[Discuss] Digital tone generator.

[pw]

chris wakefield wrote:
> On Friday 23 March 2007 06:56, pw wrote:
>> chris wakefield wrote:
>>> Evening all.
>>>
>>> I'm trying to find a current name for an application that will generate
>>> simple musical tones.  I'm a singer, and I'd like to hear a "A" every
>>> once and a while.  I would call it a:  "Sound or tone generator"
>>>
>>> I don't want to have to load a file of any sort, or learn another
>>> *undocumented* command line option <hours on Google>
>>>
>>> I'm finding that there are many applications out there in Debian land,
>>> for example, that have the word "Sound" in them, and it's a vast list.
>>>
>>> I would like to simply click a button, or just:
>>> ~$binary --pitch A --duration 10
>>>
>>> Does anyone know of such a program, or even a source compileable on
>>> X86_64?
>>>
>>> Thanks,
>>> Chris W.
>> Audacity will allow you to do that.
>> You could just make an mp3 file with a tuning tone.
>> It's an Xwindows program.
>>
>> Peter
> Hi Peter.
> 
> Thanks for the suggestion.
> 
> For some reason the audacity.deb won't see my soundcard, so I compiled from 
> source;  this version sees my card but won't play the generated tones.  I get 
> clicks & pops when I try to play stuff. 
> NOW, I think its my deb kernel 2.6.20-1 (kbuild) timer frequency which is set 
> at 250 htz.   I think this, because rosegarden complains about the timer 
> frequency being to low.
> I would like to re-set the kernel timer frequency to the max - 1000 htz, but I 
> need the boot - timer frequency boot parameter.
> 
> I would like to re-compile a kernel, but the latest kernels don't support my 
> new Mboard (m2npv-vm).  This is why I'm running a kbuild kernel.
> 
> Is anyone familiar with a way of changing the kernel timer frequency via boot 
> or a system call?
> 
> Thanks to all offering help on this.
> Chris W.
> 


Hello,

The reason I suggested audacity is you can make an MP3 of the 440 tone 
you want. Your sound card doesn't need to work. Just generate a 2 minute
440 tone and save it to MP3 format.

With the MP3 you can use any player or put the tone on your
ipod/portable if you have one. It makes tuning a bit more portable than
taking the whole computer along.

You can also plug/patch your MP3 player into the audio LINE IN on your 
sound card and use it independently of your sampling/midi stuff.

I put a 30 second 440 tone MP3 up for download at:

http://www3.telus.net/amphora/music/440.mp3

Let me know if you need a longer one or a different octave.
Incidentally, due to the 60 hz line frequency in North America
you can also accurately tune to the hum of any old refrigerator.
Most fridge pumps run at 120 or 220. And it's really accurate too.


Peter