Sticky system settings

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cardioid
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Sticky system settings

Post by cardioid »

Hi guys,

I wonder why my MiniMac does not remember the system settings after a restart. Specifically, I'd like to turn down the system beep volume and it always comes back up full blast. The same goes for other settings, although they don't bother me so much.

Thanks,
cardioid
MacPro with OSX 10.6.8, Mini vMac 3.2.3 with 6.0.7
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gryphel
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Re: Sticky system settings

Post by gryphel »

cardioid wrote:I wonder why my MiniMac does not remember the system settings after a restart. Specifically, I'd like to turn down the system beep volume and it always comes back up full blast. The same goes for other settings, although they don't bother me so much.
From the FAQ:

"A real Macintosh has a small amount of memory that is preserved when the computer is turned off. This memory, the PRAM, is used to hold settings such as sound volume, start-up system drive, and printer connection.

vMac saves this information to a file upon quit, and loads this file on launch. Very early versions of Mini vMac also did this, until one day Mini vMac stopped working for me. I eventually realized that it was because the saved PRAM was corrupted. (This was a problem on real Macs too.) To prevent support headaches, I stopped saving the PRAM state.

If you compile your own version of Mini vMac, you can change the initial settings of the PRAM in the source code. A possible future feature for the Mini vMac build system is to make this easier, by providing build options for the more useful PRAM settings."

I recent added the first such build option, Caret Blink Time, after it was requested. I should do the same for sound volume.

But one thing to be aware of is that choosing sound volumes less than maximum will degrade the sound quality. A Mac Plus outputs 8 bit sound, and Mini vMac currently passes 8 bit sound to host operating system. So with less than maximum volume, the 256 sound levels are reduced to a smaller set of possible values. In the future I may add the option to output 16 bit sound, which can mostly avoid this problem. But generally, for best quality it is better to reduce volume at the last possible possible stage, such as if your headphones or speakers have a volume control.

By the way, there is already an option to disable sound entirely. I use this most of the time, when not running a game or something that requires sound.
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cardioid
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Re: Sticky system settings

Post by cardioid »

Thanks gryphel - I'm not concerned about audio quality. I only hear loud bongs everytime the vMac beeps. I don't have any programs running that do anything fancy. So turning the sound off altogether (with corresponding flashing menu bar) would certainly be an option. I'll look into that. Thanks for the link!

cardioid
MacPro with OSX 10.6.8, Mini vMac 3.2.3 with 6.0.7
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Ronald P. Regensburg
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Re: Sticky system settings

Post by Ronald P. Regensburg »

I simply turn down sound volume on the host machine when running Mini vMac.
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adespoton
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Re: Sticky system settings

Post by adespoton »

You could also set up Mini vMac to output its sound to SoundFlower or Jack instead of hardware out, and adjust the volume there.
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cardioid
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Re: Sticky system settings

Post by cardioid »

Ronald P. Regensburg wrote:I simply turn down sound volume on the host machine when running Mini vMac.
Nice simple workaround. But then.. how do I know when a mail comes in?? :lol:
MacPro with OSX 10.6.8, Mini vMac 3.2.3 with 6.0.7
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cardioid
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Re: Sticky system settings

Post by cardioid »

adespoton wrote:You could also set up Mini vMac to output its sound to SoundFlower or Jack instead of hardware out, and adjust the volume there.
That's a good idea too, especially since I often have SunFlower running anyway.

Thanks,
cardioid
MacPro with OSX 10.6.8, Mini vMac 3.2.3 with 6.0.7
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