How do I get the Tascam US122L USB audio interface to work?

Question

I have a Tascam US122L (NOT US122). I've spent hours trying to get this to work but it just won't detect in Pulse Audio Volume Control. I've installed the Alsa firmware and Alsa firmware loaders and updated to the latest Kernel (3.16).

I added my user to the audio group and modified the limits.conf file in etc/security/ adding these lines:

@audio - rtprio 99

@audio - memlock unlimited

@audio - nice -10

cat /proc/asound/modules ~/.asoundrc gives me:

0 snd_hda_intel

1 snd_usb_us122l

2 snd_hda_intel

got from http://www.nabble.com/tascam-us122l-and-ccrma-td24036395.html thanks to Karsten

The usb_stream plugin configuration

pcm.!usb_stream { @args [ CARD ] @args.CARD { type string default "1" }

  type usb_stream

   card $CARD

}

ctl.!usb_stream { @args [ CARD ] @args.CARD { type string default "1" }

  type hw

  card $CARD

}

Despite all efforts it just won't get recognized? Any help? I'm going to have to go back to Windows if I can't get this to work :/

Answer 1

"This sound device does not have any controls"

Sounds like you face a problem similar to what I had getting the FCA610 to work. The device has probably been detected and brought up by ALSA just fine (you can check this be suspending pulseaudio and use the card with aplay and arecord), but doesn't get picked up by PulseAudio because it cannot find a matching profile for your interface (look at the output of pulseaudio -vvvv to find messages of PulseAudio giving up to configure the device after trying for 5 times).

I was pointed to a discussion from January 2014 for a workaround on the PulseAudio mailing list and was able to get my device working.

Note that the topic was about firewire devices. For USB devices you would have to use a matching udev rule with vendor and product id for your device, mine looks like this:

ATTRS{idVendor}=="1397", ATTRS{idProduct}=="0003", ENV{PULSE_PROFILE_SET}="multichannel.conf"

you can find the vendor end product id of USB devices by using lsusb, here is the example for the Behringer FCA610:

Bus 003 Device 051: ID 1397:0003 BEHRINGER International GmbH

To create and edit files on the commandline you can use nano. Ctrl+o saves changes and Ctrl+x quits.

There is also a patch from David Henningson that adds functionality to properly detect such devices, but you would have to compile PulseAudio yourself to test this (which I didn't find enough time for).

Answer 2

The Tascam US-122L is only supported via the usb_stream access method which aplay cannot work with. You need to use the instructions (in another answer) for creating a usb_stream access in your .asoundrc.

The only application I know that actually can open devices like that is jackd. It may have at one time offered -dusb_stream as access method: no idea. At least some old instructions seem to imply that. But I only got is working with -dalsa -dusb_stream:1 (use the correct card number). Once you have jackd running (I use -r96000 -p512 -n2 I think), you can go from there.

For Ardour and other jack-centric applications, you are set.

On the Ubuntu desktop, the least painful way for most applications will be to go via Pulseaudio. Install the pulseaudio-module-jack package and then create a script (and make it executable) as ~/bin/pulsejack with the following content:

#/bin/sh
if [ $# -gt 1 ]
then
    killall jackd 2> /dev/null
    jackd "$@" & sleep 2
fi
pactl load-module module-jack-sink channels=2
pactl load-module module-jack-source channels=2
pacmd set-default-sink jack_out
pacmd set-default-source jack_in

This script can be called without arguments to make a running jackd instance the default in/output for Pulseaudio. If you give it arguments, it will kill any running jackd and start a new jackd with the options you give it.

When jackd dies, Pulseaudio will usually be smart enough to revert to an existing soundcard, I think.

It's possible to let Alsa go via jackd with suitable ~/.asoundrc file, but on Ubuntu this additional redirection to access stuff from the Pulseaudio-centric desktop does not seem useful.

As a last note: I use jackd1: I don't know whether or not jackd2 deals gracefully with the usb_stream stuff.

Answer 3

You have to use your sound card with Jack audio server and your .soundrc was ok
(From alsa sound card matrix Module-usb-us122l: "This module is intended for use with the jack driver "usb_stream". " )

I suppose that you want to make music recording so the best way is to install Ardour (best multitrack recorder for Linux) , Jack audio server(jackd) will be installed as dependency (say "yes" when asking about realtime privileges, reboot) .

Install also qjackctl , launch it , click "settings" button, then click ">" near "interface box" to select "usb_stream" (which is created by .asoundrc). In the same way select also "input " and "output" device.

Then launch Ardour, create project, and test recording: usually Ardour connect automatically tracks as needed.
On a track , press shift+e to get a mixer strip for setting track connections and level

You can look this thread : Digitech USB multi-effect with Jack for some tips (in case you have too much delay or to much xruns (clicks) , or problem with non-jack compatible software)

The best info for Ardour recording is there: Ardour manual

Answer 4

Tried once more with audiojack but this is what I get:

Mon Oct 6 21:59:17 2014: Starting jack server... Mon Oct 6 21:59:17 2014: JACK server starting in realtime mode with priority 10 Mon Oct 6 21:59:18 2014: ERROR: cannot register object path "/org/freedesktop > /ReserveDevice1/Audio1": A handler is already registered for /org/freedesktop/ReserveDevice1/Audio1 Mon Oct 6 21:59:18 2014: ERROR: Failed to acquire device name : Audio1 error : A handler is already registered for /org/freedesktop/ReserveDevice1/Audio1 Mon Oct 6 21:59:18 2014: ERROR: Audio device usb_stream:1 cannot be acquired... Mon Oct 6 21:59:18 2014: ERROR: Cannot initialize driver Mon Oct 6 21:59:18 2014: ERROR: JackServer::Open failed with -1 Mon Oct 6 21:59:18 2014: ERROR: Failed to open server Mon Oct 6 21:59:19 2014: Saving settings to "/home/david/.config/jack/conf.xml" ... 21:59:21.155 Could not connect to JACK server as client. - Overall operation failed. - Unable to connect to server. Please check the messages window for more info. Cannot connect to server socket err = No such file or directory Cannot connect to server request channel jack server is not running or cannot be started