NAME

       alsamixer - soundcard mixer for ALSA soundcard driver, with ncurses interface

SYNOPSIS

       alsamixer [options]

DESCRIPTION

       alsamixer  is  an  ncurses  mixer  program  for use with the ALSA soundcard drivers. It supports multiple
       soundcards with multiple devices.

OPTIONS

       -h, --help
              Help: show available flags.

       -c, --card <card number or identification>
              Select the soundcard to use, if you have more than one. Cards are numbered from 0 (the default).

       -D, --device <device identification>
              Select the mixer device to control.

       -V, --view <mode>
              Select the starting view mode, either playback, capture or all.

       -B, --black-background
              Use the black background color.

       -g, --no-color
              Toggle the using of colors.

MIXER VIEWS

       The top-left corner of alsamixer shows some basic information: the card name, the mixer  chip  name,  the
       current  view  mode and the currently selected mixer item.  When the mixer item is switched off, [Off] is
       displayed in its name.

       Volume bars are located below the basic information area.  You can scroll left/right  when  all  controls
       can't  be put in a single screen.  The name of each control is shown in the bottom below the volume bars.
       The currently selected item is drawn in red and/or emphasized.

       Each mixer control with volume capability shows a box and the current volume filled  in  that  box.   The
       volume  percentages  are displayed below the volume bar for left and right channels.  For a mono control,
       only one value is shown there.

       When a mixer control is turned off, M (mute) appears below the volume bar.  When it's  turned  on,  O  in
       green appears instead.  You can toggle the switch via m key.

       When  a  mixer  control has capture capability, the capture flag appears below the volume bar, too.  When
       the capture is turned off, ------- is shown.  CAPTURE in red appears when the capture  switch  is  turned
       on.   In  addition,  L  and  R  letters appear in left and right side to indicate that left and the right
       channels are turned on.

       Some controls have the enumeration list, and don't show boxes but only texts which indicate the currently
       active item.  You can change the item via up/down keys.

VIEW MODES

       alsamixer  has  three  view  modes:  playback,  capture and all.  In the playback view, only the controls
       related with playback are shown.  Similarly, only the controls for capture (recording) are shown  in  the
       capture  view.  The all view mode shows all controls.  The current view mode is displayed in the top-left
       position together with the mixer name, etc.

       The default view mode is the playback view.  You can change it via -V option.

       Each view mode can be switched via keyboard commands, too.  See the next section.

KEYBOARD COMMANDS

       alsamixer recognizes the following keyboard commands to control the soundcard.  Commands  shown  here  in
       upper case can also be given in lower case.  To be reminded of these keystrokes, hit the h key.

   General Controls
       The  Left  and  right  arrow  keys are used to select the channel (or device, depending on your preferred
       terminology). You can also use n ("next") and p ("previous").

       The Up and Down Arrows control the volume for the currently selected device. You can also use + or -  for
       the  same  purpose. Both the left and right signals are affected. For independent left and right control,
       see below.

       The B or = key adjusts the balance of volumes on left and right channels.

       M toggles muting for the current channel (both left and right).  If the hardware  supports  it,  you  can
       mute left and right independently by using , (or <) and . (or >) respectively.

       SPACE  enables recording for the current channel. If any other channels have recording enabled, they will
       have their recording function disabled first. This only works for valid input channels, of course.

       L re-draws the screen.

   View Mode Controls
       Function keys are used to change view modes.  You can switch to the help mode and the proc info mode  via
       F1  and  F2  keys,  respectively.  On terminals that can't use function keys like gnome-terminal, ? and /
       keys can be used alternatively for help and proc modes.

       F3, F4 and F5 keys are used to switch to playback, capture and all  view  mode,  respectively.   TAB  key
       toggles the current view mode circularly.

   Quick Volume Changes
       PageUp increases volume by 5.

       PageDown decreases volume by 5.

       End sets volume to 0.

       You can also control left & right levels for the current channel independently, as follows:

       [Q | W | E ]  -- turn UP [ left | both | right ]

       [Z | X | C ] -- turn DOWN [ left | both | right ]

       If  the  currently selected mixer channel is not a stereo channel, then all UP keys will work like W, and
       all DOWN keys will work like X.

       The number keys from 0 to 9 are to change the absolute volume quickly.   They  correspond  to  0  to  90%
       volume.

   Selecting the Sound Card
       You can select another sound card by pressing the F6 or S keys.  This will show a list of available sound
       cards to choose from, and an entry to enter the mixer device name by hand.

   Exiting
       Quit the program with ALT Q, or by hitting ESC.  Please note that you might need to hit ESC twice on some
       terminals since it's regarded as a prefix key.

