Software mixing for sound?

[silverpig]

First I have a hackintosh so this may not even be possible.

I've got an EP45-DS3L that uses the ALC888 codec I believe. I have digital out working great with one minor exception. Controlling the volume is not so consistent.

I know that's how digital works, but I also know that you can control the volume via software mixing. For example, when I play music, I can tell iTunes to turn the volume down and it does. When watching youtube, I can turn the youtube volume down and it goes down. This is fine.

However, there is no system-wide volume control. This normally wouldn't be too much of an issue as I generally only listen to one thing at a time, but when the sound has no volume control itself (some stupid website etc) then I can't really do much about it. I have the sound going over to a home theater amp so getting up to manually control the volume knob is not an ideal situation.

So what doesn't work exactly? Well my keyboard's volume controls don't do anything. My ipod running snatch to control plex as a remote doesn't have any volume changing ability. Really those are the two most important volume controls and I'd like for them to work.

So is there some way to get software mixing so I can control the volume with my ipod or keyboard?

 

[biggestmuff]

I've only had my Mac for a few months, but don't you have a system volume control in the upper right-hand corner of your screen?

 

[Kmax82]

Yea, even when I was using the onboard audio on my P35 board, I had a volume control in the top right menu bar. Have you checked System Preferences/Sound to make sure:

1) Show volume in Menu bar is checked.
2) Does the output volume control in this pref pane work?

 

[silverpig]

Originally posted by: biggestmuff
I've only had my Mac for a few months, but don't you have a system volume control in the upper right-hand corner of your screen?

Yes, but it's stuck at the top. 100% volume and I can't change it.

Kmax:

1. I've got that volume control already
2. Nope. It's stuck at 100% too. This is a digital out thing. If I switch to an analog output I can change the volume, but I'm not hooked up to any speakers via analog.

My pref pane looks like this:

Sound Effects [Output] Input
Choose a device for sound output

Internal Speakers - Built-in Speaker
Headphones - Built-in Headphones
Line Out - Built-in Line Output
Digital Out - Built-in Digital Output

Settings for the selected device:

The selected device has no output controls

?

Output volume: |------------------------V| []Mute (unchecked)
[v] Show volume in menu bar (checked)

 

[Kmax82]

Oh, I bet that's the issue. I've never tried to use the digital out on my board. Sorry..