then the kernel oss drivers and alsa, the sound quality is superior in orders of magnatude. Thats why you have to pay for them. Besides, that 2 hour trial is history now.
Re: Souncard drivers should be free.
> "Free as in beer, but not free as
> in speech." Bah! Whatever. You
> don't have to pay for hardware drivers
> in Windows, so why should you have to
> pay for them in Linux? 3 hour trial.
> Wow. I might be able to listen to 2 CDs
> if I'm lucky. Even most Windows
> software comes with a 30 day trial.
Hi,
what is your problem with the trial time ?-
"trial" means to try if it works and if it's what you expected
but it isn't the sense of a trial version to use it forever...
by that way - as far as i know the new OSS version can
be used in a unregistered mod - yes, without paying for a
license and without a time out...
this seems to be what you're looking for ;-)
Re: Souncard drivers should be free.
Considering the high price of soundcards, I think that manufacturers should fund the development of support software for their products. And, frankly, $20 US is kind of steep for a driver. That's more than 10% of the price of a poorly implemented operating system. Now, I don't know about you, but I have a large number items that require drivers. I'm quite happy I don't have to shell out $20 for each one. You are correct in pointing out that we do not have a 'right' to OSS's software. It is thoroughly within their rights to charge what they want for their efforts. However, I am also not going to pay for the 'honor of using *nix, *doze, or OS*'. I use linux because it is inexpensive, powerful, reasonably stable, and flexible. If linux ever ceases being any of the above, I will switch to an OS that better answers my needs and desires.