VOLUME MAPPING

       In  alsamixer,  the  volume  is  mapped  to a value that is more natural for a human ear.  The mapping is
       designed so that the position in the interval is proportional to the volume as a human ear would perceive
       it,  i.e. the position is the cubic root of the linear sample multiplication factor.  For controls with a
       small range (24 dB or less), the mapping is linear in the dB values so that each step has the  same  size
       visually.

       Only for controls without dB information, a linear mapping of the hardware volume register values is used
       (this is the same algorithm as used in the old alsamixer).

FILES

       Configuration is read from the following files:

       $XDG_CONFIG_HOME/alsamixer.rc

       $HOME/.config/alsamixer.rc

CONFIGURATION

       Comments start with '#'.

       color element foreground background [attribute...]

              Valid values for foreground and background are: red, green, yellow, blue,  magenta,  cyan,  white,
              black, none / default.

              Valid values for attribute are: bold, normal, reverse, underline, dim, italic, blink.

              See section THEME ELEMENTS for a list of elements.

       set option value

              mouse_wheel_step <N>

              Set the mouse wheel step to <N>

              mouse_wheel_focuses_control 0|1

              If enabled (1), mixer controls can be changed by hovering over them and scrolling the mouse wheel.

              background color

              Set the default background color

       bind key_definition command

              A key_definition may be:
                 - a single character
                 - a combination with control: C-a
                 - a combination with alt: M-a
                 -  a  special  keyname:  Enter,  Escape,  PageUp,  PageDown,  Left, Down, Right, Up, Home, End,
              Backspace, F1 .. F12

              See section COMMANDS for a list of commands.

   COMMANDS
       textbox_close
              Close textbox

       textbox_up / textbox_down
              Scroll text up/down by one line

       textbox_left / textbox_right
              Scroll text left/right by one column

       textbox_page_up / textbox_page_down
              Scroll text up/down one page

       textbox_page_left / textbox_page_right
              Scroll text left/right one page

       textbox_top / textbox_bottom
              Go to top/bottom position of text

       mixer_balance_volumes
              Balance both channels

       mixer_close
              Close alsamixer application

       mixer_help
              Show help

       mixer_mode_playback
              Show playback controls

       mixer_mode_capture
              Show capture controls

       mixer_mode_all
              Show playback and capture controls

       mixer_mode_toggle
              Toggle between playback/capture/all controls

       mixer_refresh
              Refresh screen

       mixer_previous / mixer_next
              Select previous/next mixer control

       mixer_control_focus_<N>
              Focus control number <N>.

       mixer_control_set_<N>[_left|_right]
              Change volume of current control to <N> percent.

       mixer_control_up_<N>[_left|_right]
              Increase volume of current control by <N> percent.

       mixer_control_down_<N>[_left|_right]
              Decrease volume of current control by <N> percent.

       mixer_toggle_mute[_left|_right]
              Toggle mute state of both/left/right channels

       mixer_toggle_capture[_left|_right]
              Toggle capture state of both/left/right channels

       mixer_select_card
              Show window for selecting sound card

       mixer_system_information
              Show system information

   THEME ELEMENTS
       mixer_frame Color of the box around the mixer

       mixer_text Color of text at the top of the mixer

       mixer_active Color of AlsaMixer heading

       ctl_frame Color of the frame around the mixer controls

       ctl_mute Color indicating the mute state (MM)

       ctl_nomute Color indicating the unmute state (00)

       ctl_capture Color of CAPTURE text

       ctl_nocapture Colof of disabled capture label

       ctl_label Color of label underneath mixer controls

       ctl_label_focus Color of label underneath focused mixer control

       ctl_mark_focus Color of <> marks beside focused mixer label

       ctl_bar_lo Color of lower volume bar

       ctl_bar_mi Color of middle volume bar

       ctl_bar_hi Color of top volume bar

       ctl_inactive Color for inactive control

       ctl_label_inactive Color for inactive label

       errormsg Color used for error message

       infomsg Color used for information message

       textbox Color used for textbox (user input)

       textfield Color used for textbox

       menu Color used for menu

       menu_selected Color used for selected entry in menu

SEE ALSO

        amixer(1), aplay(1), arecord(1)

AUTHOR

       alsamixer has been written by Tim Janik and been further improved by Jaroslav Kysela <perex@perex.cz> and
       Clemens Ladisch <clemens@ladisch.de>.

       This manual page was provided by Paul Winkler <zarmzarm@erols.com>.

                                                   22 May 2009                                      ALSAMIXER(1)