Sonata refuses to play music

Question

Yesterday, I was finally able to install arch. I immediately went installing programs, which went well untill I got to mpd/sonata. Mpd seems to be working, and I can see my songs within sonata. However, when I click on a song to play, it appears to start but stops immediately. If i start sonata from a terminal, it doesn't display any errors.
Here's my /etc/mpd.conf
# An example configuration file for MPD
# See the mpd.conf man page for a more detailed description of each parameter.
######################## REQUIRED PATHS ########################
#music_directory "~/music"
#playlist_directory "~/playlists"
#db_file "~/mpd.db"
#log_file "~/mpd.log"
#error_file "~/mpd.error"
music_directory "/media/data/mpd/music"
playlist_directory "/media/data/mpd/music/pls"
db_file "/var/lib/mpd/mpd.db"
log_file "/var/log/mpd/mpd.log"
error_file "/var/log/mpd/mpd.error"
# Note: ~ is the home directory of user set in the "user" option
######################## OPTIONAL PATHS ########################
# If you wish to use mpd --kill to stop MPD, then you must
# specify a file here in which to store MPD's process ID.
#pid_file "~/.mpd/mpd.pid"
pid_file "/var/run/mpd/mpd.pid"
# If specified, MPD will save its current state (playlist,
# current song, playing/paused, etc.) at exit. This will be
# used to restore the session the next time it is run.
#state_file "~/.mpd/mpdstate"
state_file "/var/lib/mpd/mpdstate"
######################## DAEMON OPTIONS ########################
# If started as root, MPD will drop root privileges and run as
# this user instead. Otherwise, MPD will run as the user it was
# started by. If left unspecified, MPD will not drop root
# privileges at all (not recommended).
user "varreon"
# The address and port to listen on.
#bind_to_address "localhost"
bind_to_address "any"
port "6600"
# Controls the amount of information that is logged. Can be
# "default", "secure", or "verbose".
#log_level "default"
########################## PERMISSIONS #########################
# MPD can require that users specify a password before using it.
# You may specify one ore more here, along with what users who
# log in with that password are allowed to do.
#password "password@read,add,control,admin"
# Specifies what permissions a user who has not logged in with a
# password has. By default, all users have full access to MPD
# if no password is specified above, or no access if one or
# more passwords are specified.
#default_permissions "read,add,control,admin"
########################## AUDIO OUTPUT ########################
# MPD supports many audio output types, as well as playing
# through multiple audio outputs at the same time. You can
# specify one or more here. If you don't specify any, MPD will
# automatically scan for a usable audio output.
# See <http://mpd.wikia.com/wiki/Configuration#Audio_Outputs>
# for examples of other audio outputs.
# An example of an ALSA output:
audio_output {
type "alsa"
name "My ALSA Device"
options "dev=dmixer"
device "plug:dmix" # optional
# An example of an OSS output:
#audio_output {
# type "oss"
# name "My OSS Device"
# device "/dev/dsp" # optional
# format "44100:16:2" # optional
# An example of a shout output (for streaming to Icecast):
#audio_output {
# type "shout"
# name "My Shout Stream"
# host "localhost"
# port "8000"
# mount "/mpd.ogg"
# password "hackme"
# quality "5.0"
# bitrate "128"
# format "44100:16:1"
# user "source" # optional
# description "My Stream Description" # optional
# genre "jazz" # optional
# public "no" # optional
# Force all decoded audio to be converted to this format before
# being passed to the audio outputs.
#audio_output_format "44100:16:2"
############################# MIXER ############################
# MPD needs to know what mixer settings to change when you
# adjust the volume. If you don't specify one here, MPD will
# pick one based on which ones it was compiled with support for.
# An example for controlling an ALSA mixer:
#mixer_type "alsa"
#mixer_device "default"
#mixer_control "PCM"
# An example for controlling an OSS mixer:
#mixer_type "oss"
#mixer_device "/dev/mixer"
#mixer_control "PCM"
# If you want MPD to adjust the volume of audio sent to the
# audio outputs, you can tell it to use the software mixer:
#mixer_type "software"
######################### NORMALIZATION ########################
# Specifies the type of ReplayGain to use. Can be "album" or
# "track". ReplayGain will not be used if not specified. See
# <http://www.replaygain.org> for more details.
#replaygain "album"
# Sets the pre-amp used for files that have ReplayGain tags.
#replaygain_preamp "0"
# Enable on the fly volume normalization. This will cause the
# volume of all songs played to be adjusted so that they sound
# as though they are of equal loudness.
#volume_normalization "no"
########################### BUFFERING ##########################
# The size of the buffer containing decoded audio. You probably
# shouldn't change this.
#audio_buffer_size "2048"
# How much of the buffer to fill before beginning to play.
#buffer_before_play "0%"
# Similar options for the HTTP stream buffer. If you hear
# skipping while playing HTTP streams, you may wish to increase
# these.
#http_buffer_size "128"
#http_prebuffer_size "25%"
########################### HTTP PROXY #########################
# Specifies the HTTP proxy to use for playing HTTP streams.
#http_proxy_host "proxy.isp.com"
#http_proxy_port "8080"
#http_proxy_user "user"
#http_proxy_password "password"
############################# LIMITS ###########################
# These are various limits to prevent MPD from using too many
# resources. You should only change them if they start
# restricting your usage of MPD.
#connection_timeout "60"
#max_connections "5"
#max_playlist_length "16384"
#max_command_list_size "2048"
#max_output_buffer_size "8192"
###################### CHARACTER ENCODINGS #####################
# If file or directory names do not display correctly, then you
# may need to change this. In most cases it should be either
# "ISO-8859-1" or "UTF-8". You must recreate your database
# after changing this (use mpd --create-db).
#filesystem_charset "ISO-8859-1"
# The encoding that ID3v1 tags should be converted from.
#id3v1_encoding "ISO-8859-1"
######################### OTHER OPTIONS ########################
# The metadata types MPD will recognize.
#metadata_to_use "artist,album,title,track,name,genre,date,composer,performer,disc"
# Enable this if you wish to use your MPD created playlists in
# other music players.
#save_absolute_paths_in_playlists "no"
Edit: Forget about the xmms comment posted earlier. Xmms works, yet sonata still doesn't.
Last edited by Varreon (2008-07-22 01:41:32)

Answer 1

I have the exact same issue. Reboot is not helping.
Trouble is, I had it working properly in my other Arch install. I have tried ncmpc and Sonata and gmpc, they all start to play the song - I even see the CD covers (for the songs that I have CD covers for) -- but only for a split second and thenit stops.
I don't think alsa is an issue, because cplay plays all songs without a hitch.
I was hoping for a solution - but all I found was this thread and unfortunately Varreon doesn't know what he/she did to get it to work.
Could you maybe retrace your steps - if you remember them ?
EDIT : This is my mpd.error file. Having a look at it, it does seem that mpd is not recognizing mpdvol
ALSA lib control.c:909:(snd_ctl_open_noupdate) Invalid CTL mpdvol
ALSA lib pcm.c:2144:(snd_pcm_open_noupdate) Unknown PCM mpdvol
Jul 26 10:02 : Error opening alsa device "mpdvol": No such file or directory
Last edited by Inxsible (2008-07-26 15:34:24)